Tuesday Spill: Three Cartoon Collections I Never Heard Of…Til Now

Three Cartoon Collections I Never Heard Of..Til Now

I know there are many stray cartoon collections out there I’ve never heard of — even after years and years of making it my business to know about such things. It’s always fun when one turns up. Today I became aware of three — highly unusual! Stranger still: they’re all linked together by one New Yorker cartoonist: Joseph Farris.

First up is a 1979 collection, with the not so easy-on-the-ears title, Pilgrim’s Regress. Not only hadn’t I heard of this collection, I also hadn’t heard of the The Critic, the publication the cartoons appeared in. I’m showing the back cover because it features photographs of all the cartoonists, save Sid Harris, who elected (I suppose) to be represented by a self portrait (there’s a photo of a young Mr. Harris at the bottom of this post). Of the five contributing cartoonists, only Joe Farris and Sid Harris were published in the New Yorker. I really like Farris’s exclamation point cartoon on the cover. Sid Harris’s Void Ten Commandments drawing remains timely.

The other two collections — both by Farris, are a strange duo. Not the content (which I haven’t seen) as much as the covers. They’re A Very Successful Family” seems in the school of Charles Saxon, the King of Upscale Suburban cartoons (the book’s subtitle, Upscaling it in Suburbia gives it away). The other collection, 1977’s Phobias & Therapies, has a wild cover that I find somewhat Ed Steedish (drawn before Mr. Steed was born). If I came across any of these titles in a used bookstore or library sale, I’d snatch them up.

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Joseph Farris Born May 30, 1924, Newark, NJ. Died January 28, 2015, Bethel, Connecticut. New Yorker work: 1956 – 2010. Collections include: Just A Cog In The Wheel ( Bob Adams, Inc., 1989). Special mention: Mr. Farris’s memoir, A Soldier’s Sketchbook (National Geographic, 2012)

Sidney Harris Born, May 8, 1933. New Yorker work: May 6, 1961– . Harris is well known for his science themed cartoons, of which there are numerous collections. His website: sciencecartoonsplus.com