Killed Cartoons: Casualties from the War on Free Expression (Paperback)

by David Wallis (Editor)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Operating under the premise that it's fun to get a glimpse of something verboten, Wallis (Killed: Great Journalism Too Hot to Print) presents dozens of political cartoons yanked prior to publication. Functioning as both a compendium and history of political cartooning, the book is full of cartoons, each accompanied by a brief narrative describing why it was killed, and though some cartoons seem fairly innocuous, the background provides intriguing context. Perennially controversial cartoonist Ted Rall has several entries, including one from 1991 captioned "How Gulf War Veterans Like To Spend Their Summers," which features a kooky-looking guy burying beachgoers. It was inspired, Wallis writes, "by a report in Newsday that U.S. Gulf War veterans might be having some remorse about using tanks outfitted with earthmoving plows to bury Iraqi troops alive." Older cartoons are included, as well, like a David Low cartoon killed in 1937 that "skewered the imperialist ambitions of Fascist leaders in Spain, Japan, Germany and Italy." Catholicism gets spanked, too, as do a host of presidents, notably Clinton, Bush I and II and Reagan. With 100 illustrations, this is a commendable collection.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
If editorial cartoonists are the court jesters of journalism, using humor to speak truth to power, I^Killed Cartoons demonstrates that the monarchs who run newspapers have grown increasingly unwilling to listen. The collection rescues dozens of cartoons rejected for politics, offending advertisers, or just plain effrontery. Their artists include Pulitzer Prize winners Garry Trudeau, Doug Marlette, Paul Conrad, Paul Szep, and Mike Luckovich; renowned illustrators Al Hirschfeld and Edward Sorel; and young turks Ted Rall and Keith Knight and comics creators Carol Lay, Ward Sutton, and Peter Kuper. Sometimes the editorial vetoes are understandable, such as the I^Los Angeles Times spiking Conrad's rendition of a Republican elephant humping a Democrat donkey, but just as often what has been squelched is surprisingly benign. Historical examples include a 1952 Herblock cartoon excoriating McCarthy I^ and Nixon and a 1968 Norman Rockwell illustration for I^ Look, but "old" in this book means 1982 or 1991. Most selections are recent, attesting to increased media cowardice and irrelevance. But not all cartoon killers are daily papers or otherwise corporate-owned. A handful have been such purportedly open-minded publications as the I^ Nation, the I^ New Yorker,and I^ Mother Jones. Gordon Flagg
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: W.W. Norton & Co.; 1 edition (March 17, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0393329240
• ISBN-13: 978-0393329247
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 6.1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #408,621 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Understand what you're getting, April 20, 2007

By	Scott B. (Durham, NC USA) - See all my reviews

For the right audience, I'm sure this is a fine work. I was not the right audience. I wanted a book that presented the cartoons, with perhaps minimal commentary, and let me decide for myself. Instead, this provides pages of commentary and, actually, very few cartoons (94 in its 282 pages - I counted). If you're looking for a treatise on the myth of freedom of the press, using a few cartoons as case studies, then by all means look at this book. Just know what it is you are buying, and know that less than a third of the pages in the book actually show the "Killed Cartoons" that the title promises.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Slightly Disappointing, October 30, 2007

By	John Erickson - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I was expecting a compilation of editorial cartoons that had been "killed" by editors for their controversial content, and to some extent, that's what this book is. But each cartoon (or group of two or three) is accompanied by a story about how and why it got cut. While some of the stories are pretty interesting, it also means that there are about half as many cartoons as I was expecting. In addition, the text often comes across as preachy (even though I largely agree with the politics of the author) and in almost all cases, gives away the punchline of the cartoon before you see it, greatly lessening the impact. As you might have guessed, I was a little disapointed in the format of this book. If you get it, I suggest looking at the cartoons first, and then reading the text accompanying the ones you want to know more about.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Funny, but you don't want to laugh, April 27, 2007

By	Max Schneiderman "Reader" (New York, New York) - See all my reviews

I enjoyed KILLED CARTOONS immensely. The work illustrates beautifully why political cartoons are important. (And why they're capable of generating real controversy.) What Wallis understands is that cartoons have a contradictory function. One the one hand they have to amuse the reader, and on the other, they have to upset his/her equilibrium--ideally to the boiling point. Cartoons reach us on a visceral level, which is why I found Wallis' commentary (captions, if you will) a perfect complement to them. Wallis is a witty intelligent and apparently well-informed writer. This book came to me as a gift, I just bought his KILLED: Journalism To Hot to Print, with my own money.