Last night I watched the documentary about the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes and its creator, Bill Watterson.
The movie focused on fans of the comic talking about the impact it had on their lives, why it was so great and how it lives on, as popular more than a decade after the last panel was published as it was when it appeared in the newspapers every day.
If you are not familiar with Calvin and Hobbes, the strip is still available everywhere books are sold. Get yourself a collection and acquaint yourself with it. I envy you the fun you’re about to discover.
For everyone else, no explanation is necessary. Calvin and Hobbes was simply the best drawn, smartest and funniest comic…ever.
Oh, there may have been one or two that were drawn as well, back in the early, golden era of comics but none that dealt with metaphysical, philosophical ideas while careening down a snowy hillside with the hilariously wild abandon of our favorite six year old and his stuffed tiger.
Everyone knows how great the comic was and is.
I don’t really think of it as a comic strip anymore. It exists now in book form, as collections of strips that have become a single narrative; short, quick glimpses into the inner life of a six year old kid. In this form, C&H has more in common with Winnie the Pooh than it does with say, Peanuts.
A.A. Milne’s books are my favorite kid’s literature out there. The stories are wonderful, the writing is great and while even toddlers love them, they are so well done that adults laugh themselves silly while reading them, too. Ernest H. Shepard’s illustrations are some of the best ever. Calvin and Hobbes is like a modern day, MTV style take on Winnie the Pooh. And quite frankly, as much as I love Shepard, Watterson’s illustrations are even better. Shepard nails the attitudes and inherent sweetness of tiny children but Watterson nails the manic excitement of little boys. When Christopher Robin drags Edward Bear down the stairs, his head gently bumps each step. On the other hand, you feel it in your spine every time Hobbes tackles Calvin. It’s all in the way it’s drawn.
Christopher Robin behaves like a little boy who knows his father is watching him. Calvin behaves like a boy unchained. The 100 Acre Wood exists in Christopher Robin’s solitude. Spaceman Spiff arrives in the middle of the school day to rescue Calvin from the horrors of the classroom.
I love them both but I think Calvin is more like the boys I have known.
The really interesting part of the story is that of Mr. Watterson himself.
He doesn’t appear in the documentary. He gives no interviews, signs no autographs, never licensed his creation and allows no photos of himself to be published. Ever.
This, in my opinion, makes him the coolest guy on earth.
By never giving interviews, Bill Watterson makes the strip speak for itself, as all art must. I think a definition of greatness is that it doesn’t have to be explained. “Because” negates “great”. As John Cleese said about Andy Kaufman, “If I’m not laughing, he’s not a genius.”
The documentary spends a lot of time emphasizing how amazing it is that Watterson never licensed Calvin and Hobbes; they never appeared on merchandize and you’ve never been able to buy your own stuffed versions. By making that decision, Watterson was passing up millions, perhaps tens of millions of dollars.
I totally understand why he did that. He was already probably profiting far more than he ever expected to as a comic strip author. In our current age and the state of our culture, people have a hard time understanding that there can be such a thing as ‘rich enough’ but Watterson apparently made a completely rational decision that he was rich enough to say “You can’t pay me enough to disrupt my life with your needs and desires.”
I respect that.
It’s also difficult for some to understand that there are people out there who do not crave fame. In their imaginations, fame means everyone knows, admires and listens to you but the truth is far more invasive, inhuman and encroaching than that. Who cares what total strangers think of you? The truly wise do not crave fame and avoid it when it comes knocking.
All any of us ever need to know about Bill Watterson is contained in his strip. Don’t bother him: read Calvin and Hobbes. It’s enough.
Someone in the movie describes Watterson as private and shy. Private yes, obviously but I wouldn’t bet on ‘shy’. My guess is that most people bore the snot out of him. Getting to know people takes time and effort. Read Calvin and Hobbes; look at the art; the mind out of which this stuff springs would find most people pretty dull in comparison.
I’m looking forward to the time when the world (might) get to see what Bill Watterson has been doing and creating since he drew the last panel of Calvin and Hobbes in 1995.