WE GO POGO

Walt Kelly (1913-1973) is one of the most respected and innovative American cartoonists of the twentieth century. His long-running Pogo newspaper strip has been cited by modern comics artists and scholars as one of the best ever. Cartoonists Bill Watterson (Calvin and Hobbes), Jeff Smith (Bone), and Frank Cho (Liberty Meadows) have all cited Kelly as a major influence on their work. Alongside Uncle Scrooges Carl Barks and Krazy Kats George Herriman, Kelly is recognized as a genius of funny animal comics.We Go Pogo is the first comprehensive study of Kellys cartoon art and his larger career in the comics business. Author Kerry D. Soper examines all aspects of Kellys career--from his high school drawings; his work on such animated Disney movies as Dumbo, Pinocchio, and Fantasia; and his 1930s editorial cartoons for Life and the New York Herald Tribune. Soper taps Kellys extensive personal and professional correspondence and interviews with family members, friends, and cartoonists to create a complex portrait of one of the art forms true geniuses.From Pogos inception in 1948 until Kellys death, the artist combined remarkable draftsmanship, slapstick humor, fierce social satire, and inventive dialogue and dialects. He used the adventures of his animals--all denizens of the Okefenokee Swamp--as a means to comment on American and international politics and cultural mores. The strip lampooned Senator Joseph McCarthy during the height of McCarthyism, the John Birch Society during the 1960s, Fidel Castro during the Bay of Pigs fiasco, and many others.