Look at "blurb" in upper right!
Posted on 09/05/2002 8:47:16 AM PDT by NativeNewYorker
Garry Trudeau, creator of ''Doonesbury'', the only comic strip to
win a Pulitzer Prize, says, ''If someone isn't mad, I'm probably not
doing my job.''
His latest collection, ''Peace Out, Dawg! Tales From Ground Zero
''(Andrews McMeel, $16.95) continues his tradition of publishing an
''anti-blurb'' on the cover. ''Insults are funnier than accolades,''
he says.
The anti-blurb comes from the ''Opelika-Auburn ''(Ala.) ''News'',
which in November, after ''Doonesbury'' resumed ridiculing President
Bush, dropped the strip ''voluntarily to honor our national resolve.''
The editors, among others, were offended by a strip in which an
aide tells the president that ''the missile defense program, and
corporate tax cuts, and subsidies for the power industry, and oil
drilling in Alaska ... in fact most of the items on our political
agenda are all justified by the war against terrorism.''
''Wow ... what a coincidence,'' the president responds. ''Thanks,
evildoers!''
Trudeau, in a rare interview, says that strip prompted hundreds of
angry e-mails and letters, calling him a ''traitor'' and saying,
''There's a war on.''
He says the newspaper's reaction serves as ''a chilling reminder of
how unwelcome dissenting voices can sometimes be in a time of
crisis.''
The collection deals in part with how the original ''Doonesbury''
gang and their offspring deal with Sept. 11. Even at Walden,
''everything's changed.'' Boopsie, auditioning for a role on
''Survivor'', declares, ''I no longer care what Madonna had for
breakfast!''
B.D. is called up by the reserves to serve at Ground Zero, handling
crowd control and ''celebrity tourism.''
Mike, flying to New York to attend memorial services for a
colleague who was killed at the World Trade Center, worries about his
seatmate. He's an Arab-American Palm Pilot salesman later detained by
FBI agents who confuse Palm Pilots with airplane pilots.
Trudeau also pokes fun at Enron, Fox News, the CIA and, most of
all, a simple-minded, syntax-mangling president who's portrayed by a
cowboy hat.
Trudeau says that, even on Sept. 11, ''There was never a moment
when I doubted that I would have to write about it - and soon. In the
beginning, I was so shaken that I proceeded largely on instinct and
force of habit, hoping my experience would guide me through a very raw
and emotional time.''
But, he adds, ''It was my job. I had to continue reporting to work
like everyone else.''
''Doonesbury'', which runs in 1,400 newspapers worldwide, won't
mark the Sept. 11 anniversary, ''largely due to a failure of
imagination, not deliberate choice. I simply felt I didn't have
anything new to say.''
--
(BREAKOUT MATERIAL)
'Doonesbury' creator says humor helps us
Garry Trudeau, who has been drawing ''Doonesbury'' since 1970,
prefers to make fun of journalists (among others) than be interviewed
by them. But to mark the publication of his latest collection, ''Peace
Out, Dawg! Tales From Ground Zero'', Trudeau agreed to a rare
interview, by e-mail, with USA TODAY's Bob Minzesheimer. Some
excerpts:
Question: When was the first reference to Sept. 11 in
''Doonesbury''?
Answer:The first week of 9/11 strips were written on 9/20 and
9/21. There was in fact enough time to do some strips a week earlier,
but the event was too fresh, and I was too stunned, to find a way in.
So instead, I continued with a pre-existing story line about Mark
visiting his dying father. That particular subject had the virtue of
being somber, so at least the tone was appropriate in a way that a
week of burlesque wouldn't have been.
Q: When did you resume criticizing President Bush?
A: The middle of October (in strips that ran five weeks later). ...
My thinking was that if the White House was cynical enough to start
using the war on terrorism as pretext for advancing its entire
pre-9/11 political agenda, then the moratorium on criticism was over.
Q: Is the reader response (''Traitor!'' ''Back off!'' ''Hellooo?
We're at war!'') real? How does it compare to earlier criticism?
A: Yes, it's real, but it can't begin to compare in
vituperativeness of reader response during Vietnam.
Q: If ''Doonesbury'' had been around during WWII, would it have
been as satirical?
A: Definitely. ''Willie & Joe'' (Bill Mauldin's World War II
cartoon) was very satirical, and fortunately, his superiors understood
how valuable it was for troop morale. During the Gulf War, I wrote
about the conflict continuously for nearly a year, and even though I
didn't always depict the military in the most flattering light, the
Pentagon arranged an exhibition of my work to tour the bases in the
war theater. Some of my fiercest defenders through the years have been
in the armed services - indeed some of the most eloquent letters ever
written about the strip have appeared in military publications. Many
of them disagree with my positions but demand that I be heard. Why?
Because as a rule, members of the armed services, especially career
officers, have given a LOT of thought to what it is they're putting
their lives on the line for. They're knowledgeable and passionate
about things like the Bill of Rights and freedom of expression.
''Doonesbury'' has been in ''Stars & Stripes'' for over 30 years, and
even during the Vietnam War, the paper never dropped a strip.
Q: I assume the ''actual Bush sayings'' in the book are real, but
that he never said, ''I did not have political relations with that
man,'' referring to Enron's Ken Lay. How do readers know what's real?
A: Readers seem to understand that I'm generally making things up,
unless I signal otherwise. Sometimes it's labeled; sometimes it's just
the tone. I rarely have a problem with people thinking something
fictional is real; when I do have problems, it's usually the reverse -
some readers can't quite believe I DON'T make up some of the things
Bush really says.
Q: Which President Bush, father or son, is the easier target?
A: Well, Bush ''pere'' was more fun because he would fight back - a
huge mistake, because it gives the cartoonist a whole lot more
standing than he would normally have. His son also took a few shots at
me in the early years, but among the hundreds of lessons he drew from
his father's misfortune was not to give criticism traction or
legitimacy by seeming to react to it. As to which Bush is easier to
write about, hard to say.
Q: After Sept. 11, was news of the death of irony premature?
A: You might say that. All the talk shows were back in business
after a week or so, and their magnificently scornful tone had been
fully restored by the end of the month. The obit writers forgot that
people actually need irony and the release it affords precisely
BECAUSE life is a bitch. In the shadow of great sorrow, sometimes
laughter is the only thing between people and utter despair.
Look at "blurb" in upper right!
Not true. Berke Brethed won a Pulitzer for Bloom County. It upset a lot of political cartoonists as well - particularly Pat Oliphant.
Trudeau's dot.com series over the late 90's was hilarious.
He won his Pulitzer in 1987, btw, Trudeau his in 1975.
I certainly think Bloom County lost something toward the end. And I never warmed to Outland. But when Bloom County was good, it was among the best ever. I think Berke writes children's books now.
Unlike a lot of conservatives, I think Trudeau is very talented and his strips are frequently funny. However, he's a leftist animal who can never bring himself to criticize the left as harshly as he does the right. He has had moments of embarrassing political conformity and naivety when pretending to "satirize" the left.
Ironic, what I find more chilling is that this socialist shill is willing to endorse arab-backed terror because it provides an opportunity to advance his propagand against capitalism and democracies. The social and political commentary contained in his Doonesbury strip masquerades as inteligent "dissent", but when confronted with the facts of current events Trudeau's positions and assumptions are exposed as hackneyed liberal fantasies promoting his agenda above truth.
Is this bastard implying that he has anything resembling a conscience or sense of morality?
I have a copy of HST's book. Picked it up at a garage sale for 25 cents. I think it held its value pretty well, considering. My favorite Doonsesbury cartoons are the ones making fun of Alzheimer's disease. They're a hoot.
;)
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