When I was around six or seven, I was home sick from school and in an effort to make me happy, my mother gave me a pencil, a stack of paper and a book of cartoons. She knew I loved to draw, and knew this would help me get through the sick days.  The book of cartoons she gave me was called Thurber Carnival, a collection of work by the renowned New Yorker writer and cartoonist James Thurber.  His drawings are very simple, almost childlike, and I took to them immediately. I started tracing them.  Soon, I realized this made my mother smile.  I was hooked.  From there, I started to draw my own cartoon characters.  This is how I became a cartoonist.

So it is especially wonderful for me to be a finalist for the Thurber Prize this year for my book Women On Men (Narrative Library).  It is the sole award in America for written humor, and is annually given out by Thurber House (the birthplace of James Thurber and an active literary center in Ohio). Thurber was a master humorist in both the written word and the cartoon, working primarily for The New Yorker in mid-century 1900’s. Past winners have included Jon Stewart, Calvin Trillin, Christopher Buckley and David Sedaris. The other finalists that were nominated along with me are David Letterman and Bruce McCall for their book “This Land is Made For You And Me” and John Kenney for “Truth in Advertising.”    We will gather in New York City at Caroline’s Comedy Club on September 30th, where we will all do a reading and then they will announce the prize.

Ironically for me, one of the things that made some of Thurber’s cartoons so notable with the public were their misogynistic tone.  Thurber was married twice to strong women, and had a daughter, but his cartoons sometimes betray befuddlement and often hostility towards women, as did his wonderful humorous essays. Who knows if he personally was a misogynist (some say he was), or that he just used it as a comedic tool, not uncommon in the humor of his time.

 

As a child, I remember that his cartoon women perplexed me and scared the heck out of me. I thought, is this what I have to be when I grow up? A hag, an angel, a delusional waif, a love object…and nothing in between?

Maybe deep down, this is why I wrote Women On Men, a book about women relentlessly making fun of men. Lovingly. My tribute to James Thurber.