Thurber Esque Esq.

Thanking / tanking with / Mr Thurber

 

There is no cartoonist I enjoy going back to quite so much as Thurber, maybe because his cartoons are not many, and the few that there are, can be relatively inscrutable, such as the one in which the boyfriend asks the girl, “What do you want to be inscrutable for, Marsha?”

 In that cartoon,all the very badly drawn furniture is outlined or filled in with black. But the truth is, women have very good reasons to try to be inscrutable; and to remain so.  And to have men remain as prosaic as possible, as we see in his other cartoons: “Yoo hoo it’s me and the Ape Man!”  These are all in The Thurber Carnival, and once appeared in TNY I think.  I would love to see all his cartoons in one book.  (Dennis?)

There is a new book of Flannery O’Connor’s linoleum-cut acidic-based cartoons for her high school and college papers.  When we visited Millidgeville one had to have special permission to view these, and we were the exception to see them even though we were not doing research. Had a nice day!

 

Thurber’s  captions come to me in odd moments, precisely as Thurber intended, for that is largely how his comic stories go—oddly.  There doesn’t seem to be  much room for this kind of gentle humor in today’s politicized world. Oddly enough.

It is also true that Mr. Thurber does not demonstrate that he gives God two thoughts in a row. Yet unlike many today, there isn’t really much of a touch of hostility towards God either.  This is a kind of Grace, I think, which used to come  very “normally” to people who, “enjoy a good laugh as much as anyone.”  Thurber was not merciless or judge-mental, as more and more of us are in USA today.  In that sense, he was a lot like Walt Kelly, who could be pretty cynical, critical, and even prophetic; but was not as harsh as is the rule today—from a more civilized day, one could say. So even his enemies had some human qualities that did not make them entirely detestable—unlike, say, “GI Joe.”

But to what do we owe such gentleness, and why is it so long gone?*

I would like to explore one possibility, triggered by the cartoon that came to mind today; in which a young woman is praying to God on her knees at bedtime-  a stock cartoon situation.  But she says, “….And Keep Me a Normal, Healthy, American Girl”  (capitalized with no period, as if it were the title of a book, I just noticed that.  Which helps us to understand that this is ironic, without the sledge hammer of insult-humor; which I would insist is not humor at all. Period!)

I wonder if Thurber knew how many layers of irony this simple-on the surface-gentle mockery of many of us, contains.  Example: What if the “prayer”—which like most of our prayers were not a petition but a demand—and went like so:

“…And Keep Me a Normal Healthy German Girl”

(And I know something about a German girl, and about being German too.)

That would be even  more startling in the 1950’s, when this cartoon hit the refined audience of NYC, “after za war.”

I think that this, while it may be a commentary on our spiritual life and our constant demands on life and/or God, is really more of a cultural commentary as such.  But perhaps Thurber did not think beyond that: to him, God appears to be irrelevant, a shadow figure at best, which people, himself included,  used on occasion when it suits them.  Even if only for comic relief; with God as the dimwitted sidekick.

Another irony is that most people are not like this girl: they don’t pray until they reach their particular foxhole, and they want to be particularly rescued. The funny-odd thing about this spoof is that it is a horrible example of what I would call, “Preventive Prayer.”  Except that this does not say, “Forgive me Father for I know not what I do”—a point of fact about all of us if there is any true fact on earth.  Her prayer is really saying is what folks generally say when one brings up God; “I’m good, thanks.”  In stark contrast to Jesus’ Socrates- style reply, “Why do you call Me good?”

The heart of the matter  is the girl’s de facto demand,

“Don’t change me.”

Give me my culture, or give me death.

 

Is’t  not so: that most of us are de facto materialists; and that what we are hoping for is not salvation or heaven but complete annihilation? A complete end to all our seemingly, and possibly  really,endless responsibilities seems very tempting from here!

I don’t know Thurber’s End—maybe he died laughing.    (remember the Python sketch on the Funniest Joke in the World?)     There are certainly those whose wish is to, “Leave ‘em laughin’ as you go."  That would make them a Normal Healthy American GI Joe, is’t no so?  But some cultures, perhaps because they are/were all about political theatre and entertainment values, are no laughing matter; and for all their strength and worldly successes, have become a veritable torrent of unmerciful acts.  

What is the heritage of Egypt? Rome? 20^th century Germany?  And of 21^st Century USA Today?

That we were “normal?” 


*answer later--how about yours?