The blog of Richard Thompson, caricaturist, creator of "Cul de Sac," and winner of the 2011 Reuben Award for Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year.

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

A History of Valentine's Day Cards

This is also from the Post mag, Valentine's Day '03. And every word of it is true. I was shocked to find out that my editor didn't know that diarist Samuel Pepys' name is pronounced "Peeps", especially as I'd only learned it the day before. I always thought it was Pep-eez, which is actually a stomach antacid.


6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Waw I'm just mad about your works Richard. I'm a french comics artist and discovered your blog with gocomics.com. I think I will read all the stuff you shared online :)
Really pleased to meet your comics (and sorry for the way I write english ;)

here today, gone tomorrow said...

Hah! You said, "furbelows"...

Danny Fry said...

I'm a greeting card artist and those little sentiments like "You urned my love" are not far off from the copy we have to illustrate. The recycled writing we work with can be depressingly pathetic. The upside... we get to illustrate a lot of fart jokes.

Thanks for sharing... I love all the stuff on that huge Heart Alice is holding especially the frog!

Bear said...

Great stuff as always, Richard. Thanks for posting the large versions. To aspiring cartoonists like myself, it's invaluable to see the pen and brush work up close and personal.

Mike Rhode said...

Of course it's Peeps! He founded the company that made the first English marshmallows - unfortunately he was ahead of his time and driven into working for the government - and regular whoring - by the new craze for coffee.

So - 5 pounds? Really? That's like a year's salary. No wonder he couldn't capitalize on marshmallows.

richardcthompson said...

Hey Ian, merci! And believe me, you write Englsh much better than I write French.

Heretoday, if I get a chance, I'll work "furbelows" into every possible conversation. And I'm not entirely sure what it means.

I've never gotten a card with a fart joke, Danny, and I'm a little disappointed. And I never get a chance to illustrate fart jokes, yet. My wife can make an origami frog that jumps; she used to make them all the time in restaurants while we waited for the food to come, then we'd have contests trying to make them jump into the water glasses.

Thanks, bear. I've figured out how to reduce the drawings in photoshop some but they still come out big; glad you don't mind.

Mike, I thought, as I said, it was Pep-eez and he'd invented an antacid. Which would go well with his actual invention of the pre-staled marshmallow treat, I'd say.