Sunday, October 20, 2013

Civic Culture Down the Drain

Hully gee, Kelly certainly had the boyish spirit.

Happy Sunday, Kelly Sunday.

Good morning Hun, LLK!

May 2, 1971

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13 comments:

  1. Anonymous10/20/13, 2:16 AM

    Thom,
    I see the bright light from the burning midnight oil...
    Don't overdo it; (candle being lit on both ends).
    Great thanks; LLTHB!
    Hun

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thomas Haller Buchanan10/20/13, 12:32 PM

    Hun, you've got great eyesight, foresight, hindsight, left-right-up and downsight. The smoke from the burning midnight oil leaves me with only middle sight. Holding a candle burning at both ends leaves a mess of wax.

    Thanks Hun.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous10/23/13, 7:03 AM

    It's me again - the one that was recommending Ozy & Millie as a Pogo descendent. Figured this time I'd share some thoughts about my growing up in the south and Kelly's work.

    I recall when I was younger being introduced to Kelly's work in some study I don't recall the specifics of when I lived on the coast of South Carolina (I now live in Atlanta, where presumably where the fictional residents of Fort Mudge might head for the cosmopolitan delights). I vaguely recalled reports of Walt Kelly’s death as a boy and felt faintly sad that someone that drew funny animals had left us, but I was not really aware of how important it would become to me later.

    What may be interesting was how much I initially disliked Pogo. You see, it was all too familiar to me the earthy twang of the southern dialect, which for Walt being a yankee was exotic and had a pleasant mystique, was actually rather off-putting since at my youth in the 70s and 80s I associated it with ignorance - and not the pleasant blissfully unaware of modernism ilk. That and the fact everyone seemed to be fairly dirty-soled (which really is more an artifact of 'tread shading' that Kelly liked to use) and had those unique four-toed-not-quite-human not-quite-classic-cartoon-three-toed feet (which grew on me as they are actually indispensable in the blend of expressiveness without losing too much cuteness).

    It never occurred to me until much later how much time Pogo characters tend to laze about or indulge in play - more so than many other cartoon characters. When it comes down to it, there are strong hints that Pogo is essentially Kelly’s own extended boyhood, full of fishing and baseball and shenanigans galore that perhaps his health may have disallowed the apportionment he truly desired. I tend to be of the mind that as much as I love all of Kelly's work, there's a special place in my heart for the Albert the Alligator era from Animal Comics, back when he could, when particularly grumpy, go back to four-footed mode and tailwomp the tar out of particularly ardent aggressors. That and I liked his eyes being somewhat wildly separated, his scutes pronounced, and his nostrils present. Admittedly he was a fairly surly sort, and Pogo himself certainly was fairly scraggly, but not as fearful as Kelly's revisionish view held. Later, he slowly devolved in details to where he got faintly salamanderesque and soft, which admittedly has its own charms. Kelly had refined the characters to the level that they were practically rendered in 3d mental space, and then expressively brush-worked in the resulting mental image with photographic accuracy - there’s no arguing the backgrounds had become downright lavish towards the end.

    As I started to enjoy the depth of the wordplay and poetry in it over the years, I was able to distance Kelly's much more liberal and comforting funny-animals version of the deep south from the painful and oppressive one from my childhood. It's possible some of the reason why Pogo is growing less easy to relate to is the growing and obvious rift between these two realities. I've been noticing awareness and gatherings for Kelly's work have been fading to alarming levels, with the official site in mothballs and frankly this site being about the most active I can find, though it wasn't this way in the early 2000s. I have to wonder if anything is going on behind the scenes, or if this is just the continuation of that slow painful slide into mainstream obscurity.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Thomas Haller Buchanan10/23/13, 12:50 PM

    Wonderful comments here. This is the kind of dialogue gambitry that I've been encouraging since the beginning of this blog (though Hun and some others have lovingly fulfilled that encouragement). Rather than dialogue in the relative obscurity of this comment section, I'd like to happily respond out in the open with new posts in the next week or two.

    Thank you!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous10/25/13, 7:24 AM

      Since I've become somewhat a regular lately (well, 3 comments are mine - I was the one suggesting reassembling the word balloons in the french version). I should probably at least identify myself by some tag so at least I'm not simply 'that verbose anonymous Albert the Alligator fan'. So let's go with (A) for now, short Alimentary - probably the latter since it's the name of one of Albert's forgotten nephews.

      Delete
  5. Thomas Haller Buchanan10/25/13, 12:44 PM

    Alimentary my dear fellow — I like it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous10/25/13, 2:30 PM

      The other option was Alexander, but Alimentary is infinitely funny, since it pertains to anything regarding sustenance. And Albert was always having things falling with comedic regularity into his maw. Including nearly deliberately Alexander at one point.

      Delete
  6. Anonymous10/27/13, 3:15 AM

    ...alimentary, Dr. Watson!
    Hun

    ReplyDelete
  7. Anonymous10/27/13, 7:03 AM

    Alimentary,
    are you still interested in in "crummies" containing the balloons for the "French publication"?
    If so (and if Thom agrees) I could post a link for downloading.
    Hun

    ReplyDelete
  8. Thomas Haller Buchanan10/27/13, 1:44 PM

    I certainly agree to it!

    ReplyDelete
  9. Anonymous11/1/13, 11:43 AM

    My offer still stands to do the paste ins from the original runs into the french comic-book style version. If anyone can translate the characters pages, I'll Photoshop in the English there as well.
    - (A)

    ReplyDelete
  10. Anonymous11/2/13, 2:21 PM

    Alimentary,
    I just a moment ago uploaded 'crummies.zip' to MailBigFile.
    Download Link is : http://mbf.me/rTC22B
    Sorry to have to grumble; but the amount of volunteering response from the community you can expect in my experience in all probability is:minimal.
    So I'm going to elbow myself into the limelight (even if it is kind of silly for a hun to translate from French to English). Plus it will take some time; so do not hold your breath...
    Hun

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous11/7/13, 4:37 PM

      I just now notice this. I'll pair this up with the french translations I did this morning. I need to employ some foxes for fixes on those anyway since I bolded some text that shouldn't be.

      - (A)

      Delete

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