Category: Charles M. Schulz

The all-time greatest comic strip

Happiness is… Facsimile Editions

Until the publication of The Complete Peanuts, my favorite books with Charlie Brown & Co. were the old Holt, Rhinehart & Co. reprints that sold for $1. Reading them on Christmas mornings is a particularly happy childhood memory. Forty years ago I happened to come across a large collection of the original paperbacks for cover price at a used bookstore. As a bonus, most of them are first printings.

My buddy Denro surprised me with a few facsimile editions of the paperbacks, published by Titan Comics. A direct comparison with the original books shows they are indeed exact replicas. Peanuts, from its modest Truman-era beginning to its LBJ glory, really comes alive in these collections.

For a deep dive into what Sparky Schulz created with pencil and ink on paper, there is the Unpacking Peanuts podcast.

https://www.unpackingpeanuts.com/podcast/

A very different Schulzian world is found within Monte’s new novel, Metropolis. It’s complex, and densely packed, with many quotable lines. A review will be coming up, as soon as I get to a million other things that have “best if done by” dates associated with them.

https://www.amazon.com/Metropolis-Monte-Schulz/dp/1683965795/

Sparky at 100

Schulz with Donna Wold, the inspiration for “the little red-haired girl,” April 1950

There are plenty of online notices right now about Charles M. Schulz, who was born 100 years ago today. Terry Gross interviewed Schulz in 1990. Good Ol’ Monte gets a nod, as does cartoonist Jimmy Johnson’s then-wife Rheta, who wrote Good Grief!: The Story of Charles M. Schulz.

Schulz with Charlie Brown’s namesake, Charles Brown, a co-worker at Art Instruction, Inc.

Apple-infused Pumpkin

Note: The first airing was October 27, 1966, not 10/22.

Good thing I kept last year’s PBS airing of It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown on my OTA TiVo. This year, Apple TV+ will be the only place showing the cartoon, ending its 55-year run on broadcast television.

https://appleinsider.com/inside/apple-tv-plus/tips/how-to-watch-its-the-great-pumpkin-charlie-brown-in-2022