How does a cartoonist get an idea that will strike a chord with people everywhere?

Here is the cartoon by New Yorker cartoonist Liam Walsh that quickly went viral:

And here's Walsh discussing, in a New Yorker video, how he came up with the idea:

CLICK ON THE PHOTOGRAPH TO ACCESS THE VIDEO LINK.

Also read:

• When furniture get nightmares

• Telling it like it is... with cartoons

• One of India's most famous cartoonists, Hemant Morparia, bemoans the decline (and possible early death) of the political cartoon in India. (Scroll down to read the item on Morparia.)

• A Commits alumna's long-drawn affair with illustrations

Should a cartoonist apologise when readers complain his work is "insensitive and tasteless"?

Fourteen people died and as many as 200 others were injured in an explosion in a Texas town earlier this month.

Last week a newspaper published from Sacramento, the capital city of California, published this cartoon by Jack Ohman on its editorial pages:

Joshua Gillin, writing on Poynter, tells us that Ohman has said on his blog that he had received many complaints calling it (and him) “insensitive and tasteless” and pointed out he had drawn much more graphic images in the past to make his points.

I knew it was close to the edge, but I went with it, and I don’t go with things I can’t defend. I’m defending this one because I think that when you have a politician travelling across the country selling a state with low regulatory capacity, that politician also has to be accountable for what happens when that lack of regulation proves to be fatal.

Ohman also writes on his blog that when he has to come up with these ideas, he is not deliberately trying to be tasteless. He continues:

What I am trying to do is make readers think about an issue in a striking way. I seem to have succeeded in this cartoon, one way or the other.
 
The question is whether it is tasteless or not.
 
My answer, respectfully, is that it isn't.

Read Ohman's blog post here to understand how to defend brilliantly and pithily the seemingly indefensible: 'Explosion' cartoon published to make a point.

• ALSO READ: "Telling it like it is... with cartoons".

• Sherry M Jacob-Phillips (Class of 2007), who is a journalist in Bangalore, commented via e-mail:
  I found Jack Ohman's cartoon strip a tad insensitive, but the message was clear. Hence, it served the purpose. But where is the need for him to apologise? The cartoonist is not making any assumptions here; instead, he is sketching an independent analysis of the situation. If writers can express every note that lingers in their mind, then why prevent cartoonists from doing so? Ohman justifies his stance by writing that he is trying to make people think about an issue in a striking way. This is the best way by which one can measure the levels of press freedom a country enjoys. If you fear such cartoons, then just stay away from them.

How a great cartoonist does what he does

Did you know each cartoonist who freelances with The New Yorker, that storied magazine founded by Harold Ross in 1925, is required to submit 10 panels a week for consideration (nine of which typically get rejected)?

How do they do it? How do they come up with so many original jokes?

Well, thanks to Jeff Bercovici of Forbes, we know how one great cartoonist does it. In an interview with Matthew Diffee, who draws cartoons for The New Yorker and other media organisations, Bercovici draws out the essence of a cartoonist's light-bulb moment. We learn that Diffee parks himself at a table for the first hour or two of each day — however long it takes him to drink an entire pot of coffee — and forces himself to free-associate on a blank sheet of paper. That means writing, not drawing:

Diffee says his cartoons always start with words, not images. Typically, he’ll take a phrase that’s lodged in his mind and tweak it this way and that until he comes up with something funny or hits a mental dead end. By the time he fills up the paper, he usually has at least a couple workable ideas.

Here is a Diffee cartoon from a recent issue of The New Yorker:

“I’m sorry, Paige, but grades are based on the quality of the writing, not on your Klout score.”

Diffee also demonstrates how he does what he does in a brief (less than five minutes) video interview with Bercovici:

You can read the Forbes interview here: "New Yorker Cartoonist Matthew Diffee Shows How To Be Creative".

And take a look at a collection of New Yorker cartoons here.

• Additional reading: An insight into the ingredients of great writing from The New Yorker.

• Also read: "A man whose genius for cartooning matches his flair for wit" and "Hadi Farahani, the most brilliant illustrator and cartoonist I have met".

• Plus, meet the R.K. Laxman of England, Matt of The Daily Telegraph: "There’s no cartoonist like Matt. With his sharp humour and kind touch, he expertly captures the absurdities of everyday life. No wonder our readers start the day with a smile" — A tribute by Mick Brown.

The most intelligent comment I have read on the Aseem Trivedi controversy

COURTESY: AJIT NINAN/ToI

There have been many reports and editorial comments on the arrest in Mumbai last week of cartoonist Aseem Trivedi. But it is veteran journalist Salil Tripathi, whose writing I admire, who has put the whole issue in perspective.

And the issue, he writes in his column in Mint is not whether Trivedi's humour is juvenile or witty. That is irrelevant.

To be sure, the cartoons for which Trivedi landed in trouble are neither great works of art, nor are they necessarily funny. Like graffiti, some of his cartoons remind one of teenage toilet humour ...  But... his right to express himself is fundamental, even if it is a rant ... For the Constitution recognizes his right to express himself, without preaching violence. And he aims to taunt and ridicule, even if he may end up irritating and disgusting some. But that’s the point of the law.

And look how Tripathi treats the person who filed the case against Trivedi in the first place:

When the laws are wrong and the defendant acts to exercise his freedom, what is the state to do? Err on the side of freedom. And yet, unfortunately, from the police who registered the complaint of a random busybody (who shall remain nameless here, to deny him the oxygen of publicity he craves), and the prosecutor who decided to argue the case, and the magistrate, who thought it fit to admit the case, the state has capitulated again to the hypersensitive, insecure among us.

This is commentary of the highest order. Read the column in its entirety here: "Aseem Trivedi vs the State".

COURTESY: RAJNEESH KAPOOR

Also read:

• "Cartoons, politics and hypocrisy", by another Mint columnist, P.N. Vasanti, who is the director of the Centre for Media Studies.

• And here are two of Salil Tripathi's columns that I have referred to in the Reading Room earlier: A critique of Arundhati Roy's Outlook essay and A tribute to Soumitra Chatterjee.