The sharp-witted reflections, amusing absurdities, and humor found in the conflicting relationships between art and artist are at the forefront of Adrian Tomine‘s The Loneliness of the Long Distance Cartoonist and Lisa Hanawalt‘s I Want You. A master humorist, Hanawalt strikes the perfect balance between drawing the gorgeous and the repugnant, the fantastical and the lifelike, and the bizarre and the hilarious. Tomine’s comedic memoir about fandom, fame, and other embarrassments from the life of a New York Times bestseller is his funniest and most revealing work yet. Watch both these authors and friends dive into the depths of the cartoonist’s mind in all its amusing glory to find a deeply human experience that everyone can relate to.
Enter At Your Own Risk: Inside a Cartoonist’s Mind
Enter At Your Own Risk: Inside a Cartoonist’s Mind
Author:
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Adrian Tomine
Adrian Tomine is the author of Scenes from an Impending Marriage, Shortcomings, Summer Blonde, Sleepwalk, 32 Stories, and the comic book series Optic Nerve. He is also an illustrator for The New Yorker, Esquire, and Rolling Stone, and his stories have appeared in The Best American Nonrequired Reading and An Anthology of Graphic Fiction, Cartoons, and True Stories. What happens when a childhood hobby grows into a lifelong career? The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Cartoonist (Drawn and Quarterly) Adrian Tomine’s funniest and most revealing foray into autobiography, offers many unexpected answers. When a sudden medical incident lands Tomine in the emergency room, he begins to question if it was really all worthwhile: despite the accolades and opportunities of a seemingly charmed career, it’s the gaffes, humiliations, slights, and insults he’s experienced (or caused) within the industry that loom largest in his memory. But in between chaotic book tours, disastrous interviews, and cringe-inducing interactions with other artists, life happens: he fumbles his way into marriage, parenthood, and an indisputably fulfilling existence. A richer emotional story emerges as his memories are delineated in excruciatingly hilarious detail. Ed Park, in the New York Times Book Review marvels at how “Adrian Tomine has gone from “the boy wonder of mini-comics” (per Daniel Clowes) to master of the form… The 26 vignettes here trace a lifetime of neuroses and humiliations [with] artful minimalism.”
Lisa Hanawalt
Lisa Hanawalt is the creator of the animated series Tuca and Bertie—which will be premiering its second season on Adult Swim in 2021—and the production designer/producer on Netflix’s Bojack Horseman. Lisa has worked on illustrations, book covers, animations, comics, and textile patterns and has published three previous books with Drawn & Quarterly: the humor collections My Dirty Dumb Eyes, Hot Dog Taste Test, and the bestselling graphic novel Coyote Doggirl. Before the success that came with all her critically acclaimed work, cartoonist Lisa Hanawalt was a comic-book-industry sensation with her minicomic series I Want You. Her outlandish humor and ingenious formalism are evident in the comics collected in I Want You (Drawn and Quarterly) Her love of anthropomorphism and scatology are on full display, all lovingly and grotesquely drawn by Hanawalt in obsessive, unnerving detail. We meet and join a She-Moose while sex-toy shopping, and also a He-Horse, who suffers from ornithophobia. The true star of I Want You may just be Hanawalt’s hilarious command of the graphic listicle. “Top Causes of Freeway Accidents” is a prescient pre-BoJack display of Hanawalt’s love for all things equine. Whether she’s discussing the daily commute or masturbation, she packs each comic in I Want You with punchy cultural observations and sharp-witted reflections on typically taboo subjects. Library Journal, in a starred review, called it “A brilliant collection from an audacious and boldly inventive cartoonist with a distinct and necessary perspective.”
