Thurber Thursday: Thurber Couldn’t Draw? Pshaw!

Thurber Couldn’t Draw? Pshaw!

Whenever James Thurber’s drawings come up in conversation (outside of this household) it almost never fails that someone will say, almost as an aside, “But of course he couldn’t draw.” For me, those have always been fightin’ words.

Thurber was fond of telling this story (you can see him telling it here at the 16:00 mark):

“Some people thought my drawings were done under water, others that they were done by moonlight. Mothers thought I was a little child or they [the drawings] were done by my granddaughter. So they sent in drawings to The New Yorker of their own childrens work, you see. I was told to write these ladies, and I would write them all the same letter: ‘Your son can certainly draw as well as I can. The only trouble is he hasn’t been through as much.'”

Thurber’s “hasn’t been through as much” is, I believe, one of the most important keys to the success of his art. Thurber is relaying, on paper, experiences lived, absorbed, and churned around in his wonderfully creative mind. I don’t care a hoot that he didn’t draw like Da Vinci. What I love (yes, love) about Thurber’s drawing style is the expression of a moment, and how it perfectly fits with the emotion of the caption.

Fourteen years ago, in a piece for The New Yorker about Thurber’s great drawing, “What have you done with Dr. Millmoss?” I wrote: “…look closely at the hippopotamus: at its eye and its eyebrow, at the curve of the mouth. What is that expression? There’s no answer. And so you look again, and again. I’ve been looking for thirty-five years.”

Well now I’ve been looking at that hippo for nearly fifty years. It has never failed to thoroughly amuse, to inspire, to puzzle over. I’m sure we all have our Millmoss hippos; great art never fails –it stays with us. If Thurber couldn’t draw, Dr. Millmoss would’ve been long forgotten, as would the Seal in the Bedroom, and the Thurber dog, as well as so many more classics.

Yes, Thurber could draw. He drew well and he drew beautifully. His work is representative of what New Yorker cartoonists reach to express: a consistent humorous voice, relayed through art of individuality and originality.

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Thurber drawings above:

The original art for “I don’t want any part of it.” published in The New Yorker November 28, 1936.

A Thurber dog used as a Spot drawing in the issue of May 29, 1943

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James Thurber Born, Columbus, Ohio, December 8, 1894. Died 1961, New York City. New Yorker work: 1927 -1961, with several pieces run posthumously. According to the New Yorker’s legendary editor, William Shawn, “In the early days, a small company of writers, artists, and editors — E.B. White, James Thurber, Peter Arno, and Katharine White among them — did more to make the magazine what it is than can be measured.”

Key cartoon collection: The Seal in the Bedroom and Other Predicaments (Harper & Bros., 1932). Key anthology (writings & drawings): The Thurber Carnival (Harper & Row, 1945). There have been a number of Thurber biographies. Burton Bernstein’s Thurber (Dodd, Mead, 1975) and Harrison Kinney’s James Thurber: His Life and Times (Henry Holt & Co., 1995) are essential. Website