New Yorker, New Yorker, it’s a wonderful ‘toon
November 27, 2021 in Comment, General
‘I can explain the meaning of life, but not the meaning of New Yorker cartoons.’
Cartoon © Nick Newman
Why do cartoonists struggle to break America?
by Nick Newman and courtesy of The Spectator.
Cartoons are like gossamer and one doesn’t dissect gossamer.’ So says Mr Elinoff, the fictional cartoon editor of the New Yorkerin an episode of Seinfeld, when trying to explain a cartoon to Elaine. Elaine isn’t satisfied. Mr Elinoff suggests the cartoon is a commentary on contemporary mores, a slice of life or even a pun. ‘You have no idea what this means do you?’ says Elaine. ‘No,’ he concedes.
The scene sums up the problem of understanding the New Yorker’s sometimes oblique sense of humour — and may come as a relief to the many British cartoonists who have tried and failed to break into the Big Apple’s literary bastion. It’s reassuring to think that even Americans as funny as Seinfeld can be baffled by New Yorkerjokes. Yet still the mystique survives, and most British cartoonists have had a stab at getting into the magazine, lured by its great cartoon history (James Thurber, Saul Steinberg, Charles Addams) and the money: it pays more than ten times as much for a cartoon than UK magazines.
Former (real) cartoon editor Bob Mankoff said in a Ted Talk: ‘The New Yorker occupies a very different space. It’s a space that is playful in its own way, and also purposeful, and in that space, the cartoons are different… New Yorker humour is self-reflective.’ Elsewhere, he recalled that when he was finally rewarded with a contract in 1980, the contract referred not to cartoons but to ‘idea drawings’, what Mankoff calls the ‘sine qua non ofNew Yorkercartoons’: a drawing that requires both cartoonist and reader to think. Indeed, there is Sam Gross cartoon of a landscape with a large sign reading ‘STOP AND THINK’ and a man saying: ‘It sort of makes you stop and think, doesn’t it?’
So New Yorker gags are more philosophical than their British counterparts. Here, virtually anything goes — sick jokes, coarse jokes, badly drawn jokes, puns. The New Yorkerhas a metropolitan disdain for crudity and eschews wordplay. We reckon that if bawdy humour and puns were good enough for Shakespeare, they’re good enough for us.
New Yorker cartoons also tend to be more lifestyle-oriented, and inhabit a more whimsical world of middle-class social gatherings, boardrooms, domestic relationships and navel-gazing neuroses. Some recent ones look like architectural drawings, whereas British cartoons tend to inhabit a more traditional cartoon landscape: big noses, goofy expressions, surreal situations.
Humour is, of course, a serious business, and from the outset nobody took it more seriously than the New Yorker. Its legendary founding editor Harold Ross was obsessed with perfection and detail. Thurber recounted how Ross studied a cartoon of a Model T Ford on a dusty road and demanded ‘Better dust!’ He would also scan for hidden phallic symbols and sent a photographer to the UN building to check whether a drawing of its windows was accurate. Cartoons that fell below his standards would receive a ‘Get it out of here!’
Cartoon by © The Surreal McCoy/ New Yorker
Today, aspiring New Yorker cartoonists just have to endure months of silence once their ideas are submitted. Success is greeted with a restrained ‘Okay’ from cartoon editor Emma Allen. Two British cartoonists who have enjoyed such success — following on the heels of a few UK predecessors such as Ronald Searle, H.M. Bateman, and Heath Robinson — are Will McPhail and Carol Isaacs (who draws under the pseudonym The Surreal McCoy). Both are adamant that the work they submit for the New Yorker is essentially no different from that published in British magazines.
‘My approach is more or less the same for both sides of the pond,’ says Isaacs. ‘Maybe tweaking the grammar and spelling for the Americans. I love Seinfeldand the Marx Brothers as much as I love Spike Milligan and Fawlty Towers. As they say over there, go figure.’
Cartoon by © The Surreal McCoy/ New Yorker
McPhail thinks the recent trend towards more absurd and bizarre cartoons in the magazine have helped his cause. ‘Those are the cartoons that genuinely make me laugh, the ones where I don’t know why it’s funny. I’ve always seen a lot of the humour in British cartoons like maths equations. They’re perfectly balanced and everything that is set up at the start of the equation works out correctly by the end. But I like cartoons where you can’t see “the strings”, if that makes sense.’
Is familiarity with New York essential to inhabiting the New Yorker mindset? Isaacs thinks not. ‘After all,’ she says, ‘there are many New Yorker cartoonists who’ve never set foot in New York. Their sense of humour is perhaps more about the absurd than anything else — and that knows no borders.’
McPhail confesses that he used to make pilgrimages to the New Yorker offices just to submit in person to Bob Mankoff. ‘I of course pretended that I just happened to be in New York at the time. So I do think there’s a certain amount of them needing to know you’re serious about it before they publish you, like “Wow, he’s come all the way here to get rejected in person!”’
Each week thousands of submissions are boiled down to some 50 acceptances. The closest I’ve come to making the grade is when I saw a cartoon identical to one I once drew for Private Eye(of a drunk ventriloquist in the gutter whose dummy is vomiting) on the cover of a book entitled The Rejection Collection: Cartoons You Never Saw, and Never Will See, in the New Yorker.
This article first appeared in the 20 November 2021 issue of The Spectator
Latest Blog
by Glenn Marshall
The PCO Cartoon Review of the Year 2021
January 3, 2022 in Comment, General
Cartoon by © Brian Adcock
To quote the great Benny Andersson ‘Mamma mia, here we go again’ with another PCO members ‘Cartoon Review of The Year’. For the most part it’s been another %¢º€@$ one (Google Translate it) but once more cartoonists injected some humour into it….apart from the odd cartoonist injecting humour refusenik.
The above transitional cartoon by Brian Adcock for The Independent.
Cartoon by © Dean Patterson
Mystic deAn did warn us what was coming in Phoenix Magazine.
Cartoon by © Len Hawkins
This Len cartoon from The Spectator sums up everyone’s coping strategy for 2021
Caricature by © Jonathan Cusick
In January Trump won the US election despite those commie Democrats who tried to rig it by getting more votes! A fine portrait of high-chair hysterics by Jonathan Cusick.
Cartoon by © Pete Dredge
Early in the year Dredge went viral in The Spectator….
Cartoon by © Clive Goddard
…and Clive Goddard addressed one of the vaxxing questions of our times.
Cartoon by © Matt Percival
A Whitty cartoon by Percival for The Spectator.
Cartoon by © Pete Songi
In March the Suez Canal got blocked (cancel culture!). This chuckle raised by Pete Songi.
Cartoon by © Zoom Rockman
Two cultural phenomenons in one in Private Eye from Zoom Rockman, featuring Rishi’s ‘Quids Game’ (see what I did there? I took the ‘s’ off the front of ‘squid’ and put it at the end so it becomes ‘quids’ which is what Rishi is in charge of! I’M A GENIUS!)
Cartoon by © Kathryn Lamb
Guerres de poissons par KJ Lamb pour Détective Privé.
Cartoon by © Ed Naylor
In June GB News launched, riddled with missus takes and on-air coke ups. A Nay cartoon broadcast by Private Eye.
Cartoon by © Henny Beaumont
A cartoon on the closing of schools by Henny Beaumont for the Guardian. In October it was voted a winner in ‘The Political Cartoon of the Year Awards 2021’. You can see Henny’s acceptance speech here.
Cartoon by © Steve Bright
In July Dominic axed his way back into the news headlines. Here’s a Shining example of the caricaturist’s art by Brighty for The Sun.
Cartoon by © Andrew Birch
Our Royal Correspondent Andrew Birch spews forth on a year long media obsession in Private Eye.
Cartoon by © Nick Newman
In travel news we had the very confusing Red, Amber, Green traffic light system…or as us artist types thought of it the Viridian Green, Cadmium Orange, Vermillion Crimson traffic light system. This long haul travel cartoon by Nick Newman was for The Sunday Times.
Cartoon by © Andrew Fraser
More (Gulliver) travel news from Drew in Private Eye.
Cartoon by © Tat Effby
In July football came home but then quickly went away again to Italy. This winner by Tat Effby.
Cartoon by © Tames Mellor
In August the new football season started and VAR was maddening crowds. A jewel from James Mellor in Private Eye.
Cartoon by © Mark Winter/Chicane
In more sports news Mark ‘Chicane’ Winter social distancing at the Olympics . Published on the cover of Il Vernerdi ‘di Repubblica (Italian news magazine, supplement of La Repubblica) to promote Michael R Payne’s Toon In Olympic book.
Cartoon by © Andy Davey
In August we had the orderly allied withdrawal from Afghanistan in scenes reminiscent of the Dad’s Army titles ‘Who Do You Think You Are Kidding Mr Taliban?’. Andy Davey records events for posterity in The Evening Standard.
Cartoon by © Wilbur Dawbarn
Wilbur on the desperate refugee channel crossings published in Private Eye.
Cartoon by © Jonesy cartoons
It seemed this summer that most of the world was aflame or flooded, this take on it by Jonesy taken from Prospect Magazine.
Cartoon by © Royston Robertson
A shortage of HGV drivers was blamed for empty shelves. My local Tesco Metro had completely run out of HGV drivers by the time I tried to buy one. A spikey cartoon by Royston from The Spectator.
Cartoon by © Grizelda
No shortage of shortage cartoons this year. Grizelda emptying shelves in New Statesman.
Cartoon by © Dave Brown
September saw Boris reshuffle his pack of jokers. Dave Brown dealt this up for The Independent.
Cartoon by © Jeremy Banks
Also in September Texas voted in new draconian anti-abortion laws. Banx on the pro-life/anti-life contradiction in his Financial Times slot. Jeremy went on to win Pocket Cartoonist of Year at the aforementioned awards for his FT work. His triumphant speech can be seen here
Cartoon by © Guy Venables
More from September where the UK was doing its bit to fight global warming by making fuel scarce. This twist on the new Bond film release by Venables, Guy Venables in his daily Metro cartoon spot.
Dog drawing by © Glenn Marshall
At the beginning of October I drew my parent’s dog Barney chewing a sock.
Cartoon by © Graeme Bandeira
In other October news we had the sewage crisis as Tory MPs voted against the Waste Prevention Bill. Here’s a very clever rendition of our leader by Graeme Bandeira for The Yorkshire Post.
Cartoon by © Sarah Boyce
At the end of October COP26 started in Glasgow and we all became environmentalists for a fortnight. Here is Sarah Boyce on fast fashion from Private Eye.
Cartoon by © Kipper Williams
In November Boris Johnson peppered his speech with porcine references at the CBI (Cured Bacon Industries?) conference. Here’s Kipper Williams’ take on it for The Spectator.
Cartoon by © The Surreal McCoy
The only bit of snow most of us saw over Christmas was provided by The Surreal McCoy in Fortean Times.
Cartoon by © Martin Rowson
In business cheese and wine news Martin Rowson served up some nibbles in The Guardian…
Cartoon by © Steve Bell
…and Steve Bell released secret footage of the Downing Street Tory parties. Watch it here.
Cartoon by © Jonathan Pugh
Pugh put out the empties in his Daily Mail pocket cartoon.
Cartoon by © Chris Williams
A Christmas card by Dink on the introduction of chimney passports.
Cartoon by © Rebecca Hendin
And finally Rebecca Hendin on Christmas regifting in The Guardian.
I’ve just noticed there are eight cartoons featuring BodgeJo and none turned up of Keir Starmer which may reflect that he didn’t turn up much as leader of the opposition – Peppa Pig has featured in our review more!
See you again next January for the Review of 2022 where no doubt we’ll be talking about the Zeta variant and looking forward to Trump being on the campaign trail for the US election 2024….UGH!
A Happy New Year from all at PCO Global Media.
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