Private Eye cartoon: Fine-tuning jokes

"That's a little unfair, I just haven't found my niche."

I've got a couple of cartoons in the current Private Eye, here's one of them.

It's a reworking of a gag I sent round a few years ago which was rejected. The original drawing was a similar set-up but the cat looked depressed and said "I wouldn't say I was lost, it's more of a disaffected malaise".  I think I did another version where he spoke of "ennui". It's more than possible that I was over-thinking the joke.

While re-working it I removed the repeated use of the word "lost" in the caption and decided that making the cat look depressed was over-egging the joke. These were both crucial to making it all work, I think. Cartoons often need a little fine-tuning to get them right.

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Pet subject: More dog and cat cartoons

"It's a battle of wills – I'm refusing to do anything funny for his YouTube page ..."

Fashions come and go, governments rise and fall, but yer humble gag cartoonist carries on drawing jokes about cats and dogs. People love 'em! The cartoon above can be seen in the current issue of Reader's Digest, the one below was in the last Private Eye.

"They're the dog's Pollocks."

Cartoonists are often the worst judges of their own material – you never know what people are going to go for – I had few hopes for this cartoon.

My surprise that it was taken by Private Eye was nothing compared to the surprise that since it appeared two weeks ago I have had emails almost every other day praising the cartoon and asking for the original, prints and redrawn versions (including a request to rework it "with the dog as identifiably an Airedale Terrier".)

Expect more dog and cat cartoons ...

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Football cartoon: Make some noise

His Master's Vuvuzela

As the England football team face their final chance in the World Cup in South Africa tomorrow, here's a topical spin on a favourite cartooning theme. Paarp!

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Music cartoon: Taking it easy

His master's chill-out album.

It's been a while since I've had a cartoon featuring this little fella on the blog, so here's another one.

I've drawn so many variations on this theme over the years. Perhaps I should do a whole book of them and try to sell it through the HMV chain. Or maybe they would just tell me to stop.

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Twitter cartoon

"This is progress for you, social-networking that does not involve lamp-posts."

Here's a cartoon about Twitter, which was drawn to accompany an article about a dog that has its own Twitter feed. No, really! OK, maybe the owner had something to do with it.

I set up a Twitter account recently. I was very sceptical about it at first, as I couldn't see the point of it. But as with all these sites, you really have to try them out to see what it's all about. I can use it in a social-networking way or to point people in the direction of this blog and my portfolio site.

I find that it's a lot more instant than Facebook and it's also good fun. There are a lot of very funny people on there, such as ace comedian Peter Serafinowicz and the comedy writer Graham Linehan, sharing thoughts and links.

My Twitter updates now appear on the right of this blog (though obviously some of the links would just send you back here!) or you can follow me at twitter.com/roystoncartoons.

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Cat and dog cartoons

Over the years I have done many cartoons on the subject of cats and dogs, including the one above which was in Private Eye in 2004. So when I came to do a revamp of my portfolio site recently I decided to create a gallery exclusively consisting of cat and dog cartoons from various publications, for all you pet lovers out there.

Here it is: Cat and Dog Cartoons. Enjoy (I hope no one's allergic?).

Music cartoon: A surprise appearance

People often ask if I send a new batch of cartoons to several magazines at once. The answer is no, I send in rotation i.e. I send the gags to one magazine at a time, then any that don't sell I will send to the next magazine on my list. And so on. The main reason is that you'd look a bit silly if several magazines wanted the same cartoon. And the editors concerned wouldn't be too happy about it.

But there's another reason and it's this: sometimes they will print the cartoon before they've got around to telling you they're using it! Or there's some communication breakdown and you don't get the message. The above cartoon is a case in point. It is in this week's Spectator magazine, but I only found that out yesterday while browsing through the mag in in WHSmiths.

Regular readers will note that this is not the first time I've done an "HMV dog" cartoon. And it probably won't be the last.

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Cartoonists' party time

It's that time of year when even cartoonists emerge from their hovels to attend Christmas parties. And so it was that last week I went along to a party thrown by Reader's Digest (cartoon from the Christmas issue, above) at the restaurant at the top of the Harvey Nichols store in Knightsbridge, London.

Much champagne was quaffed and canapes nibbled, while chatting to other cartoonists, illustrators, writers and Digest staff. There was the usual complaining about the cartooning business, as is traditional, and marvelling at some of the bizarre canapes. One of them looked like tomato soup in a small, thin glass and turned out to be, er, tomato soup in a small, thin glass – a kind of Harvey Nichols version of Cup-a-Soup.



Here's me, on the right, with cartoonists Ger Whyman, aka "Ger", left, and Ian Baker, aka "Ian Baker". Ger's not really cross, I think he's pulling a comedy face. Thanks to Clive Goddard for the pic. Afterwards several of us retired to a charming, tiny pub nearby for a fine pint of ale. A good start to the festive season and particularly welcome as most of us have been drawing flippin' Christmas cartoons since August.

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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!