Throughout Charles Schulz life he did many things he enjoyed and many things he disliked; however, no matter what he could always convey his experiences with a comic. As a young child, Charles Schulz moved from St. Paul, Minnesota to Needles, California. He did not enjoy Needles at all; he referred to his two years there as a “miserable life.” He did well in school, but he did not make very many friends. To describe his life in Needles he made, “an outcast- his most isolated character, Spike, a gaunt, desert-hardened-for community-to bring the desert’s peculiar immediacy and remoteness…” (Michealis 48). The cartoon shown below depicts just that, Spike, the isolated dog. He shows his loneliness in Needles where he didn’t make very many friends, but one thing he always had was the ability to draw and depict that “miserable life” in a way that makes everyone laugh.
Charles also dealt with self-confidence issues as a child. He described himself as “bland” or “blank.” The author comes in to defend him saying, “…it was not he who was featureless, it was the world he grew up in- flat, impoverished in language, stricken by silences, stripped to essentials or less” (Michealis 65). In other words, he wasn’t a dull kid; it was just a dull society. No one could truly understand his gift yet and neither could he because no one paid much attention to him. In the comic below Charles shows how he felt as a kid, in that he thought that he bored everyone.
Michaelis, David. Schulz and Peanut: A Biography. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2007.
"Comics.com." Comics.com. 2008. Comics.com. 13 Nov 2008 <http://comics.com/peanuts?DateAfter=1975-10-03&DateBefore=1975-10-03&Order=s.DateStrip+DESC&PerPage=1&Search=&x=30&y=13>.
"Comics.com." Comics.com. 2008. Comics.com. 13 Nov 2008 <http://comics.com/peanuts/1957-07-30/>.
(In order of appearance)
4 comments:
The book you picked sounds great! I personally love the comic strip charlie brown, and this book sounds really interesting. After reading your post I want to read this book!
Wow, I've never made the connection between Snoopy's "lonely dog" character and the author behind it. Schulz sounds like an appealing person and your insights make it seem like an interesting book to read. (Ironically, as I was reading this blog-I'd just put own the sunday paper cartoons.)
This is really interesting. I never would have guessed that Charles Shulz was such a lonely and lifeless child. I can now see the connection between him and the characters he creates! It's like getting a sneak peek into Shulz's life through reading the comics!
This post really gave great insight into the thoughts of a great comic. I never knew that Schulz lived in St. Paul, or that he thought of himself as a boring kid. He makes such great comics that he should have been the class clown and everyone should have liked him. One question. Does Spike transform into Snoopy? Cause there is a definite resemblence.
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