Bill Watterson

Bill Watterson

William B. "Bill" Watterson II (born July 5, 1958) is the author of the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes and a few poems (which are mostly embedded in his works).

Life

Watterson was born in Washington, D.C., where his father, James G. Watterson (1932 - ), worked as a patent examiner while going to law school, until becoming a patent attorney in 1960. The family moved to Chagrin Falls, Ohio when Bill was six years old; his mother (Kathryn) became a city council member. He has a younger brother, Tom, who is a high school teacher in Austin, Texas.

In 1980, Watterson graduated from Kenyon College in Gambier with a degree in political science. Immediately the Cincinnati Post offered him a job drawing political cartoons for a six-month trial period:

The agreement was that they could fire me or I could quit with no questions asked if things didn't work out during the first few months. Sure enough, things didn't work out, and they fired me, no questions asked.

My guess is that the editor wanted his own Jeff MacNelly (a Pulitzer winner at 24), and I didn't live up to his expectations. My Cincinnati days were pretty kafkaesque. I had lived there all of two weeks, and the editor insisted that most of my work be about local, as opposed to national, issues. Cincinnati has a weird, three-party, city manager-government, and by the time I figured it out, I was standing in the unemployment lines. I didn't hit the ground running. Cincinnati at that time was also beginning to realize it had major cartooning talent in Jim Borgman, at the city's other paper, and I didn't benefit from the comparison.

Calvin and Hobbes was first published on November 18, 1985.

Watterson spent a huge portion of his career trying to change the climate of comics. He believed that the artistic value of comics was being undermined, and that the space they occupied in newspapers continually decreased and was subject to arbitrary whims of publishers (on one occasion, Watterson said "I am a cartoonist, not the leader of a commercial Calvin and Hobbes factory.") Watterson believes that art should not be judged by the medium for which it is created (i.e., that there is no "high" art or "low" art, just art).

Watterson is also known for battling against the arbitrary structure publishers imposed on newspaper cartoons: the standard cartoon starts with a large wide rectangle featuring the cartoon's logo, and the strip is presented in a series of rectangles of different widths, limiting the cartoonist's options of allowable presentation. Watterson managed to get an exception to this constraint for Calvin and Hobbes, allowing him to draw his Sunday cartoons the way he wanted. In many of them the panels overlap or contain their own panels; in some of them the action takes place diagonally across the strip.

Moreover, Watterson battled constantly against the many things that he felt cheapened his comic. He refused to merchandise his creation on the grounds that pasting Calvin and Hobbes images on commercially-sold coffee mugs, stickers and t-shirts would devalue the characters and their personalities. This also explains his refusal to allow the strip to become an animated series. Watterson fought this uphill battle against the pressure from publishers with success, until and beyond the end of his career.

Watterson took two extended breaks from writing new strips, from May 1991 to February 1992 and from April through December of 1994.

In a brief letter newspaper editors made public November 9, 1995, Watterson announced his retirement:

Dear Editor:

I will be stopping Calvin and Hobbes at the end of the year. This was not a recent or an easy decision, and I leave with some sadness. My interests have shifted however, and I believe I've done what I can do within the constraints of daily deadlines and small panels. I am eager to work at a more thoughtful pace, with fewer artistic compromises. I have not yet decided on future projects, but my relationship with Universal Press Syndicate will continue.

That so many newspapers would carry Calvin and Hobbes is an honor I'll long be proud of, and I've greatly appreciated your support and indulgence over the last decade. Drawing this comic strip has been a privilege and a pleasure, and I thank you for giving me the opportunity.

Sincerely,

Bill Watterson

The last strip of Calvin and Hobbes was published on December 31, 1995. Since retiring, Bill Watterson has taken up painting, often drawing landscapes of the woods with his father. He has also published several anthologies of Calvin and Hobbes strips.

According to the October 2005 issue of Maxim, Watterson requested that Universal Press Syndicate not forward any fan mail.

Living in relative seclusion in Chagrin Falls with his wife Melissa, Watterson refuses to sign autographs or give interviews., emerging only occasionally into the public eye On December 21, 1999, a short piece called "Drawn Into a Dark But Gentle World," written by Watterson to mark the forthcoming end of the comic strip Peanuts, was published in the Los Angeles Times, and most recently in October of 2005, Watterson answered fifteen questions submitted by readers. The Wattersons have been seen sometimes roller skating at the rink in Chagrin Falls.

Awards

Watterson was awarded the National Cartoonist Society Humor Comic Strip Award for 1988, and their Reuben Award for 1986. He was the youngest person to ever receive the award. He received the same award in 1988, and was nominated again in 1992, before the National Cartoonists Society announced a new rule: no artist could win the award more than once.

Influences

Bill Watterson said in one of his interviews that he had been influenced by: Charles Schulz, for his work in Peanuts, Walt Kelly for his comic, Pogo, and George Herriman for Krazy Kat.

• Watterson's style also clearly shows the influence of Little Nemo in Slumberland, a popular early 20th century comic strip by Winsor McCay.

Trivia

• Bill Watterson designed grocery advertisements for four years prior to working on Calvin and Hobbes.
• Bill Watterson is the subject of a song by Neil Cicierega, featuring the lines "Bill Watterson, can't you hear me? / Bill Watterson, please don't fear me / Don't treat me like I have rabies / I only wanna have your babies".
• Bill Watterson wrote a brief, tongue-in-cheek autobiography in the late 1980's
• He is a good friend of Lynn Johnston, creator of For Better or For Worse.
• Was vocally critical of Jim Davis and his decision to license his strip Garfield to so many different things, saying that it "cheapened" the originality of the strip.

External links

• Michael's Calvin and Hobbes Website-Bill Watterson Includes information about the genius behind Calvin and Hobbes, as well as speeches and interviews.
• Calvin & Hobbes Comics at uComics
• "After an Early Bedtime, Calvin and Hobbes Are Up and Running in a New Collection" - Washington Post book review of "The Complete Calvin and Hobbes", October 2005, including broad look at Watterson's career.
• Interview with Bill Watterson's mother (interview begins around 7:10)
• Of Counsel - James G. Watterson - Watts Hoffman law firm bio of Bill's father
• Chagrin Falls Council Staff - Picture of Bill's father (the inspiration of Calvin's father)