Review of Pogo Volume 2

Walt Kelly, October 1994, Pogo volume 2, Fantagraphics. This volume covers June 27th 1949 to December 10th 1949. This is the second of 11 large-format paperback volumes of daily syndicated strips that were published by Fantagraphics. Unfortunately, Pogo was published for well over 20 years, which would have taken more than 40 volumes like this. However, the same publisher is currently reprinting all of the daily strips and the color Sunday strips, and has so far published eight of 12 planned volumes in hardback format. These books (the series reviewed here) that were published in the 1990s are long out of print, although still available used. The new series is in print, though one or two volumes may be temporarily out of print. <br><br>

RC Harvey's introduction to this volume includes a lot of information about Kelly's time at the Disney studios from 1936 to 1941. It also compares gags from the New York Star, shown in volume one, with the same gags repeated in different forms in this volume in the syndicated strips. In the early days of Pogo, Kelly pretty much stayed away from political satire, which was such an important feature in the strip from 1952 on into the 70s. Instead, he pretty much stuck with vaudeville and slapstick, which of course played a major role throughout the entire run of Pogo.  <br><br>

One of the most remarkable things about the early Pogo strips is that in 1949 Walt Kelly was already breaking the fourth wall routinely. This occasionally included the characters specifically referring to their world as a comic strip or as something that was drawn. In other cases, characters would light matches against the borders of their panels, or lean against them. Also, the word balloons often extended out of one panel and into the next. All three of these techniques were used as early as 1949. <br><br>

One of the characteristics of the Pogo strip is the abundance of puns. For instance, in this book, Mr Weevil says that he knows the Chinese weevil trick. Speak no weevil, and people put their hands over their mouths, hear no weevil, and they put them over their ears, see no weevil, and they put them over their eyes. Mr Weevil then picks up the picnic lunch hamper and takes off in a hurry, while everybody else says now what? <br><br>

In this book Albert uses a line that he uses again later in the strip. "Funny how a good lookin' fella looks handsome in anything he throw on!" This is part of a sequence in which Churchy and Howland trick him out of a box of cigars. The brand? El Falfa, priced at 20 for 5 cents. <br><br>

Note that the cover illustration shows a Thanksgiving dinner, with a turkey as special guest. <br><br>