The Lair

So Amazon basically bettered their estimate by more than a month and delivered early. I got myself The Complete Far Side.

Well, yeah. So buying a book isn’t a noteworthy episode anymore. Even buying a book of cartoons. Because that’s what Gary Larson does – he draws (drew) cartoons. The blurb for this set says that there are more than 4300 cartoons contained within two volumes. The product description also says that the package weighs in at a hefty 19.8 pounds. Even a set of books which weigh in at nearly 10 kilos isn’t a sufficiently weighty experience to blog about. Except for one thing. The Far Side cartoons are drawn by Gary Larson.

Why do I like Gary Larson so much? Unlike the more widely known cartoonists like Bill Watterson and Charles Schulz, there was an unapologetic darkness and bizarreness to the typical Larson cartoon that I simply adored. Calvin and Hobbes, Charlie Brown and Snoopy, Marmaduke, Heathcliff, Garfield – lots of different cartoons dealing with animals. But nothing quite like Larson’s work. Most of his stuff is single panel, quite a few didn’t even have any dialogue attached. They deal with role reversal, mostly for animals. Some of the cartoons are actually terrible stomach churning puns. What’s not to love about a cartoonist with a penchant for bad puns?

I suppose another reason to respect Larson is that he didn’t stick around flogging a dead horsecat like some other cartoonists I could name (*cough* Garfield *cough*) but opted to retire in 1995.

Couldn’t find many examples of Gary Larson’s work online, this is the only cartoon I could locate.

And I have 4300 like that waiting for me at home. I don’t think anyone is supposed to like them all, there are lots of cartoons that I don’t even quite understand – but a frequently recurring psychotic cow theme always has me in stitches.