Monday, April 29, 2013

Day Jobs of the Poets



This comic is factual, but it requires a couple clarifications: Wallace Stevens was an executive at an insurance company, not your average insurance salesman. And there's no evidence that Emily Dickinson liked cats, but her sister Lavinia was cat-obsessed. So Emily must have been forced to cat-sit occasionally.

You can order a poster here.

23 comments:

  1. you should really put a pinterest button! love your comics btw!

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  2. The colors in the flag of Chile are wrong, Pablo Neruda its hate you right now

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  3. Larkin was a university librarian not a public librarian. University of Hull

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  4. despite the quibbles, this is brilliant.

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  5. It is absolutely brilliant. Love it. Just wondering why 10/12 poets are male?

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  6. bukowski really worked at the mail company. love it. dr. ford is right, you should do one with female poets, too.

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  7. Thanks all! I'm sensitive to the fact that most of the poets are dead white men of English descent. I considered including Gertrude Stein (among others), but she would require a more avant garde approach... :)

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  8. "So Emily must have been forced to cat-sit occasionally" seems like it might have been plagiarized from a freshman comp paper (but not a good one).

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  9. @ Anonymous - so most Universities in the UK are *not* "public?" - or what...! Doooh..

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  10. You can't use a university library if you're Joe Boggs, a member of the public. You can apply for special admittance privileges but typically if they accept you're not allowed in past 5pm. Uni libraries are for uni students.
    Thrilling stuff.
    But yes, wonderful comic despite the small mistake :)

    --different Anon

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  11. Just to weigh in on the debate, here was my basis for the Philip Larkin, Public Librarian line:

    "In autumn 1943 Larkin was appointed librarian of the public library in Wellington, Shropshire."

    Straight from Wikipedia, so you know it's legit.

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  12. Em, the colors of the Chilean flag are wrong: The bottom is red and the little square is blue, bot the other way around

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  13. This reminded me of the Gashlycrumb Tinies. Perhaps lesser-loved poets have been assaulted by bears in another panel.

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  14. Why not Nabakov, lepidopterologist? He studied butterflies fairly seriously for most of his life, in addition to writing novels.

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  15. Well, Nabokov wasn't wasn't a lepidopterologist as a day job. But then, I suppose Herman Melville wasn't an aspiring harpooner as a day job, either.

    Vladimir Nabokov, lepidopterologist;
    Ezra Pound, aspiring fascist.

    More that might be notable or at least amusing:
    Sylvia Plath was a psychiatric receptionist, and Anne Sexton was (briefly) an advertising model.

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  16. You are clearly brilliant, Grant! I love your illustration style, your humor, your insight, and your color choices. Why are you studying orthodontics instead of illustration/design?

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  17. jobs in middle east
    http://india.dzemploi.org/

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  18. She sights a Bird - she chuckles -
    She flattens - then she crawls -
    She runs without the look of feet -
    Her eyes increase to Balls -
    Her Jaws stir - twitching - hungry -
    Her Teeth can hardly stand -
    She leaps, but Robin leaped the first -
    Ah, Pussy, of the Sand,
    The Hopes so juicy ripening -
    You almost bathed your Tongue -
    When Bliss disclosed a hundred Toes -
    And fled with every one -

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  19. Emily D looked after cats,
    William Yeats was sort of bats.
    Tommie Eliot kept the books,
    Melville wrote of thieves and crooks.
    Jackie K. stayed on the road,
    One not taken by Frost we're told.
    Williams dealt in little babies,
    Larkin dealt in "ifs" and "maybes."
    Maya went from song to verse;
    I s'pose she could have done far worse.--C.C. Twombly

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  20. Melville waorked at the Customs house.

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