Doonesbury: He's Never Heard of You, Either

Doonesbury Annuals #19

by G.B. Trudeau

An instant biography of the Great Gonzo, John Connally's seminar on Free Enterprise Seminar Training, and Mike Doonesbury's support for the Anderson presidential campaign are included among this collection

Genres: Humor, Comics, Cartoon, Politics, Comic Strips, Nonfiction, History

128 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1976

About the author

Garretson Beekman "Garry" Trudeau is an American cartoonist, best known for the Doonesbury comic strip. In 1970, Trudeau's creation of Doonesbury was syndicated by the newly formed Universal Press Syndicate. Today Doonesbury is syndicated to almost 1,400 newspapers worldwide and is accessible online in association with Slate Magazine at doonesbury.com. In 1975, he became the first comic strip artist to win a Pulitzer, traditionally awarded to editorial-page cartoonists. He was also a Pulitzer finalist in 1990. He was nominated for an Oscar in 1977 in the category of Animated Short Film, for A Doonesbury Special, in collaboration with John Hubley and Faith Hubley. A Doonesbury Special eventually won the Cannes Film Festival Jury Special Prize in 1978. Other awards include the National Cartoonists Society (NCS) Newspaper Comic Strip Award in 1994, and the Reuben Award in 1995. He was made a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1993. Wiley Miller, fellow comic-strip artist responsible for Non Sequitur, called Trudeau "far and away the most influential editorial cartoonist in the last 25 years." In addition to his work on Doonesbury, Trudeau has teamed with Elizabeth Swados and written plays, such as Rap Master Ronnie and Doonesbury: A Musical Comedy. In 1988, Trudeau joined forces with director Robert Altman for the HBO miniseries Tanner '88 and the Sundance Channel miniseries sequel Tanner on Tanner in 2004. In 1996, Newsweek and The Washington Post speculated that Trudeau wrote the novel Primary Colors, which was later revealed to have been written by Joe Klein. Trudeau wrote the political sitcom Alpha House, starring John Goodman and Bill Murray. The pilot was produced by Amazon Studios and aired in early 2013. Due to positive response Amazon has picked up Alpha House to develop into a full series.

Reviews

[Valerie]

Mike campaigns for John Anderson, and runs into intractable name recognition problems.

I was intrigued by the title, and it got me thinking how few politicians actually DO know anything about their (actual or potential) constituents. They tend to assume they do know--but their pathetic reliance on polls that don't actually ask any determinative questions hampers them severely, and indicates that they don't actually intend to know people as persons (but rather as oversimplified categories).

Reminds me of one of my cousins who once failed a lie-detector test because, when asked "Have you ever considered stealing from your employer?" he thought to himself "Of course. How could I have decided not to do it, if I hadn't considered it?" But that answer wasn't one of the options--so either 'yes' or 'no' came out as a lie.

[寿理 宮本 · Rating 4 out of 5]

The big takeaway I remember is a different comic—unfortunately I can't remember which, and finding it would take longer than is worth searching for—where one of the characters remarks, "I read Doonesbury... that's LIKE the news, right?"

I think that's a bit too true for a punchline—albeit news on a six-to-eight week delay based on syndication times and with a storyline to it. Granted, this particular volume runs through a period when I (justifiably) wasn't particularly aware of what's going on compared to today, where social media means it's practically impossible to be unaware of what's going on... which means that all the political ills at current are mostly with the *approval* of the people in higher powers. Ugh.

At least "before" it was easier to be in the dark about stuff! For instance, if you didn't like it when Doonesbury printed something you didn't like, you could write to the newspaper and demand it get pulled, and that would be the last you probably heard about the thing Doonesbury mentioned due to media suppression and lack of social connectivity! These days, you have to aggressively curate your echo chambers to do the same!

I do like the strip in general, but I haven't followed the less political strips to be able to follow the regular Doonesbury characters that well. For instance, Mike spells out in this volume that he's a Democrat, but I need other cues to know which way most of the other characters lean, else I just generally guess that younger = liberal, older = conservative.

Which is true in general, I suppose, besides poor = liberal, rich = conservative as an additional (*typical* but not guaranteed) political indicator.

Also I just haven't read enough strips, especially consecutively, to remember all the characters' NAMES, much less their personalities and so on. Luckily, I found a BUNCH of the books together for CHEAP, so I can catch up! This one... just happens to be in the middle of a bunch of stuff I'm aware happened but am not familiar with enough to necessarily "get" all the jokes, other than politicians are crooked, rich people are greedy, and grifters gonna grift.

You know, normal stuff.

[Duncan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Just re-read it again. I'm sure I've read it a few times. This was the first Doonesbury book I ever bought in the wild. I must've been 14 or 15. No superhero comix for me when I was a teen. I was an intellectual of course. But of course despite being an intellectual I wasn't a genius so for me it was books and mostly mags about rock'n'roll, Kurt Vonnegut & Doonesbury comix. Doonesbury from the 70's and early 80's still holds up in my opinion. Not only is it pretty accurate political satire but also good social satire. Even more importantly & this is something Trudeau gets little credit for but it was a great character building narrative of the lives and times of the 60's generation of his particular group of characters. I really cared and about these characters and felt for their particular events and mishaps and trials. Doonesbury the strip fell off in quality once Trudeau started paying too much time and attention to political and social satire. He lost track of the great wacky pseudo-intellectual characters he had built up during the late 60's-70's. This edition is when he was still more interested in the characters but the coming change is on the horizon in this book. In particular the "Inside Reagan's Brain" series of strips. Okay, but no character building just making fun of the (at that time) presumptive GOP nominee for Pres. By the end of the 80's he would almost full-time be making fun of Bush, Quayle and other political and cultural (Trump!) targets and spending no time at all portraying the lives of the special group of characters that made his strips special in the first place. Pretty sad. Thank you.

[Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

Coming out in 1981 with strips from the first half of 80, they seem to be sticking to the pattern of covering one year in two “annual” books, a good improvement from the early days of the Doonesbury books. Between the presidential primaries and the hostage situation in Iran this run seems a little heavier than usual in political issues, not that the strip is ever short in that department. Zeke Brenner is revealed to be JJ’s significant other, we’ll see how long that lasts.

[Karen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Always worth reading.
My favourite bit?
"Of course if you want it to have literary merit, I'll have to charge you extra"
"What do you mean by literary merit?"
"Adjectives, adverbs, that sort of thing"

[Sally · Rating 3 out of 5]

Flashback to the early 1980s with lots of strips about the Independent candidate for president John Anderson, who was too articulate and thoughtful to win. Also strips on the Iranian hostage crisis and Zeke's ghostwritten biography of his odious uncle Duke. A mixed, but amusing collection.

[David]

On the 5th tour through the entire Doonescape. It never fails.

[Shoshanna · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of Iran and John Anderson...

[Craig Werner · Rating 2 out of 5]

The Iran Hostages, with Duke still in captivity; the last days of the Carter administration; Zeke and JJ; Zonker in the tanning tournaments; the John Anderson campaign that provides the title. (Wonder how many people remember Anderson today. The last Republican presidential candidate who got my vote.) Nothing that irritates me (or provokes me much at 30 some years distance), but a forgettable piece in the Doonesbury mosaic.