The New Yorker 75th Anniversary Cartoon Collection (Hardcover)

~ Bob Mankoff (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

This 75th anniversary collection pulls together a variety of cartoonists ranging from James Thurber and his ever-battling sexes to Bruce Eric Kaplan and his modern urbans. Readers who are put off by The New Yorker's reputation for stodginess may be pleasantly surprised: a city lot offers Extreme Parking, and one of George Booth's crotchety old ladies urges a silent ogler to "Whistle, you dumb bastard!" There are plenty of sight gags and silly puns (a worried buffalo complains about his cell phone's roaming charges), but don't expect to get through without picking up on a literary reference or two. Roz Chast revisits Eloise at the Plaza hotel at the age of 46 and chronicles the Dialogues of Plato over what to have for lunch. And of course no New Yorker collection would be complete without the sly ghoulishness of Charles Addams. The perfect book for anyone who has ever flipped through a copy of The New Yorker just for the cartoons. --Ali Davis

Product Description

If you like inexpensive restaurants where the main course is Beluga caviar, radio stations that play nothing but your favorite hits, and airlines that automatically upgrade you to first class and never lose your luggage, forget it. There's no such thing. But here's a dream that actually comes true: The New Yorker 75th Anniversary Cartoon Collection, the biggest and funniest collection of New Yorker cartoons ever assembled. From the unforgettable classics to contemporary favorites, this drawing gallery of comic genius spans nearly the entire 20th century!

This satisfyingly bulky volume brings together the best of every New Yorker reader's favorite feature of his or her favorite magazine. Edited and introduced by New Yorker cartoon editor and no-slouch-himself cartoonist Bob ("How about never -- is never good for you?") Mankoff, The New Yorker 75th Anniversary Cartoon Collection is a riotous panorama of three-quarters of a century of life, love, business, society, and human nature as seen by the most gifted comic artists on the planet -- Peter Arno, Charles Addams, Mary Petty, Roz Chast, William Steig, Jack Ziegler, and many more. Besides reminding us of how fresh the old favorites remain, The New Yorker 75th Anniversary Cartoon Collection unearths page after page of long-forgotten gems that startle us with their perspicacious commentary on the ever-changing world around us and the neverchanging ways we react to it, cope with it, and stumble (or, occasionally, triumph) over it.

The New Yorker 75th Anniversary Cartoon Collection is too thick to be Scotch-taped to the refrigerator or pinned on the bulletin board, but every one of these on-the-nose cartoons yields an insight that stays sharp -- and stays funny -- every time. The New Yorker's cartoons and its cartoonists are one of the great treasures of the century. Trusting their keen eye for the idiosyncrasies of people and the caprices of culture, we know we can rely on them to make us laugh, over and over again, as they reveal what we are really thinking about -- usually before we realize it ourselves.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Atria; Reprint edition (November 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 067103555X
• ISBN-13: 978-0671035556
• Product Dimensions: 12.3 x 9.3 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #432,539 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The New Yorker 75th Anniversary Cartoon Collection, December 5, 1999

By	[e-mail] (Charleston, Illinois) - See all my reviews

Since we already own several anthologies of New Yorker cartoons, and have always subscribed to the New Yorker I really didn't anticipate that I would find anything really "new" in this collection. I was, however, rather surprised when looking through the book after I gave it to my son as a hanukah gift at the selection of cartoons. Mankoff has come up with a timeless collection--one that shows us that real humor crosses over decades and generations. How he managed to choose these cartoons, I do not know, but I imagine he had to go through thousands and thousands of cartoons, and make thousands of decisions that no cartoonist or cartoon lover would want to have to make. The newer cartoons (those by Roz Chast and her contemporaries) are destined to be classics. I am so glad that we bought it.

24 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Eclectic Collection and Layout of Many Famous Cartoons, July 9, 2000

By	Professor Donald Mitchell "Jesus Makes Me a P... (Boston) - See all my reviews (TOP 10 REVIEWER)

I was introduced to the recent books of New Yorker cartoons by The New Yorker Book of Money Cartoons, which I liked. Imagine my excitement when I saw this massive volume of 707 cartoons by Peter Arno, Charles Addams, Roz Chast, Mary Petty, William Steig, Jack Zeigler and others.

When I opened the book, I was in for another surprise. The book didn't live up to its potential, which is why I graded it down one star.

First, the introduction was a weak stab at humor that didn't work for me about encouraging the reader to skip the introduction and go to the cartoons. I did learn from the introduction that Bob Mankoff, the cartoon editor of The New Yorker, chose these cartoons after reviewing 60,000 cartoons and consulting with the cartoonists, editors of The New Yorker, and readers of the magazine. That research provided the opportunity to insert some of the comments that were made either into the introduction or onto the pages with the cartoons. Neither was done. You can safely skip the introduction, and you will like the book better.

Second, the material could have used some organization. The time periods, subjects, and styles seemed haphazard to me in their order. That robbed the material of some of its strength. The layouts were of 1 to 3 cartoons per page in random fashion. It has a feeling like a scrapbook would.

On the other hand, you'll never find all of these cartoons any place else. Here are a few of my many favorites:

Man in pajamas in a hotel room: "Front desk? There are no little candies on my pillow."

Pilgrim speaking to a Native American: "We're here to escape religious persecution. What are you here for?"

One couple in a living room to another couple: "The work being done on your marriage -- are you having it done, or are you doing it yourselves?

Couple looking at a sunset: "Too much purple."

"Now, if you'll just sign right here . . . you'll be making the biggest mistake of your life!"

The book repeats many of the best cartoons from the various subject series (money, business, lawyers, and doctors) that are separately published by The New Yorker.

The book would make a good gift except that the reproduction of the cartoons is not as sharp as it should be. It seems to have been caused by the digitalization process. Perhaps that's another cartoon for us: "Technology is always a source of progress."

The real strength of the cartoons is to remind us about our stalled thinking: Wanting the world to conform to our ideas about it, rather than perceiving reality and the other person's point of view. The captions take some line or concept that we all use at one time or another, and put them into an unfamiliar setting or turn them around a little. If you treat this as a potential source of self-improvement rather than humor, this will be a five-star book for you.

Sit down with someone you care about and discuss the lessons that you both draw from the humor. That will give you the added benefit of becoming closer, as well as wiser.

If the book doesn't make you laugh, think about why! Why is the humor stalled?

26 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars The New Yorker 75th Anniversary Cartoon Collection Is Biased, December 26, 1999

By	Mary Pugh (New York, NY) - See all my reviews

I just read this book cover to cover. I found it a vanity-piece for the editor and was disappointed by the selection and presentation of the cartoons.

The introduction is precious and information-free. On the preciousness, who expects or wants to read the cartoon editor's version of humorous writing? On the content, I wanted to know how the cartoons were chosen and how he chose to distribute them through the book. Also, some of the cartoons were smudgy and hard to read --- it would have been interesting for the intro to discuss the shape the various originals were in.

I was amazed to find that the editor included as many of his own cartoons in the anthology as he did of Charles Addams'. Even if he considers his own work at the level of Addams', it would be more graceful to leave the announcement of this fact to someone else. His parents, perhaps.

Finally, I would have really enjoyed seeing the cartoons grouped in some manner, by genre or by decade for example. Seeing either the evolution of topics or the universality of topics would have been interesting. I suspect that such a sorting would have made the past few years of New Yorker cartoons look topical and transient --- as I have found them in the magazine itself.