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an existing sketchbook and published it. I’ve either done
things that feature me as a character but are light and
fluffy, with almost sitcom-like gags. Or I’ve done things
that are personal but cloaked and veiled in a million
little reflecting mirrors that I can hide behind. So, for
me, the biggest challenge of this book was getting ideas
that I had in my head and getting them down on paper.
Because all the material was very clear to me but then
almost every story I would have some moment where I’d
be like, “I don’t know if I want to tell this story. Is it right
to put this out there?”
For what reasons?
The most selfish one being that I’m a private person. In
general, I keep to myself and don’t expose myself in the
way that a lot of artists do now. That was hard for me.
Also, just taking into account other people. It would
be easy if it were just 100 pages of me sitting in a room
talking to myself. But I have to interact with other real
humans, so there was a lot of hand-wringing with my
own conscience. There are certain things that I omitted
or changed, and you’ll notice that at some moments in
the book names are scratched out. That was an edit that
was happening up to the very last minute.
For the people in your life who are portrayed in the
book, is that a conversation that needs to happen with
them? Or are you using your own judgment on what is
fair to them or not?
Well, the general rule that I set for myself is that I need to
be as open and as brutally honest as possible about myself.
As a reader, I would be really annoyed with a book
like this that felt like it was protective of the author’s ego.
Beyond that, I feel like, in general, I was pretty innocuous
in my depiction of most other people. I don’t think there’s
anybody who would get embarrassed by what I depict.
If there were any doubt on my part I would err on the
side of changing people’s appearance or crossing out
their names.
How did the story change as you were creating the book?
To me, there are a couple of stories that are told in the
background of this book. In the foreground it’s a comedy
about the mishaps of being a cartoonist. But as I was
planning it out, I realized it would be evident to some
readers that it’s about me leaving home, leaving California,
moving here and having kids, having a domestic life.
Is being an artist still a lonely endeavor for you?
There are often days where I feel like I sort of painted
myself into a corner, I’m trapped in a life I can’t stand to
live another day, and then something will come around
to change that and I’ll want nothing more than to
return to the usual routine. I didn’t want to have a story
that wrapped up with some sort of salvation or something
An excerpt from "The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Cartoonist."
like that. When I posed the topic of this book
to myself, and tried to explore it mentally, I just kept
coming up with very mixed emotions. And I thought,
“Well, actually, that’s probably the most honest way to
write about it.”
Those mixed emotions are something I imagine most
creative people will find relatable.
I don’t know if this is true of younger cartoonists,
because the field has changed so much since when I
started, but I know for me and my peers and maybe the
artists who were inspirational to us, loneliness is just
a huge through line through cartooning and the lives
of cartoonists, whether you’re looking at someone like
Charles Schultz, probably the most successful, most