Cartoon Marriage

With Valentine just around the corner, love is beaming in the eyes of many a young girl who is propositioned each year that leads to marriage. This sacred institution is a work of hardship and the rewards to be shared together in eternal bliss. Liza Donnely and Michael Maslin are a unique couple who happen to be cartoonists for The New Yorker. Together they have compiled a collection of the celebration of marriage. The trials and tribulations of the unity of two different bodies of thought. With over 200 gut busting cartoons we have the chance to see the works of a parody of sorts of their own union. There is only one couple who emulated this type of talent in the past, the Berenstains coupled their resources to give us insightful observations on marriage and children and look what spun out of that collaboration.

What happens when two cartoonists for The New Yorker fall in love and marry? Lots of witty wordplay, skewering drawings, and a healthy dose of illustrative competition. For twenty years, veteran cartoonists Liza Donnelly and Michael Maslin have been exploring in their work the ins and outs of marriage. From whimsical and wacky to risqué and barbed, their humor allows us to laugh at our follies and foibles and the insanity that is inherent in the day-to-day workings of every marriage. From meeting, wooing, and dating to marrying, divorcing, and remarrying, from having sex to having kids, the course of true love never runs smooth–but it’s excellent fodder for talented humorists.

Here, Donnelly and Maslin offer a his-and-hers view of marriage, a cartoon conversation about all that love entails. From the wedding day (“And do you, Louise, take Jack to be your husband until really, really pissed-off do you part?”) to cohabitation (“And this is where I go to escape from where I go to escape”) to parenting (“Dad says it’s all right with him if I watch TV as long as it’s not all right with you”), husband and wife give us hilarious insights into the way relationships work. Cartoon Marriage shares clever takes on male/female communication (“You could at least acknowledge the fact that I’m ignoring you”) and renovation (“I’ve made a few improvements, but the way you see him now is pretty much the way I found Harold eleven years ago”). And of course, what view of marriage would be complete without a trip to the bedroom: “Owen, look, the good-sex fairy.”