Scotch & Toilet Water?: A Book of Dog Cartoons [Hardcover]

Leo Cullum (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1, 2003

In this volume, "New Yorker" cartoonist Leo Cullum pokes gentle fun at the foibles and eccentricities of cavorting canines and their human owners. Or is it the dogs who are in charge? As his fans well know, Cullum's dogs are an eclectic and enterprising lot. They are lawyers and doctors and businessmen, and more than a few like to sit in bars and debate the predicaments of life. Whether they portray a confounded dog therapy patient searching for the reason he is barking, or an exasperated dog humouring his human owner's need to keep throwing a stick for him to fetch, the 125 cartoons in this book tell us almost as much about people as they do about dogs.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Leo Cullum was born in New Jersey in 1942. He graduated from Holy Cross College in 1963. Upon leaving the Marine Corps in 1968, he joined TWA and flew as a commercial pilot until retirement in January 2002. He has published 500 cartoons in The New Yorker since first appearing there in 1977. His work also appears regularly in Barron's and the Harvard Business Review. Numerous anthologies include his work and it has been hung in the Brooklyn Museum of Art. In 1996 one of his cartoons was selected to appear on a postage stamp of the Royal Mail in Great Britain.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 128 pages
• Publisher: Harry N. Abrams; Later printing edition (April 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0810944391
• ISBN-13: 978-0810944398
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 8.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #863,742 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not just for dog lovers, May 6, 2003

By 

Claire Leigh (los angeles,ca) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Scotch & Toilet Water?: A Book of Dog Cartoons (Hardcover)

This book is a wonderful gift book . It's a beautiful book besides being totally hilarious. It's more about life than it is about dogs and very, very funny!

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars (4+) Cartoons that Capture the Essence of Dogdom, October 18, 2004

By 

Tucker Andersen (Wall Street) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Scotch & Toilet Water?: A Book of Dog Cartoons (Hardcover)

Readers of THE NEW YORKER or even individuals who occasionally just peruse the magazine's wonderful cartoons will be familiar with the talent of Leo Cullum, who has had over five hundred of his cartoons published there since 1977. This collection of his dog cartoons, which in his words "seem to be a recurrent theme" in his work, will undoubtedly delight all dog lovers with their abiity to generate frequent broad smiles interspersed with many chuckles and occasional outright laughter. Some of them examine the often uneasy truce between dogs and cats, and several simply represent the humanizing of our companions often engaged in by all dog lovers. However, many of the most intriguing are (in the cartoonist's own words) "actually about something else cleverly disguised as a dog cartoon". In effect, many of these cartoons use dogs as a metaphor to illuminate aspects of the human condition.

While this book will appeal to almost everyone who has ever had the good fortune to have a dog as a family member, it will particularly resonate with those individuals for whom their canine companions have achieved the special place in their hearts and lives reserved for their closest friends and most loved family members. Those who often ask themselves the question "What if my dog were human?" or wonder about the secret life of their dogs will enjoy the best of these cartoons tremendously and recognize the truth encapsulated in many of them. My only reason for less than a five star rating for the book was my reaction that the collection included several less than top quality entries. While I recognize that such an evaluation is partially a reflection of my personal tastes, I think that it may also result from an attempt to assemble a collection of commercially acceptable length. Despite this one minor reservation, this is definitely a worthwhile addition to the library of any dog aficionado.

Tucker Andersen

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Laugh-OUT-LOUD Funny!, November 8, 2004

By 

Eliot B. Muir (Portland, OR United States) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Scotch & Toilet Water?: A Book of Dog Cartoons (Hardcover)

Whether you are a fan of New Yorker cartoons or not, this collection should touch your funny bone. I will only say this: I kept this book at my bedside, allowing myself only three or four cartoons a night, and those cartoons always left me laughing out loud and feeling ready for a good night's sleep.

Oh, did I mention that I'm not one who normally laughs out loud?

Enjoy!