Garry Trudeau Quotes

I don't want to sound disingenuous here - controversy is obviously good for business, especially if your business is satire. And it does amplify the discussion - in my view, a good thing.

At some point free expression absolutism becomes childish and unserious.

I can only try to keep the characters interesting; it's up to the readers to decide whether they're still relevant.

Humor can inform and break down stigma, which is a huge issue in the military.

I just happen to have one of those skill sets that allows me to work in my underwear.

Anyone dumb enough to get his political information from a comic strip deserves what he gets at the polls.

The systematic dismantling of reproductive rights, much like the takedown of collective bargaining, has been taking place in full view.

I'm still passionately interested in what my fellow humans are up to. For me, a day spent monitoring the passing parade is a day well-spent.

For the most part, editors no longer view 'Doonesbury' as a rolling provocation, which is fine by me. It makes no sense to intentionally antagonize the very people on whose support you most depend.

Comic-strip artists generally have very modest ambitions. Day to day, we labor to fit together all these little moving parts - a character or two, a few lines of dialogue, framing, pacing, payoff - but we certainly don't think of them adding up over time to some larger portrait of our times.

Coming up with ideas is really hard - they don't spontaneously pop into my head while I'm cutting vegetables.

Commencement speeches were invented largely in the belief that outgoing college students should never be released into the world until they have been properly sedated.

America: the only country in the world where failing to promote yourself is regarded as being arrogant.

Keith Knight is mapping out a previously unknown vector of the vast cartoon universe.

I'm never happier than when I'm not working. The strip is a job - that's why I take money for it. It's a job I'm passionate about, but it's a job I totally leave in the studio when I walk out of here, unless I'm late and I have to work at home. I never think of the strip unless I'm compelled to.

There's always been some concern that adult subject matter should be quarantined from a page that attracts children. Unlike late at night, when 'South Park' and 'Colbert' are on, impressionable minds are wide awake when the newspaper arrives.

Having stretched the boundaries some, I'm perfectly content now to work within them. 'Doonesbury' doesn't need to become 'South Park.' You won't ever see any singing turds.

In any event, it's not exactly a secret to regular readers what my views on the war are.

In Palm Springs, they think homelessness is caused by bad divorce lawyers.

Not only was one cartoonist gunned down, but riots erupted around the world, resulting in the deaths of scores. No one could say toward what positive social end, yet free speech absolutists were unchastened.

I think it's very dangerous for people who do anything that's public to venture on the Web and check out what people are saying about them. Yes, you're bound to find things that will delight you - but you also find things that will make you brood and feel bad about yourself. Why would you intentionally invite that into your life?

Freedom should always be discussed within the context of responsibility

Isn't it possible that self-esteem isn't causal at all, but simply the happy side effect of a sturdy character, itself the product of unambiguous moral education?

I found that not having a public profile was not hurting the work, and it freed me up to be the satirist I wanted to be.

Lives have been altered in fundamental ways, and later, after they acquire a more complete understanding of what goals are actually attainable, many are left facing a lot of pain and frustration. And yet, there's no culture of complaint.

That's what fiction writers do: create characters and do terrible things to them for the entertainment of others. If they feel guilty enough, they write happy endings.

There is nothing worse than annotated humour.

I try to take people one at a time, with all the contradictions and compromises that most of us live with.

I'm a pointillist, just working my tiny little piece of the canvas. I'm not so good at perspective.

Satire is a form of social control, it's what you do. It's not personal. It's a job.

At college my three main interests were - in descending order of importance - a steady supply of recreational drugs, a 2-S draft deferment, and overthrowing the Nixon administration.

I don't think so, but it's always in the back of my mind that many of the soldiers being wounded and killed in Iraq are about the same age as my kids. My godson is going over soon, so the war's about to get personal for me.

Comic strips are like a public utility. They're supposed to be there 365 days a year, and you're supposed to be able to hit the mark day after day.

I try not to second-guess editors; they're the clients, and I have no expectation that my strip is going to make it into every paper every day.

Becoming the new feminine ideal requires just the right combination of insecurity, exercise, bulimia and surgery.

When you're young, with less on the line, it's easier to be audacious, to experiment. So I introduced the concerns of my generation - politics, sex, drugs, rock-and-roll, etc. - to the comics page, which for many years caused a rolling furor.

Most writers seem to prefer the morning, or they feel at their best in the morning. Ideas are popping into your head while you're in the shower. And that's true for me, as well.

The strips about the military do seem to provoke moving and thoughtful responses. It's nice when the strip resonates, but more importantly, I need to know when I'm getting something wrong. The last thing I want to do is contribute to the suffering that wounded warriors already endure.

Medical decisions have been politicized. What doctor wants a state legislator in his consulting room?

As far as I'm concerned, there is no subject that's off the table.