Return of the scary clown cartoon

Regular readers to this blog will know that when I doodle I often seem to end up drawing sinister and/or sleazy looking clowns. Some people have even been helpful enough to suggest that this indicates some deep-seated psychological problem and I should probably seek help.

I'm starting to think they may be right, as even by my standards the guy above, who emerged yesterday when I was supposed to be thinking of a cartoon for a client, is pretty disturbing.

Royston's portfolio website

Cartoons appreciated by their subjects

"It may surprise you to hear that, actually, morphine is the best medicine."

This old cartoon is to be reprinted to accompany an article written by, wait for it, a clown who works in hospitals, voluntarily giving his time to cheer up patients.

It's not often that someone who is effectively the subject of a cartoon gets in touch to say how much they appreciated it, but it's great when it happens.

Here's another example: This Reader's Digest cartoon was used in a lecture on black holes by a professor who is an expert in that field.


"I'm afraid there's a black hole in our finance department."

And here's my favourite example. Unlikely though it sounds, the original of this cartoon, which appeared in The Spectator, was bought by someone whose work involves Health and Safety regulations pertaining to fairground rides.
"Damn those Health & Safety guys."

If only this kind of thing happened with every cartoon, we cartoonists would be a lot richer!

Royston's portfolio website

Cartoons: You love them!

There's no doubt that there are significantly fewer markets for on-spec gag cartoons these days, hence we all have to branch out into other areas. But it's good to see Reader's Digest keeping the faith.


On top of the usual selection of gags there's an extra section in this issue, which includes a couple of mine (above). The contents page reads: Cartoon Bonus: You love them. Here's more. Music to the ears of any cartoonist, so amen to that!