Mr. Saturnhead

"The New-York Ghost"

2006-09-27T08:41:00.000-07:00

This agreeable logo for The New-York Ghost ("The Weekly Newspaper You Print Out at Work") was done with a black China Marker (grease pencil) on a piece of mailing already crowded with doodles of dogs drinking martinis. The e-mailed word document is available for free to interested parties. To sign up, go to the blog and send an e-mail (subject line: "Subscribe") to the address therein.

—September 26, 2006

"Take Care"

2006-09-21T10:59:00.000-07:00

The final "Mr. Saturnhead" strip is a fitting conclusion, at once tipping its hat to previous themes (e.g., the "dream job" recalls the employment anxiety of "Occupational Hazard") and holding out hope for the future. The movement from despair to a life "full of possibilities" is swift and potent, but this text-heavy send-off transcends valedictory sniffles by featuring one of the funniest Saturnhead panels ever—#3, which suggests a whole secret universe of nonexistent Van Morrison albums. Only one full title is visible; the adumbrated album name cut off by the right border is apparently "Gypsy Jigmeister—Live!" The strip's title, however, comes from Big Star's Third, an album the artist listened to incessantly at the time.

A previously unseen fair copy has also been reproduced above. Significantly, the final panel is blank—an equally resonant farewell. The sun-window combination is drawn twice, as are practice runs for the puddle (panel 1) and upturned face (panel 4). The marginalia in the upper-righthand corner (cut off due to scanner limitations) reads in full: Can I trust you pen. It's a poignant glimpse of the artist beseeching his materials for one last good go.

—The Yale Herald, April 24, 1992 (Vol. XIII, No. 13)

"Occupational Hazard"

2006-09-05T05:36:00.000-07:00

Stiff, unrealistic stances, odd perspective shifts, frame-busting wordiness, and about six different ideas about line (scratchy, thin, shadowed, etc.) nevertheless combine for a pleasing take on the employment opportunities afforded the liberal arts graduate. N.B. the three droplets of sweat in the margin above the first panel. The star-marked trash can makes an appearance. (N.B., the published version has been lost, but most experts believe the title and date provided here are correct.)

—The Yale Herald, January 19, 1990 (Vol. IX, issue 1)

"A Chair in the Room Is Worth $25–30"

2006-08-26T14:46:00.000-07:00

The artistic life is often referenced in "Mr. Saturnhead," usually on a meta-level; in this strip, isolation is seen as a precondition to creation. Alas, the wordy setup obscures the joke, which is simply that, sans chair, our hero will not be able to write anything of sufficient length to be considered a novel. But the punchline itself is confusing, the title is ungainly, and matters aren't helped by the distracting presence of an odd shape on the floor in the first panel. (Was it added after the appearance of the lightbulb in the fourth?) Still, the writing-as-imprisonment theme has an indestructible appeal, perhaps expressed best in the depopulated second panel.

—From The Yale Herald, January 18, 1991 (Vol. XI, issue 1)

"Werewolf Son"

2006-08-13T08:22:00.000-07:00

The story goes that the artist's father needed an envelope, and the only one he could find contained some markings in the upper right-hand corner. His solution was to draw a bearded character; the ominous dark patches, or "eyes," correspond to where the original markings were.

—August 2006

"The Mystery of Language"

2006-07-24T05:59:00.000-07:00

This strangely elating sequence reads like a brutally edited language primer illustrated by a Scotsman in hypnopompic reverie. The yo-yo in the first panel rhymes with the High Anxiety eyes in the third, as well as suggesting the recursive use of words (dogs, anchovies). The deep, de Chirico-esque field, the enormous sack of fish, the champagne toast—this is a celebration of intangible joy.

—From The Yale Herald, November 30, 1990 (Vol X, issue 12)

"Gap Pocket T as Worn by"

2006-07-16T05:45:00.000-07:00

This strip is very similar in punchline structure to "Look, Ma, No Exclamation Points!," and displays the same taste for the fantastic. The very thin line is a nice contrast to the character's preoccupation with blubber—this is one of the most cleanly drawn strips in the collection.

—From The Yale Herald, September 27, 1991 (vol. 12, issue 53)

"Cathy Parody"

2006-07-04T06:10:00.000-07:00

If sketches are the royal road to the unconscious, the cloud of half-formed (and copyrighted) figures, geometric solids, and things too weird to classify (snake passing through a bracelet?) provide one of the richer glimpses into the artist's befogged mind. They swarm around this popular one-off, a parody of Cathy Guisewite's long-running strip.

—From The Yale Herald, Vol. XI, issue 9

Father's Day Special

2006-06-18T05:00:00.000-07:00

1. "Character Study, Towne Restaurant," date unknown (c. 1990) 2. "Apparition of Modern Day Mary"

3. "Wake Up"

4. "Freedom or Bread"

These charming illustrations, drawn by the artist's father, perfectly capture his quick, effortless style and knack for absurd humor. In the top study, drawn on a placemat at the Towne Restaurant (a Greek eatery in Buffalo, New York), a noirish cast of five—moody tough, bouffanted moll, sinister thug, mysterioso man, and scowling dame—suggests myriad plot possibilities. The woebegone pooch and suspiciously elongated car only add to the mystery.

The other three sketches, inspired by (and parodying) his son's Saturnhead strips, were executed on standard-size prescription-pad paper. In "Apparition of Modern Day Mary," a patient's complaint and wish ("Please cure me") is heard by the silent Mary figure; the information appears to be sent via computer to the "Super National Institutes of Health"; and Mary advises (without opening her mouth) to "Try Aspirin, 1 tab/day."

"Wake Up" is a superbly minimalist golf fantasia, the spell finally broken by the Kafkaesque notation: "Your father is on the phone."

And in "Freedom or Bread," the impossibility of having it all appears to have knocked Mr. Saturnhead out cold.

These hilarious miniatures were discovered cheek-by-jowl with the artist's own sketches and strips, and suggest an important "recirculating" inspiration.

—Assorted sketches, c. 1989-1991

"My Dinner With Myself"

2006-06-08T18:48:00.000-07:00

This one pulls out all the stops—wordy narration, dialogue, disorienting shirt patterns, disorienting wall/floor constructs. (Even the title triangle has a strange embellishment at the tip; Cf. the one here.) The furrows in the hero's brow (panel 3) are slightly disturbing, as are the Dagwoodian tadpoles of sweat. The strip, which is more or less autobiographical, "works"—despite this level of detail, or because of it? Further strangeness: a menu that says MEN U (panel 1), and the odd icon after the signature (panel 3).

—From The Yale Herald, April 12, 1991 (Vol. XI, issue 47)

"Weird Boots"

2006-05-30T18:22:00.000-07:00

—From "The Vermont Notebook," October 18, 2005

"Dreaming of Babylon"

2006-05-19T07:30:00.000-07:00

This solid, midcareer offering features no less than seven whole or partial Saturnheads in its regulation four squares, with a nice balance of text and picture, dream cloud and frame narrative. The work of abstract, jumbled art featured on the wall in the first panel anticipates the disorientation to follow. The format is playful, but the tone turns menacing by the end—altogether different from some of the other "religious" strips ("The Adventures of God"), and anticipating the controversial "Formative Experience" the following spring. The title is from a Richard Brautigan novel.

—From The Yale Herald, November 22, 1991 (Vol. XII, issue 61)

"Inflate! A Retrospective"

2006-05-01T06:47:00.000-07:00

In 1987, the artist and his friend Paul Yu formed the musical combo known as the Inflatable Fun Guys, which would go on to be regularly misheard as the Inflatable Fungi. The duo gradually expanded to include drummer David Miller, bassist Nelson Chang, and keyboardist Don Leslie, each of these subsequent members bringing their own style of musicianship, which could be summarized as Van Halen, Rush/Journey, and more Rush. This clashed with the original duo's creations, inspired equally by New Romantic poet-maundery and native non-sequiturism (Camper Van Beethoven, et al.). Tensions ran high; the center could not hold. Assorted cassette recordings were made and lost over the years, and it would seem that by the mid ’90s all tangible traces of the IFG had disappeared completely.

But in a startling discovery two weeks ago, a friend of the artist came across the only copy of Inflate!, the IFG's career summation, while preparing to move to a new home. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, the absence of cassette players in most North American households means that these shambling half-songs, cryptic parodies, ill-advised world music forays, and Echo and the Bunnymen covers will remain unheard by yet another generation of aspiring musicians.

The liner notes explain that "the group disbanded after one legendary gig . . . [the core members] went on to record music as Loaves & Fishes, the Style Mongers, and Eggs & Larvae," but some dispute this proliferation of names, insisting that they were only ever the IFG. The cassette's extremely simple cover art is most intriguing for the fact that those who have seen the gentlemen in question will be at a loss to decide which illustration depicts whom.

—Date unknown, but probably spring of 1990

"A.K.A. Squidman"

2006-04-19T06:54:00.000-07:00

The story behind "A.K.A. Squidman," the artist's sole collaboration, is somewhat murky. It is believed to have run in The Yale Herald, though it does not appear on the sheet of lined yellow paper that serves as the Saturnhead catalogue raisonné. Experts agree that it likely appeared in either the fall of 1989 or the spring of 1990. The illustrator is Eugene Cho, who signs his name "Echo" on the wonderful title panel (upside down in the worksheet above)—"Echo/Park" having a clean, architecture-firm-sounding ring.

Had space and time allowed it, "A.K.A. Squidman" could have become a terrific strip in its own right, a conceptual gag repeated issue after issue, with Tommy Davis turning into the titular superhero at the first sign of trouble . . . and languishing on terra firma.

—Publication history unknown, but probably The Yale Herald, Fall 1989 or Spring 1990

"Secret Poet"

2006-04-14T03:41:00.000-07:00

This decoration, entered into a publisher's galley, reveals a portlier main figure than previously, equipped with cape, scarf, and cane. The cape had some presence in the Saturnhead strip (especially as attached to the minor character "Urchin Man"); the cane and scarf are more recent accessories. The illustration has nothing to do with the book in question, but perhaps captures something of the author's spirit of adventure—here we get the sense that a stroll around the block is an event teeming with excitement.

From a review copy of David Mitchell's Black Swan Green, ca. January 2006

"I Went to High School With Christian Laettner"

2006-04-12T06:48:00.000-07:00

The penultimate Saturnhead is the only one to feature two parallel horizontal panels—a good layout solution to the formal problem presented by the joke. Also unusual in this late-period strip are the shadowing (#1-3) and the action curves in the third panel. The black star has by this point become a motif—ludicrously simple, vaguely haunting, and perhaps totally inscrutable. The artist's signature is hidden. The biographical information in the title is true.

From The Yale Herald, April 17, 1992 (Vol. XIII, issue 12)

"Lost in Translation"

2006-03-29T04:59:00.000-08:00

Perhaps the purest example of what might be termed the artist's poetic style: seemingly random language, no characters, an emphasis on clean lines and the graphic flow from panel to panel. This has even less plot than "Happiness Is a Warm Fish" (to which it is a sort of sequel), and the language is sparer. There is space to think; each scene is an invitation to quiet obsession.

The last panel quotes from a Wallace Stevens title. Some have insisted that the strip is playing with text and pictures—that the captions for #1 and #4 have been flipped, as have those for #2 and #3 (e.g., "tiny language" refers to the chatter from the TV rather than the purl of a mountain stream). This is probably true, but it's just one of several levels on which this strip works its quiet magic. Especially good is how the artist solved the problem of night in the final box.

From The Yale Herald, February 7, 1992 (Vol. XIII, issue 4)

"Creature Seen in a Dream From Which I Mercifully Woke Up"

2006-03-22T07:39:00.000-08:00

Sharks have figure prominently in the author's nightmares for years, but the oneiric emergence of this multi-finned number probably provoked more wonder than fear. Some sort of aspidistra or octopus appears to be displayed in the background, though whether this was part of the dream or a preexisting doodle is not known. Details not included in this reproduction: a man posing in front of a pyramid, and this fragment: "The sails appearing in the bay like knives."

From "Notes for The Dizzies" (detail), March 24, 2005

"About the Author"

2006-03-17T08:15:00.000-08:00

This strip belongs to—indeed, epitomizes—what might be called the "Minor Epiphany" subgenre of Saturnheads. A real-life incident is conveyed simply in the text, without overburdening it with meaning; the eureka happens (if it does) because of the art, which is just as simple but enters the reader's mind at a different angle.

Indeed, angle is key here—notice the echo of the vacuum cleaner's slant (#1 and #3) in that of the sunlight (final panel). The sun itself (hilariously crammed into the window in #1) gets transformed into the "crumb" of #2, but (as we eventually learn) that morsel is indeed part of the same material, as it were (light).

The word "vaccum" floating above the strip must have been the artist's attempt to check his usually impeccable spelling, a good move in this case. (Panel three contains a less-used variant of "traveled," however.)

From The Yale Herald, January 12, 1992 (Vol. XII, issue 2)

"Overlooked at the Philatelists' Pow-Wow" (Part I)

2006-03-15T04:04:00.000-08:00

An early interest in philately provided the organizational idea for this portfolio of tiny sketches. The turretlike perforation marks are a favorite detail of the artist, and it is likely that this series began when he threw such a frame around the topmost drawing. The "Chinatown" stamp is based on the business card of his hairdresser; the cultural reference point is nicely smudged by the passage from the Toto song "Africa". The assorted incense burners remain one of the more enigmatic instances of ornamentation in the artist's work.

From untitled black sketchbook ("EJP"), February 17, 2000

"Look, Ma, No Exclamation Points!"

2006-03-10T06:03:00.000-08:00

One can point out the rolling hill-lines that give the strip continuity, the self-defeating title, the way the flower on the shirt in panel one becomes material in panel two—but the magic of this strip is simple, and therefore harder to parse. That is to say, fifteen years later, it can still put a big smile on the unsuspecting reader's face.

From The Yale Herald, April 13, 1991 (Vol. IX, issue 11)

"The Adventures of God"

2006-03-08T07:53:00.000-08:00

Another one-off, this one featuring an Almighty with feelings. The previous week's Saturnhead had featured God as a character, and it seems that the artist unexpectedly took a liking to the bearded deity. The rather mystical mode is sustained by an unusually smooth panel flow: The thought bubble in the first box is alluded to in the next box—though the percolating circles are actually air bubbles, and the bottom of the thought balloon is the cresting seam between sky and sea. It's a subtle metamorphosis that mirrors the change undertaken by God; the bubble confusion eases the transition, for now God-as-fish is having thoughts, the way God-as-God was. Had the strip been able to fit five panels, the last one would have been wordless, just more fish swimming by at their leisure.

From The Yale Herald, October 18, 1991 (Vol. XII, issue 7)

"I Shall Carry Ev'ry Bucket o' Fish"

2006-03-04T12:19:00.000-08:00

The novel The Diet of Worms has little to do with fish, or buckets, let alone buckets filled with fish, but this whimsical illustration found on the first page of a small (4 x 8") notepad kept during the composition of the DOW seems to suggest otherwise.

—From "Notes for The Diet of Worms" (detail), March 18, 1996

"Hidden Drive" b/w "Genuine Wicker Satellite Dishes"

2006-02-28T20:23:00.000-08:00

The straightforward Freudian vibe of the first drawing contrasts intriguingly with the enigmatic, looser illo on the bottom, which looks more like a modified grapefruit half than anything else.

From "The Vermont Noteboook" (unpublished), October 20, 2005

"Three Dancing Cans of Insanity Are More Than One"

2006-02-26T10:02:00.000-08:00

A typically overstuffed early strip that nevertheless has subtle graphic tendons: The first panel's wall-line becomes the sink-edge in panel two; the tiling in panel two leads to the projector head in panel three, etc. Some have criticized this as "futile leakage," but the artist, at least in this case, knew what he was doing. When we get to the final curvature, we envision a Möbius strip (with an oblique pun on strip)—an appropriate backdrop for the unhinged finale.

Over a decade and a half later, the strip feels downright prescient. Look in your cupboard right now: You probably have three cans, and they were most likely doing the Charleston right up to the moment you blew the cover on their little world.

From The Yale Herald, March 8, 1990 (Vol. IX, issue 8)

"Despair, Depression, and Death" b/w "Art Is a Man's Name"

2006-02-24T05:14:00.000-08:00

The charming one-off "Despair, Depression, and Death" was likely inspired by the purchase of a new pen. The continuous slope of the hill through all four panels lends an unsettling air to the strip, particularly in box #3, where "Bill" appears suspended in space. (Constructing these "through-lines" was a Saturnine fixation of sorts, especially in the earlier strips.)

The cartoonist followed up "3D" with one of his recurrent musings on art (and a return to the scratchy line favored during this period). The changing expression of the face on the canvas is acceptable (cf. the stem of the flower in "3D"); more jejune, perhaps, is the painting's title, the beret, the French-fried "artiste." But Randy makes it all worthwhile—he's the squat opposite of the sort of canine one finds at the Happiness Inn.

Postscript: These strips were done on a single sheet of paper (a not atypical process). The intervening doodles depict bats or spiders. The three circles are possible title panels for "3D"; the archives are not extensive enough to tell us which one was finally used. (A circular title panel was later deployed for another one-off, "The Adventures of God.") A second "Despair, Depression, and Death" strip, never published, exists.

From The Yale Herald, January 26 & February 2, 1990 (Vol. IX, issues 18 & 19)

"Happiness Is a Warm Fish"

2006-02-22T19:18:00.000-08:00

This is a very relaxing strip, full of lazy (albeit cryptic) pleasures. The lettering here is quite uniform—at last!—and the drawings convey just enough information. Nothing distracts; every element is like a little toy. Those stiff, wooden-looking hands in the final panel look like they've escaped from the Museum of American Folk Art.

From The Yale Herald, April 19, 1991 (Vol. XI, issue 12)

"Nghuh-Ahhh, Nghuh-Ahhh"

2006-02-20T04:31:00.000-08:00

One of only three Saturnheads to appear in Fall 1990, "Nghuh-Ahhh, Nghuh-Ahhh" exhibits a move to crisper lines, thanks to a new pen—which does nothing to prevent the weight of the lettering from fluctuating wildly. Though the punchline proper remains one of the great "pure" punchlines in the series, the panels are stuffed with so much incidental text that they distract from it—all of this suggesting that religion is a difficult row to hoe (i.e., no instant gratification). Claimed as a Christian work by some readers at the time, the agonized syllables that bookend the strip invoke Lovecraftian insanity more than anything else.

From The Yale Herald, November 2, 1990 (Vol. X, issue 9)

"People Love This Strip—in Cuba"

2006-02-18T22:12:00.000-08:00

We begin with one of the most frightening works in the oeuvre. "People Love This Strip—in Cuba" features a topsy-turvy panel, an unusual dripping-blood special effect, and a bizarre culminating illo possibly drawn by the cartoonist's sister.

From The Yale Herald, November 15, 1990 (Vol. X, issue 11).