Dave Coverly is creator of Speek Bump, one of the most popular cartoons in the country. This is Part 5, follow the links for an Intro, Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 and Part 4.
Your subjects seem pretty human, pretty common to us all. How often are they autobiographical?
They're almost never strictly autobiographical in their
actual jokes. I've found that it's almost impossible to take a real-life situation and fit it neatly into a single panel cartoon. There's just never enough context.
Most of my jokes are sort of amalgamations of situations. That being said, my life does affect what I pick as subject matter. We got a dog and cartoons started to come out of that. And when we had kids, I started doing gags that may not have been straight from life, but they were jokes that I definitely would never have thought of before we had kids. My personal life is never something I put into cartoons, but it does have a very direct influence.
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Thanks for this article about Dave Coverly. I am a fellow Plainwell High School graduate and I have followed his career for years (I even get Speedbump emailed to me every day through comics.com -- what a great way to start the day!). I reguarly communicate with Dave and saw him speak at Plainwell Middle School just a couple weeks ago. Those of us in Plainwell have long known and supported Dave's talents and it's great to see others out there discovering him as well.
Posted by: Dianna Stampfler | April 29, 2006 4:27 PM | Permalink to Comment