Our interview with Bill Watterson | Hacker News Reader

Our interview with Bill Watterson

mentalfloss.com

112 pointsrhubarbcustard23 comments

This one paragraph summarizes everything that I love and respect about Bill Watterson:

> had signed most of my rights away in order to get syndicated, so I had no control over what happened to my own work, and I had no legal position to argue anything. I could not take the strip with me if I quit, or even prevent the syndicate from replacing me, so I was truly scared I was going to lose everything I cared about either way. I made a lot of impassioned arguments for why a work of art should reflect the ideas and beliefs of its creator, but the simple fact was that my contract made that issue irrelevant. It was a grim, sad time. Desperation makes a person do crazy things.

I also highly recommend reading his 1990 commencement speech at Kenyon College (his alma mater): http://www.angelfire.com/wa/HOBBES/info/speech1.html

I first read that years ago, and one line has always stuck with me: "Selling out is usually more a matter of buying in. Sell out, and you're really buying into someone else's system of values, rules and rewards."

Big fan of Bill. As a kid I used to read comic strips of calvin and hobbes in our daily newspaper. That comic section was the only reason I bought the newspaper. When they stopped publishing the stips I stopped buying the paper :)

Most of us who read calvin and hobbes know that how philosophical it can be. Nuggets of wisdom can be found beneath the funny quips.

> Everybody seeks happiness! Not me, though! That’s the difference between me and the rest of the world. Happiness isn’t good enough for me! I demand euphoria!

The actual interview:

http://mentalfloss.com/article/53216/mental-floss-exclusive-...

It was submitted earlier today but never got to the front page.

This is the same link as the one attached to the thread, though this may be due to after-the-fact HN moderation?

In any case, this is just an excerpt of the full interview which will be printed in the December issue of the magazine.

Yeah a mod changed it, thankfully.

> I figure that, long after the strip is forgotten, those decals are my ticket to immortality.

The biggest payout of all.

Again, another missed opportunity by the interviewer: Does Bill favor Chevy or Ford?

Shame. From what I understand, this guy is incredibly hard to get an interview with. So they manage to score one, and perform the mother of all rookie interviews.

Rather than ask followup questions on any of the interesting things the subject has to say, the interviewer seems to almost want to cut him short to ask the next unrelated question from his list. Terrible.

Watterson: ..It was a grim, sad time. Desperation makes a person do crazy things...

Interviewer: Great. So what kind of car do you drive?

I really wish we could get a do over on this one.

In all fairness, this is only an excerpt, so theoretically he could've asked followup questions in the full version from the magazine. On the other hand, the thoughtfulness of the questions excerpted do not bode well for the full version.

Maybe it was conducted by email? Could be, so no follow ups were available.

from the article:

"Since we’re guessing there are a few Calvin and Hobbes enthusiasts in the audience, we thought we’d provide a glimpse of the e-mail exchange."

TFA says it is a "glimpse of the e-mail exchange". I, too, would have liked to see him elaborate on what he said, but since the interview was conducted over email, I can't blame the interviewer for cutting him off.

Also, judging from the 'glimpse' part, that is just an excerpt. There is the possibility that he elaborates in the dead-tree version.

I agree. I felt it was a terrible (excerpt of an) interview, in so far as the word and analogy choices made the questions seem like they were plucked from a professor's profile in comp lit journal. Whether or not Mr. Watterson found it hard or work-intensive to comprehend and answer these questions is beside the point. The questions should have been more simply phrased. I feel like their content challenged the precedence of the answers, instead supporting or motivating them.

I wish you had linked the actual interview [0] because it took me way, way too long to find it in the linked article, which only offers two select quotes from said interview, and spends way too long praising the guy that got it for how rare a privilege it is.

[0] - http://www.cleveland.com/living/index.ssf/2010/02/bill_watte...

Edit: I'm slightly mistaken -- one of the quotes is actually from his previous interview, here:

http://mentalfloss.com/article/53216/mental-floss-exclusive-...

Actually, I think this is the new interview:

http://mentalfloss.com/article/53216/mental-floss-exclusive-...

You're right, I had them backwards. Thanks :)

For those in Boston interested in seeing the full story, I note that mental_floss is one of the digital magazines Boston Public Library now provides patrons through Zinio[1]. Unfortunately, I still see the November issue, but hopefully the December issue will show up soon.

[1] http://www.bpl.org/collections/zinio.htm

Is that cover a new Bill Watterson original?

Seriously. Of all the uncompromising, highly-principled characters amidst the vast depth and breadth of all English literature... why would anyone ever compare the guy to some fictional Randroid character like "Howard Roark"?

What an awful, awful choice. What kind of stupid shit IS that?

Good eye; I thought they were referring to Network, but that's Howard Beale.

No accounting for taste, eh?

I understand your point, although I wonder if there are many more characters that are "top of the shelf" reference points for highly-principled artists... curious who you would've preferred?

[disclaimer: I have an undergraduate degree in English Literature, which doesn't mean ALL that much, tbh, but I've read a book or two.]

The only thing worse than making flame bait comments like this is making throwaway user accounts to do it. Please don't do this on HN.

And I say this as someone who has criticized Ayn Rand numerous times on Hacker News. Just in ways that were more constructive and germane to the point.

I fail to understand this. Is your dislike of Rand overwhelming your ability to make a fair comparison? Roark's burning of "his" building provides the simplest example of an uncompromising act and damn-the-outcome that I can think off. Who would you use? Jesus and the money lenders? Ahab's hunt? Julius Levy killing his daughter? I can't think of anything even remotely as appropriate.

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