The Naked Cartoonist: A New Way to Enhance Your Creativity

by Bob Mankoff

Only people like that buy books like this...or write them."

So says Robert Mankoff—and he should know. As cartoon editor of The New Yorker , and one of its most gifted contributors, he spends his life pursuing that elusive thing called creativity, and inspring it in others. If you've ever wondered where great ideas come from, or yearned to channel your creative energies, or just wanted some pointers on how to get those artisitic juices flowing—this book was written for you.

Along with some help from his well-known cartoonist friends, Mankoff takes you on an entertaining words-and-pictures journey through the art, craft, and zen of cartooning, along the way providing lots of personal anecdotes about his development as an artist, and about life at the world's most urbane magazine. But you don't have to be an aspiring cartoonist to appreciate The Naked Cartoonist . Mankoff's wisdom, and his practical yet whimsical approach to the creative process, are designed to benefit anyone who has ever stared at a blank piece of paper or canvas and dreamed of transforming it into something truly original (and maybe even commercial).

What's so funny? Mankoff knows best. He also knows how you can find your own personal voice and mesage, how you can learn from the masters of the past, how you can transform a current event into a comic tour-de-force...even how you can incorporate telling lies and taking naps into your daily work routine—and justify it.

Genres: Art, Comics, Nonfiction, Humor, Drawing

144 pages, Hardcover

First published November 1, 2002

Reviews

[Hannah Garden · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty cute.

[Chris Page · Rating 4 out of 5]

Despite what the subtitle tells us, this is not a new way to enhance your creativity.
There may be some pampered souls who have a magical muse in a box on their desk that beams ideas directly into their cranium or even grabs the pen and does the work for them, while the 'artist' drinks tea and bathes in ass’s milk and adulation, but these folks are as common as unicorns.
For most normal people, generating ideas is a process and that process is invariably a slog.
The approaches, or the slog, outlined in this book are not particular to cartoonists or even to visual artists. With adaptations to your media, your form, they probably apply to everyone — writers, musicians, and whatevers.
Boiled down to its basics, the approach is: pick up a pen and get on with it.
However, without creative elixirs, The Native Cartoonist is a tale well-told. It’s funny, and, as you would hope from the cartoon editor of the New Yorker, it is genial and full of funnies.

[Norma · Rating 4 out of 5]

I chose this book because I’ll read anything by R. Mankoff, AKA Bob Mankoff (confusingly listed on Goodreads as if he were two different authors). While I wasn't interested in enhancing my cartooning creativity, which I neither have nor particularly long for, his light touch, intelligence, and of course, humor, are addictive. And in those characteristics, The Naked Cartoonist does not disappoint.

Now, if my New Yorker subscription hadn’t recently expired, and if I hadn’t balked at the $82 price for 12 more months, and partly because I haven’t yet caught up with the current pile of unfinished issues that unrelentingly rolled in week after week, I’d still be able to partake of his amusing videos on the New Yorker website, "The Cartoon Lounge." If anyone out there would like to loan me their NYer ID and password -- honest, I’d give them right back -- you’d make me very happy.

[Bandit · Rating 4 out of 5]

When I was a kid I always thought these types of cartoons were boring and were for snobby grown ups. Even as an adult they don’t always make me laugh, maybe a breath out of my nose. However this book made me appreciate them and the challenge to make them. With regular comic panels you can build the moment to the joke, but in a single image I think it’s far more challenging. It’s like a photo, finding the perfect snapshot and adding a caption that resonates with people- funny or not. I have an entirely new perspective on these types of comics.

[Ietrio · Rating 1 out of 5]

From a political activist, a book of meh cartoons. Each time I had the impression that there is more in the cartoons of a pretentious magazine like that, but maybe I wasn't reading the right article. Nope. Even the white washed selection of the chief weasel is meh. Maybe I should give them a second star to say thanks for helping me solve the mystery.

[Smh624 · Rating 4 out of 5]

A short, clever book describing the creative process used by the author to create cartoons, mostly for The New Yorker magazine. I think he did an excellent job of explaining something that can't really be explained. Lots of great cartoons!

[Carl · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very good, and funny, overview of what goes into creating New Yorker cartoons.

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed the cartoons, not so much the text.

[Phil Witte · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bob Mankoff knows cartoons--in particular, single-panel gag cartoons of the type seen in The New Yorker magazine. He contributed many cartoons to that magazine and was the cartoon editor for 20 years. In this book, he explores the creative process, that mysterious way that ideas arise in the minds of creators and how they become visible in the hands of an artist. Along the way Mankoff includes amusing anecdotes about his own career, supplemented with many excellent cartoons. Incidentally, the cartoon on the book's cover is included in Funny Stuff: How Great Cartoonists Make Great Cartoons, which I co-authored with Rex Hesner, to make the point that a reader must understand cultural references--in this case, Rodin's sculptures--to fully appreciate certain cartoons.

[Alan · Rating 5 out of 5]

A New Way to Enhance Your Creativity is its subtitle and Robert Mankoff, cartoons editor at the venerable New Yorker magazine really does his best to fulfill that credo. First he talks about himself, and by talks, I mean establishes his credentials through several excellent cartoons while introducing the magazine and describing its singular impact on the craft. Mankoff then takes pains to dissect and explain what exactly a cartoon is. Then he begins to explore the creative process, from idea genesis to full actualization of a cartoon. He then tackles irony and duality, noting some memorable caption contest winners. Then, as an added bonus, he enlists 11 cartoonists as diverse as Gahan Wilson and Marisa Acocellato depict their creative process by sophisticated use of the medium. Inspiring, creative, and a blast to read regardless, The Naked Cartoonist is a delight for humor lovers.

[Harley · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is fun. The author is the cartoon editor for the New Yorker, and it's mostly illustrations, New Yorker cartoons, so there's a chuckle on every page while he talks about what makes a cartoon work. Good coffee table book besides entertaining text. I've actually been through it once just reading the cartoons, which is how I first approach a New Yorker magazine anyway. Now I'm reading the how-to text.

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

First book on creativity I've read that actually paints a path forward. Also, New Yorker cartoons.


SPOILER ALERT

The secret is, you have to let yourself get bored. If you deprive your brain of stimulation, it will start to entertain itself. Write down what it comes up with and go from there.

[Shanejohnson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I probably read this book several times a year. A keeper.