AFRICAN KINGS

Modern Africa is a continent of contrasts. You have to wonder if these are genuine primitive tribesmen living in the outback, or if they're sophisticated city dwellers who are wearing the old-time clothes for some cultural event. 

My admiration for African art knows no bounds, partly because they realize the value of cartooning. Look at the cartoony furniture; look at the cartoony mask behind the king.

All tribes are not equally gifted in their ability to create great clothes for their king. These threads (above) just don't fit right.

The costumes here (above) look Hindu rather than African but the carvings on the throne look African. I include it because it's a reminder that one function of a king is to administer justice. In some cultures only royalty are fit to preside over courts because only they are presumed to have no personal stake in the disputes they judge.

Framed pictures like this one would be a great gift to give to a lawyer. The engine of impartial justice takes many forms. All over the world people crave it, and will make great sacrifices for it.

Probably the king doesn't live in this (above) room. I imagine it's a sacred space where the tribe's totem images are kept. On the other hand, maybe he does live here. I'll assume that this isn't what you'd call a wealthy tribe.

Some tribes are luckier. They're rolling in dough. They can afford to put up their monarch in a sumptuous modern palace like this one (above).

That's all I have to say about kings, but maybe there's space enough to describe a village in Mali (above) that I just discovered. It appears that the village is overpopulated and the people have to live shoulder to shoulder in the confines of a small space.

Talk about crowding...if you sneeze, the next man's toupee falls off. 

The odd thing is that there appears to be plenty of space (above) just outside the perimeter. There must be a reason for the crowding but I can't imagine what it is.

LEVINE AND KURTZMAN'S "CHRISTMAS CAROL"

Here's a novelty that I didn't know existed before: a "Christmas Carol" parody written by Harvey Kurtzman and drawn by caricaturist David Levine. It appeared in Esquire sometime in the early sixties.

It's not Levine's best work, and Kurtzman's seen better days but, c'mon, any collaboration by talents like these demands a viewing. BTW, click to enlarge.

It's eerie to see Levine doing comics. Lots of famous illustrators came to grief in the comics medium. Evidently sequential storytelling requires a knack that's rarer than commonly supposed.

Then again, you could argue that this is a parody of comics in general as well as of the Christmas Carol in particular. It probably looked a lot better on slick magazine paper than on the net, and it probably made a nice visual counterpoint to the photography in the rest of the magazine.

I'm amazed at how well the formal, standard-font lettering works in the word balloons, and how the borderless panels fit Levine's style so well. Elder did borderless panels for Humbug and the same technique didn't work for him.

HANSEL AND GRETEL

Yikes! I thought I'd Photoshop myself into some Wally Wood artwork, but the result was so unfunny that I think I'll end this experiment here, after doing only one panel. Stupid me for thinking I could compete with Wood. I'll put up the rest of this in a few days.

BTW....Don't you hate trying to draw with a mouse!???

GENERATIONAL STORIES

Every generation needs a new story, a new narrative, a new sense of history. That's what  gives the new guys the confidence to go out into the world and challenge the old bulls. I've witnessed several new stories in my lifetime and all of them are nothing less than fascinating. I thought it might be fun to tell some of them here. I'll start with the story my Dad's generation, i.e. the 40s - 50s generation, made for themselves.

My Dad's generation developed the story that my Granddad's generation were nice people but they were also stupid and uneducated farmers who were intellectually unfit for the modern world. If you saw the movie "The Caine Mutiny" you got a taste of that. 50s man believed he was suave and sophisticated and adaptable in a way that no previous generation was.

My generation, I'm embarrassed to say, was the Hippie Generation. For them the previous lot was racist, sexist, jingoistic, constipated, and emotionally disturbed. We, on the other hand, We perceived ourselves as....Ahem!....svelte, gentle, artistic, intuitive, idealistic, and (unfortunately) too hip for manual labor.

My generation was replaced by the Punks who thought that we hippies lacked manliness and were pampered and worthless. Their story cast them as refreshingly authentic and righteously angry that they were stuck in lower class Hell. A typical Punk dinner might be hot dogs with a side order of Cheese Puffs washed down with diet soda or bourbon.

Coinciding with the punks were the Yuppies who re-invented the mainstream. They had disdain for the excesses of the Hippies and Punks though they secretly envied their purity. Yuppies had a story that cast them as futuristic warriors like Luke Skywalker. They would end poverty and bring about universal peace by being Fabian Socialists working within the system and yes, making a buck or two.

The Punks and Yuppies were replaced with a grunge movement that tried to unite the two warring camps but failed. They morphed into the Emos and Hipsters, which is sort of what's around now, but is slowly winding down. Emos combine Anime, Punk, and gay culture influences. Their story is that they're the most aesthetic generation ever, and the most imaginative. I doubt that, but who am I to question?

Last but not least, comes the very latest wave...the Computer Geeks. They might look like Grungers or Hipsters or Yuppies but what they have in common is their total dedication to the computer. They have disdain for Gen X'ers who were merely part-time computer users who got side-tracked into diversions like video games.

Geeks believe that Gen X'ers never understood the mystery, the power, the cult of the computer. The Geeks story is that they are first true human beings. They are the old- world destroying infant that appears at the end of the movie, "2001." They're mad because the rest of us are still are still drawing breath. They believe that new computer programs should be as hard to use as possible because that will cull out the inferiors from the true humans.

Me, I'm a product of most of the movements that occurred in my lifetime. Maybe most people are. I'm both an anti-communist Cold Warrior, and a mellow hippie. I have a taste for the Punk, in-your-face shock ethos, and I like a good suit and a fresh salad just like the Yuppies. I like my video games and I like my computer. I'm not aware that I have any Emo influences, so maybe that's the exception. I have additional bookish influences too, but that's a subject for another blog.

Fascinating, huh?

REVIEW OF "SICK LITTLE MONKEYS"

If this were an Amazon review I have no idea how I'd rate this book. On the positive side it reads well, and it's nice to be get an overview of the events. On the negative side the book gives far, far, far too much weight to John K's detractors and doesn't answer the question, what were the innovations that Spumco was famous for, and how did they come about? It's hard to resist the conclusion that these were inadequately covered because an honest assessment would have made John look good, something the book is determined not to do.

The book does do a good job at describing TV animation before John. The industry was so corrupt, so lacking in even the attempt at any real artistic expression, that it was teetering on the edge of collapse. People tried to change it, but the obstacles were daunting. The industry had an enormous financial stake in staying exactly how backward it was, and a lot of animation artists had been so corrupted that they couldn't even conceive of anything better. I would add that only someone as combative, as driven and as stubbornly idealistic as John could have broken through the barriers and made the changes that we all benefit from today.

It's easy for the author sitting in his living room in suburbia, with a well-stocked refrigerator and a nice DVD collection to criticize John, who was fighting for his life in an unprecedented environment and had to improvise every detail of what he did during the day. John had to run an unconventional studio full of rebellious artists and simultaneously be a world-changing wunderkind. How many people could have done that? Not me. I'd have had a nervous breakdown. Did John insult people unfairly? Did he contradict himself? Did he sometimes do things that were in bad taste? Probably. Does it matter?

But ingratitude is the modern disease, isn't it? Moderns are skeptical, always looking for the tabloid dark side. If Louis Pasteur made his discoveries today we'd be regaled with stories about how the bum treated his lab assistants. Look at the way Thomas Jefferson is treated in books now. Geez, moderns are so self-righteous, so easily offended, so quick to condemn.

I'm not finished the book yet but I peeked ahead to the end which, if I'm not mistaken,  seems to say John created only one good cartoon in the post Nickelodeon years, "Ren Seeks Help." Maybe I didn't read it right, but if I did then that's ridiculous. Examples to the contrary are abundant. The cartoon that preceded it, "Naked Beach Frenzy," was hilarious. Watch it from end to end and see if you agree. I think the last 2/3 of that cartoon was the funniest short any animation studio turned out in 40 years. John is still wildly creative. Talk to him for just an hour and you'll walk away with your head in the clouds, full of thoughts of new possibilities and new directions.

RELAPSE!

I can't believe it! I got a relapse of my flu, and I'm flat on my back in bed again! Sorry about that. I'll be back tomorrow or the next day!

PARAKEET DETECTIVE

"It was a cheap frowzy cage in a cheap, frowzy living room in Cincinnati. Empty husks of birdseed lay in a pile on the floor under the cage, awaiting a clean-up that would never come. The room didn't seem to care. It was that kind of room. The killer was that kind of bird.

"Phillip Parakeet's the name. I'm a private detective. Decent birds scrub floors to hire me to find out why their hoodlum sons get murdered. That's what happened in this case."

"There's the kid, dead as a door nail, killed for a few seeds just like all the others. Of course he was no altar boy. He was a heavy-set, swarthy bird with a hunger to be a "big shot." As everyone knew, the most important part of his dress lay snugly under his feathers, a sharpened cuttle bone seldom seen, but when it was, sure to be felt by somebody. It's still on him.

Whoever did this was somebody he let close to him, somebody he knew, somebody he trusted. The last thing he saw was betrayal. He was a cheap seed hustler, but he deserved better than that."

"At first I thought a human did it. They're always playing tricks on their pets. They think it's funny. But...naaaaah...murder requires brains, and humans just aren't smart enough."

"I should know. I'm always looking into their eyes to see if somebody's home, but there never is."

"Then there's the dopey hamster that lives on the other side of the room. We can eliminate him as a suspect."

"His cage door's been left open for two weeks now and he still hasn't found his way out. He's lost in the tunnels of his own stupid house."

"The fish isn't very bright either."

"But who can blame him? He's been swimming in the humans' beer for months. No, he didn't do it."

"That leaves only one viable suspect, and (Sniff! Sniff!) if I'm not mistaken she's just landed on the bar behind me! Nobody but Vivian Parakeet uses that kind of heavy, sensuous perfume.

Don't get fooled by the lovely face. Her complexion is as false as her jewelry. Maybe you can't see the ravages of dissipation that lay beneath the paint and powder, the hard, cruel lines about the worldly eyes, the ruthless greed in the painted, obscenely small beak. Even so, you can't help wondering what's under those feathers."

"As you can see, the poor victim didn't stand a chance. All Vivian had to do was stand there with her lithe, slender figure, overdressed in vivid blue feathers, that were both too short and too tight. Birds with more experience would have recognized her for the false and dangerous beacon of allure that she was, but to the kid she was marvelous, something to worship and possess. It's an old story that too often ends in...

But I have more investigating to do, and I'll need privacy to do it. Er...put that cover over the cage, will you? I'll see you tomorrow!"

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!

EVENTS OF THE DAY JUST PASSED

Yikes! I'm caught short with nothing to post and it's almost bed time! Mmmmmm...how 'bout a post with nothing but the random thoughts I had during the day? It's not much but it's the best I can do.

Well...I was in a restaurant this morning and I remember being uneasy because the guy behind me was staring at the back of my head. I had the oddest feeling that he was telepathically commanding me to do something outrageous like mash my face in my potatoes. I even had a slight compulsion to do it. Geez, you set out to get some bacon and eggs and you meet Svengali!

Later in the morning I was thinking about snoods (above). Do you know what a snood is? It's a sort of bag that holds a girl's hair in the back.

Most snoods are decorated nets. Some women (above) prefer larva on their snoods.

I guess this gear made sense in the days when girls' hair grew down to their waists, but why does anyone wear them now? Short hair dangling in a snood looks like...well, something obscene. What an odd thing to put in back of your head!



I spent the afternoon housecleaning and cleaning out my car, then later I went over to John's to see a film that included John Barrymore's famous rendition of a scene from Richard III. Lots of people prefer this reading to any other.



I like Barrymore's reading, which is pieced together from different parts of the play, but I I still prefer Olivier's version (above).

So that was my uneventful day. After a week of raging flu a quiet, uneventful day was just what I needed.

CURES FOR STOMACH FLU

Here's (above) a get well postcard of the type that was all over the place when I was a kid. Now they're rare, even on Google. We need to bring these back...they made being sick look like fun...well, sort of.

Anyway, I've been sick for a whole week with a stomach flu. Every time I get something like this I learn something and this time was no exception. I thought I'd share what I learned here. After all, everybody here is going to have this problem, maybe even this Winter.

The main thing I learned was that throwing up isn't a bad thing. The sooner you do it, the sooner you'll recover. I just wasn't able. Maybe I waited too long. The next time I'll try harder and sooner.

The second thing I learned was that relapses are easy with this disease. I was almost well when I got cocky and ate a ham sandwich, and it started all over again. Eat only bland food for a longer period than you think is necessary.

The third thing I learned was that salt is a good thing under these circumstances. If you eat chicken broth or bland white crackers get the salty kind. Applesauce is great, but not apple juice, it's too sweet. I read a convincing argument for why this is so, but I forget the details now. Anyway, I know I felt better after drinking plain old water or tea.

The last thing I discovered was how important sleep is when you have this flu. When I finally got a good night's sleep I felt a lot better. Take half a sleeping pill every night til you start to improve.

When I went on the net to look up stomach flu I was amazed to find that so little was written about the mechanics of it. If the water we drink when sick is mostly channeled out of the body at the bottom, then why isn't the excess acid? I guess there's some natural mechanism that prevents stomach acid from leaking into the intestine, but why can't we just drink a lot of water, eat a lot of bread, and dilute the acid? I guess it's so strong that even when diluted it won't pass the barrier. It's a fascinating subject. What an interesting job doctors have!

What I want to know now is, if throwing up early really helps...and my experience over the years tells me that it does... then why doesn't anyone recommend it? And what about antacid pills like Tums? Wouldn't they help?

There doesn't seem to be a lot of original thought on the subject of stomach flu. I wonder what would happen if Christopher Kimball, the editor of Cooks Illustrated tackled the subject. Kimball caught my eye a long time ago when he posed the question, "Why doesn't somebody try all the most popular cooking methods for a given dish and see which one actually tastes the best?" He built a whole career on that question. Maybe we need to do that for stomach flu.

Why doesn't some magazine try all the hippie teas and herbs, all the fabled remedies by remote tribesmen and cannibals, all the grandmother cures, and orthodox over-the-counter drugs, and simply compare the results? I'm not looking for a scientific study here...just a trial on a couple of dozen reliable, articulate, sick adults.

POSTSCRIPT: I'm better now and am eating real food just like real humans do. No more Saltines...I had bacon and eggs this morning and they were indescribably delicious. Now I crave really high-end food. I want a five course dinner with salmon mousse served with silver spoons from a swan centerpiece. I want servants with gloves and wigs. I want a pig with an apple in its mouth. I want to eat til I burst like Terry Jones in "Life of Brian."

DON MARTIN LOVERS

I'm sick as a dog and I really shouldn't be posting at all, but Valentine's Day is almost here and I couldn't resist putting up these pictures of young lovers by Don Martin. Yep, that's what young love looks like, alright! I've been there, haven't you? 

Haw! There's the girl's dad in the background!

If I wasn't so sick I'd scan all of Martin's strip but, as it is, I'll have to settle for this (above). That's a photo of the original artwork!

Here's a picture that was described as passionate on the net, but seems tepid compared to the Don Martin. Cartooning really can express some emotions better than any other medium!