A budding cartoonist

My favourite comic strip of all time is Calvin & Hobbes by Bill Watterson - the collections of which I've read and reread many times since I was young. After taking an animation class I abandoned my dreams of being an animator (I didn't have the patience to draw the same thing over and over again) I decided that I wanted to be a cartoonist just like Bill Watterson. I made several false starts at representing the Mighty Orange-Peel in graphic novel form. Then I realised that I didn't really have the inclination for telling stories through pictures. I had too many words in my head. And, eventually, I came to the acceptance that I'm an illustrator. I enjoy pouring detail into one image that tells a story and then creating pictures with words.

However, at University, I made a brief foray into the world of comics again. I decided I had a voice/a unique perspective/a cynicism that my peers would appreciate. 'Back of the Queue' was born.

It was conceived as a comic that described how every Yalie felt. We'd all been top of the class, cocks of the walks in in respective home towns. Suddenly we were thrust into an environment where no matter what amazing thing you'd done, someone else had done it better. So, while we found camaraderie, we were suddenly thrust to the bottom of the heap in our struggles to find our 'specialness' that had once defined us.

It started out snappy and topical enough, but, eventually as sleepless nights and stress took over a sinister humour began to leak onto the pages. What resulted was a representation of my id (Angry Harry) torturing a caricature of myself. I think they worried other people. But even today they still appeal to the darker side of my sense of humour.

I made a few attempts at political statements in 'Queue' (which are not shown here because they're awful) to try and divert my attention, but ultimately, the comic ended. I finished with a dramatic flourish which can only be described as an artist's tantrum, and 'Back of the Queue' closed by running into a brick wall of my own self absorbtion.