In my journey as a cartoonist, I seem to have accidentally stumbled into all sorts of traps, damnations and blacklists.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I became a cartoonist because I'd sort of failed at everything else, really. I mean, it was by default.
There are a lot of really great cartoonists out there. It's nice to be thought of as one of them.
People often ask me about my upbringing, and if there was anything particular about it that made me become a cartoonist.
I felt so painfully isolated that I vowed I would get revenge on the world by becoming a famous cartoonist.
Cartoonists' dirty secret is that we tend to come up with stories that involve things that are really fun to draw.
I went through a phase where people would introduce me at parties as a cartoonist, and everybody felt sorry for me. 'Oh, Matt's a cartoonist.' Then people further feeling sorry for me would ask me to draw Garfield. Because I'm a cartoonist, draw Snoopy or Garfield or something.
My transition from wanting to be a cartoonist to wanting to be a writer may have come about through that friendly opposition, that even-handed pairing, of pictures and words.
I don't think there's any independent cartoonist whose stuff I don't like or respect in at least some way or another. We're all marginal laborers - we're practically medical oddities - so I don't see why we can't all be nice to each other.
Sweetheart, I'm the biggest ripped-off cartoonist in the history of the world, and that's all I'm going to say.
The best thing about being a cartoonist is to walk into a bar or someone's apartment and they don't know you, but they've taped one of your pieces up.