- Cartoons communicate ideas in ways words alone cannot.

Today's guest uses cartoons to offer humor and insight on everything from politics to literature.

He's "Wrong Hands" creator, John Atkinson, this week, on Story in the Public Square.

(upbeat music) Hello, and welcome to Story in the Public Square, where storytelling meets public affairs.

I'm Jim Ludes from the Pell Center, at Salve Regina University.

- And I'm G. Wayne Miller with The Providence Journal.

- This week, we're joined by John Atkinson, the incredibly talented creator of the cartoon "Wrong Hands" and author of "Abridged Classics: Brief summaries "of books you were supposed to read but probably didn't".

He joins us today from his home in Ottawa, Canada.

John, thank you so much for being with us.

- Thanks for having me.

- So we first stumbled upon your work in "Abridged Classics", and we want to talk about that in a moment.

But first, tell us a little bit about your background.

How did you become a cartoonist?

- Well, I, as a child, I always did cartooning.

I love to draw.

I was always drawing.

And actually, I think as a teenager, I may have been so brash to even submit some of my cartoons to some magazines.

Here was this brash 13 year old thinking his cartoons were fantastic.

I bought one of those books, I think they're called the Artist Market, that shows you the submission guidelines for different magazines, like The New Yorker.

At 13 years old I started submitting my work.

I think I still have those rejection letters somewhere.

So that was going back to a long, long time ago.

And then the cartooning sort of fell away as a young adult.

And when I went to university I studied fine arts, on the road to becoming a famous artist.

So I got my degree in fine arts.

And for many years was a practicing artist, a painter, sculpture, did little installation work.

Moved to big city of Toronto in my twenties to be the famous artist.

That didn't work out, as usually doesn't for most.

And I realized at one point, if I wanted to continue to pay my phone bill, I probably needed to do something on the side.

So I started doing a little bit of graphic design on the side, which I was not, I didn't have any formal training to do, but as a graduate of visual art, I had some of those skills.

So I started doing graphic design.

That sort of took over everything after a while, and then came children and adulthood and bills and mortgages.

And so the cartooning kind of dropped away.

I always had it in my back pocket.

I always was still drawing.

When the children were very young, I used to entertain them by playing a game where I would tell them to describe any situation.

And they would say, "An elephant with an umbrella riding a bicycle."

So I would immediately sketch that out for them.

They would laugh, and then they would color it in.

And that was the spark that started me again with cartooning, so a little later in my life.

So I think I can thank the children for that.

And then I started to work on, sort of back to my roots, started working on some single panel cartooning.

and then one day thought I should just throw these on the Internet, see if anyone likes them.

And that was about 10 years ago I did that.

And here we are today.

- And people, people definitely like them.

I'm curious, going back to, even your time as a child, playing with cartoons.

Is there something about that form that particularly resonates with you?

- I think, yes.

I absolutely think there is.

And of course my biggest influence, I'm sure most cartoonists my age would say the same, but Charles Schulz and "Peanuts".

I was an avid reader of that strip.

I loved it.

I absolutely loved that strip.

And I think what resonated with me from that strip was not only the sort of the humor of it, but I liked that Schulz was not afraid to deal with sort of more serious subjects.

And he would often talk about philosophy and literature and religion and spirituality.

And even as a young child, I think I sort of connected with that, and I thoroughly enjoyed his work, and I think that's probably what sent me on my journey.

So yeah, that's pretty much... Yeah.

- So John, we're gonna get into as many of your cartoons as we can, given the time.

And let's start with something that I would say is brilliant in its simplicity.

And that is "Tent Discontent".

And the first cartoon shows a tent with clouds overhead, everything looks great.

And the second one to the right shows exactly the same tent, the same sky, with a caption, "I hate this".

(men chuckling) Did that come from your experience with your kids sleeping out, or where did that come from?

It's just, it's so funny, as all your cartoons are.

- Well, if anyone has ever gone camping with me, which are very few people, because I generally don't camp.

(men chuckling) My standard line to people is, that's why I bought a house, so I don't have to sleep outside.

That's my camping joke.

But I think more, that cartoon, like a lot of my work, just deals with word play.

I love language.

I love playing with words.

I love playing with the sounds of words.

And I think for that cartoon, and many like that, I do a lot of them where they are very simple that way, but I think it's mostly just playing with language and playing with the meaning.

If you change a few letters, suddenly the word has completely different meaning.

The image stays the same, but the tone is different.

So I think that's sort of what I was getting at there.

- So let's get into a, quote, unquote, more contemporary cartoon, and that's "Regency Novel or Pandemic Life".

And of course, as we're hopefully coming out of the pandemic, it has particular resonance.

It's both topical, meaning relating to events today, but also historical.

It hearkens to a decade in the early 19th century in England when Jane Austen and Sir Walter Scott were literary luminaries.

Break that cartoon down for us, please?

- Yeah, well, basically it's an image of two 19th century Jane Austen type of characters standing face-to-face, and basically describing what it's like, for both, oh, I should back up.

When we were in lockdown, when I was shut in my house, I couldn't stop thinking that this is so much like a Jane Austen novel, where people are always inside.

People are always sort of questioning, "Oh, who's that outside?

"Oh, why are they coming, they can't come over.

"I can't go near those people."

So it just sort of grew out of that, where I was making that comparative analysis between how we were living our contemporary life in lockdown and how in those novels, in those Regency novels, in those early 19th century novels, social restraints were already there.

Not because of a pandemic, but more because of etiquette.

But I wanted to make that correlation.

It made me feel happier to think I was in a Jane Austen novel rather than a pandemic.

(men laughing) - So the next one is "Anatomy of Songs".

And again, I laughed at this, but I also thought, do think, that it's brilliant, because it captures, in simplicity, but also with brilliance, types of songs.

And it's called "Anatomy of Songs".

And you have Indie, Country, Blues, Pop, and Classic Rock.

And I'm just gonna give our audience a breakdown of what you have under Classic Rock, at 0:00, which would be the beginning.

Come on.

Then you have guitar solo.

Then you have cars, girls.

Then you have drum solo.

And then you have all right.

And that's the anatomy of a Classic Rock song.

Talk about this great strip too, please?

- Yeah, I, again, it's, and I think most cartoonists would say that, boiling things down to its most simplest level always makes it funny.

When you take out all the detail, you take out all the nuance, and you boil it down to that bare minimum, it becomes quite comical.

And of course, obviously I'm dealing with cliches and tropes of popular music.

So when I took those different genres and sort of broke them down in the way I hear the songs, and almost, for each genre there's a certain cliche that everyone follows.

So that cartoon is basically these little timelines that tell you what to expect in every genre of song.

I did a series of those.

I think there are three or four in that series, because, and it was interesting because I got a lot of pushback from people.

A lot of people saying it was great.

Other people being rather insulted that I would take, their favorite genre of music and break it down to an enormous cliche.

But I think that's where the humor lies, in this cartoon, I believe, and in most of the cartoons I do, is taking things down to their simplest form.

- So John you've published a book, "Abridged Classics", where you, all the stuff we were supposed to read in college, you distilled down into a single cartoon.

Tell us a little bit about the book as a whole?

- Well, the book came out of the series of, I think three cartoons I initially did, for my blog.

The first one called "Abridged Classics".

And the inspiration for that one came from, I stumbled across an article, a survey had been done, I believe it was in the UK, but I could be wrong.

But I read in this survey that apparently 60% of people lie about reading classic novels.

And I thought that was really interesting.

And then also 40% of people rely on television and movies for their knowledge of classic literature.

And I thought that coupled with our fascination with Tweet culture and sound bites, I thought it would be interesting to help everyone out and simply take these classic novels and boil them down, again, to their simplest level of what they're about.

You're at a party sometimes, and you'll say to somebody, "Oh, I read this book."

And they'll say, "Oh yeah, what's that about?"

I have the answer in my book for you.

(Jim chuckling) You can basically just, in 10 words or less, describe these novels.

Now, I'm not advocating that people don't read.

I'm simply saying, I think this is a funny, a funny way to make it more apparent to people that these novels are very nuanced.

These novels are fantastic.

Boiled down to 10 words is ridiculous, in many, many ways.

And that's what makes it funny.

If you can take "Moby Dick" and boil it down to six or seven words, that in itself is, I think, is funny.

So that's where, and I always caution students, don't use any of these abridgments as book reports, (men laughing) Unless you want a solid D minus or an F on your book report, and don't use them in your book club people as well, because they'll ask you to leave.

So that.

Yeah.

- So the name "Wrong Hands", where does that come from?

- It's a very specific reason it's called "Wrong Hands", actually.

The way I draw my cartoons is probably unlike most people.

I actually draw them with my mouse, on my computer.

After I sketched them in my idea book, I take them and put them on the computer.

I'm lefthanded.

My mouse is for the right hand, as most computer mice are.

So when I first started putting the cartoons onto the computer, I was using my right hand and the mouse, which is my wrong hand, because I do draw with my left hand and I write with my left hand.

So all of the cartoons that I draw are done with my right hand, hence the name, "Wrong hands".

- Wow.

(Wayne laughing) That's because you wanted to make it harder?

I'm trying to understand the-- - Well, I think I, initially I was, I moved the mouse to my left hand, and I found, and this is gonna sound horribly pompous, and I apologize if it does.

I draw too well with my left hand.

And I found I got more freedom with my right hand, it became a little sloppier, it became a little freer, it became a little more cartoony.

And so I stuck with the right hand, I guess that would make me ambidextrous after 10 years of doing it, but I'm still quite horrible at writing with my right hand.

But I guess I can draw with my right hand now.

But that was the reason.

And I like to play on words of wrong hands, in the sense that when something falls into the wrong hands, anything could happen.

And so it was sort of a, like I said, a very specific reason, but I also like the word play.

- So let's hear a little bit more about the craft of what you do.

Do you work every day?

How do you get inspired?

Where does your inspiration come from?

And just talk about maybe sort of a day in the life of a cartoonist, you being the cartoonist, or a week in the life, however that works.

- There's a lot of sitting and staring at the wall.

There's a lot of, I need to think of something funny.

There's a lot of naps.

I find I think best when I'm lying down for a nap.

I would say I work every day, yes.

I try to produce two new cartoons a week.

That's the sort of schedule I put myself on, which doesn't sound like much, but is actually difficult.

I have, like, I showed you, I have like hundreds of these books, which are just riddled with ideas and notes.

And that's what initially, that's the initial process, is I carry these books around.

If something strike me as funny, if I think of a funny situation, or a funny play on words, I'll write it in the book.

I'll go back to it and try to figure out, can this be a cartoon?

Is there something that could work here?

Nine times outta 10 the answer is no.

But on the rare occasion, I think, okay, this could be a cartoon.

So that's part of the process.

I'm sort of always thinking of, could this work as a cartoon?

Does this make, is this funny?

And most of the stuff I do, if it makes me laugh, I figure, well, at least I laughed at it.

You know?

'Cause humor is a very subjective thing.

It's hard to say, oh yeah, everyone's gonna find this funny, because they won't.

- A lot of what you're saying, I can completely relate to as a writer, in terms of-- - Oh, yeah.

- Of scribbling notes and carrying things around and the old trunk novel, where you, where you've, in your case, you'd have cartoons.

I've got books, beginnings of books, short stories, whatever.

What I wanted to ask, how do you deal with distractions?

Because it doesn't matter where you live, really, pretty much, there are distractions in your professional life and in your daily life.

How do you deal with that?

Whether it's somebody knocking on the door, the mail is coming, or you're kind of bored and you want to check social media, talk about that.

'Cause I think our audience would find that fascinating to hear about.

- Well it's, you're right.

There's any one of a million distractions any day for any of us.

I think for myself, as I said, I'm a graphic designer.

I've had my own business now for probably 30 years.

And I've always worked out of my house.

So I've sort of trained myself to work around distraction.

It took a number of years to do.

But it was funny when the pandemic started and everyone started working at home, boy, I had so many friends contact me saying, "How do you do this?

"How do you work at home?

"I don't understand."

And I said, "It just takes practice.

"And it takes a little bit of discipline to say, ""When I go into this room, I'm working.'"

And I do have two rooms in my house that when I'm in those rooms, I'm working.

And that's how I, for myself, that's how I do it.

And I don't, obviously you get distracted.

I'm not gonna say I have like this rigid schedule.

I don't.

And there are always a number of distractions all the time.

But I think it's just a question of trying to manage your time properly.

And like I said, I have physical rooms I go in that I'm working when I'm in those rooms.

- John, there's a strip that you did, "Disappointing Moments in Evolution", which I adore, because you trace the evolution of dinosaurs and the birds over 65 million years, the platypuses' genetic stability for a 110 million years.

And then you note that over 180 million years, the crocodile, the famous Croc, turned into a pair of rubber foam shoes.

- [John] Yes.

- Which I absolutely adore, because my daughter has those shoes, loves those shoes, and I just don't get it.

(men chuckling) So much of some of your work draws from literary references, where did something like "Disappointing Moments in Evolution" come from?

- Again, I think it's just sort of the love of science that I have, I'm horrible at science, but I love scientific fact that kind of works in a little bit of history.

And I think, for that cartoon, I was, I mean it's absolute silliness at the end, but I think that's where the humor is, that it's completely silly that the crocodile turned into these, pardon me for saying, rather ugly shoes.

- They're hideous.

- Hideous, thank you.

- Yeah.

- That would be a better word.

And what a legacy for that poor animal.

But... (men laughing) I think, you know, my cartoons, there's a lot of literary references, there's a lot of historical references.

There are, on occasions, some science and technology references.

I guess I'm trying to cover all the high school courses.

I don't know.

But that one, yes, that just came from thinking about, it actually came from thinking about dinosaurs and how they turned into these sort of, I think the turkey is the closest relative to a dinosaur that exists.

And that always makes me smile.

I just think that's, Mother Nature is a mad scientist, and that just always makes me laugh when I think of that.

And so I wanted to build on that.

And the silliness of the platypus, and unfortunateness of the platypus, that he just never really got, he never really got going.

- Wayne mentioned the "Regency Novel or Pandemic Life" cartoon.

And I wanted to ask you about that.

Did you feel a certain pressure to reflect the pandemic in your work?

- Somewhat, yeah.

I think it's important sometimes for something that major to try and reflect the way people are feeling.

I think most cartoonists would say that they, yes, they did some pandemic cartoons.

It tough sometimes because you put pressure on yourself to say, oh, I have to come up with a funny idea about being in lockdown.

But I did feel a little bit of, maybe not pressure, but responsibility to just speak about that and how I was feeling and hoping that that would maybe resonate with people who were feeling down and feeling kind of, obviously, shut in, and then maybe giving them a smile.

So I did a few pandemic cartoons.

And it happens throughout the year.

Sort of when Christmas comes around, I usually will put out maybe a Christmas cartoon.

But I try and avoid that as much as I can, because I find that if I put that pressure on myself, I think the work suffers, because it isn't as natural and fluid, because I'm forcing myself to think about certain things.

But I thought the pandemic was important enough, and it affected and impacted so many people's lives, that it was important to at least address that.

- So this is one that I've looked at repeatedly.

I'm gonna laugh, even as I describe it.

I just had such a moment of joy, and that's "Shakespeare Spoilers".

And you've got three characters from Shakespeare.

You've got Hamlet, Macbeth, King Lear, and the caption under every single one of them is, quote, "everyone dies".

Talk about that.

- Well, again, that's the sort of boiling it down to the bare minimum of what is the plot of these, what is the similarity between these three plays?

All Shakespeare tragedies, I guess.

And it, again, is that idea of just taking it down to its barest minimum and saying, "What happens at the end of 'Hamlet'?"

"Well, pretty much everybody dies."

"What happens at the end of 'King Lear'?"

Well, pretty much everybody dies."

"And what happens at the end of 'Macbeth'?"

"Oh yeah, pretty much everybody dies."

I did a similar one for three Jane Austen novels, which under each of them, it says, "everybody gets married".

- [Wayne] Yeah.

- Which is pretty much the plot of those.

And again, I'm not insulting the work.

I'm simply making it accessibly funny.

- You're distilling it to its essence, I would say.

- To its essence, thank you.

That's what it is.

- So we've got about two minutes left today.

We could talk to you all day, but there's one that I wanted to talk to you about.

It's titled "Xenophobic World Map", and you've got a multicolored map of the world with each region labeled as foreigners, except for Antarctica, which is labeled penguins.

Do you get deliberately political?

- No.

I'm a very political person, but my work isn't.

And I usually avoid, I try to avoid any kind of political comment, mostly because I find it's too easy.

I know that sounds horrible.

But being political seems to be all the rage these days.

And I don't really want to get involved in the nonsense that's going on from all sides.

So that one is particularly political, but I thought it was visually interesting.

If you look at a world map and you put yourself in any of those continents, everyone else is a foreigner to you.

So it's more about point of view.

And that's all I was really getting at with that cartoon.

I wasn't trying to make any major political statement, other than, everyone's a foreigner to someone, and that's all I wanted to say about it.

So my work is not particularly political, but that is one of the more political ones, I suppose, of my cartoons.

- We have literally about 15 seconds.

Was there something about that issue that made you willing to go there, as it were?

- I think I did that one probably in 2016, 2017.

We all know what happened in an election in your country.

I think around 2016 when someone took power and was railing against immigration.

And I think that probably is what prompted that cartoon in my mind.

- Well, that's where we need to leave it.

John Atkinson, thank you so much for being with us.

The strip is "Wrong Hands", and you can check it out online.

That's all the time we have this week.

But if you want to know more about Story in the Public Square, you can find us on Facebook and Twitter, or visit PellCenter.org, where you can always catch up on previous episodes.

For G. Wayne Miller, I'm Jim Ludes, asking you to join us again next time, for more Story in the Public Square.

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