Boats against the Current
There exists a relic of which all cartoonists know, but none will speak.
Okay, I’ll do it. The essence of this story I’m about to tell is true, although some parts of it may be factually suspect. I’m just going to assume that you’re smart enough to be able to tell the difference. How can I assume that you’re someone with a high degree of intelligence (not to mention culture and taste)? You bought this book; ’nuff said. So, not many people know this, but when Moses came down from the mountain bearing the two stone tablets with the Ten Commandments inscribed on them, he also brought with him God’s afterthought, a yellow sticky note that had the Cartooning Commandments written on it. Now there were no newspapers, internet, or media coverage of any note back in those days, which is probably why you’ve never heard of the Cartooning Commandments. But . . . somehow, in some mysterious way, these antediluvian principles would become known to newspaper editors, syndicate editors, cartoonists, and, Lord knows, most especially readers of newspapers. Which explains why the Cartooning Commandments have been hewed to religiously (pun, of course, intended) ever since, and it’s the reason that comic strips have remained virtually unchanged until, oh, I don’t know, let’s say some of the strips contained in this volume. At the time, the Cartooning Commandments weren’t nearly as spicy as the Ten Commandments, what with all the thievery and coveting and everything in the latter, and since there were no newspapers, etc., etc., around, they soon were relegated to the dustbin of antiquity, never to be seen again by the eyes of man. Until I looked them up on the internet.
From The Complete Funky Winkerbean Volume 9
