Sunday, June 20, 2010

HE COULD MAKE US ALL LAUGH. IN THIS PARTICULAR HOME, THAT GAVE HIM AGENCY: Two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Gene Weingarten doesn't write** terribly often, so when he does it's usually a must read. Today's Father's Day piece on starting a comic strip with his son Dan is no exception. [A link to the strip: Barney and Clyde.]

** Clarified: doesn't write long pieces very often. There's still the humor column.

6 comments:

  1. sconstant10:55 PM

    I've followed and enjoyed the first bunch of Barney and Clyde strips, hope they get some traction.

    (FWIW: The best strip I'd been missing is Cul De Sac - focusing on a group of four year olds, specifically one named Alice, but also including a bit of her family and her peers.  Kind of vaguely reminicent of Calvin, but not in a bad way (and in agreement, Bill Watterson, who wrote the forward to the first collection.)  I recently went back and looked at all of them in collections and online and some of the creator Richard Thompson's other panel strip, Richard's Poor Almanack.  Recommended.)

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  2. Technically, Weingarten writes every week--he has a humor column in the Post Magazine. But his longer pieces are, in general, much better than those columns.

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  3. Worth noting.  Yeah.

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  4. Genevieve10:29 AM

    Second the recommendation for Cul De Sac.

    I didn't think I was going to like Barney and Clyde, despite being a Weingarten fan - it sounded like a hokey idea (millionaire and homeless guy hang out, homeless guy shares his wisdom).  But it's pretty good and I look forward to continuing to read it.

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  5. Joseph J. Finn10:50 AM

    As someone looking forward to kids a few years down the road, definitely an interesting read.  

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  6. Having read many things that Gene has written, including his chat, this article surprised me on a certain level.  He seems very self-aware but he totally missed the boat with his own kid.  As a former teacher, it's not an uncommon sight but I am still surprised when it occurs.  Parents are not objective and have a hard time making objective decisions in regards to their kids.  This is a great article.

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