David Brass Rare Books, Inc., of Calabasas, California, offers a signed, limited edition of Arthur Rackham's exceptional Aesop's Fables (William Heinemann, 1912).
The price is $3,250.
Title page
Signed limitation page, no. 1103 of 1450
I am most intrigued by the announcement of an exhibition of Rackham's original book illustrations at London's Leicester Galleries:
The North Wind and the Sun
The Oak and the Reeds
Arthur Rackham AbeBooks listing accessed May 24, 2026
Note: I was not able to attend the Arthur Rackham exhibition at Leicester Galleries in 1912 and neither were my great grandparents. Still, I might like to see the price list, from anyone who may have benefitted from art-loving great grandparents who were also pack rats.
In The New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest #993 from the issue of June 8, 2026, three pigs are seated at a trough in a restaurant looking at the menus. The one on the left is speaking. My submission is shown below. The drawing is by Avi Steinberg.
"Could you explain for my brothers the advantages of having a brick oven?"
These captions weren't quite good enough for me to serve up:
"Is the slop fresh?" "I don't suppose the catch of the day is wolf?" "It appears the house specialty is bacon."
An original spot drawing of a girl sitting on horseback by Madeline author and artist Ludwig Bemelmans was published in The New Yorker in May of 1961. The art was framed in-house, apparently, and became part of the collection of writers Neil and Susan Sheehan. As a writer for the magazine, Susan Sheehan must have had access to a very nice selection of original art. This piece was sold on May 15 by Second Story Books.
Ludwig Bemelmans Framed original spot drawing The New Yorker,May 13,1961, p. 161
Another original New Yorker cartoon by William Steig, this one from 1969, was sold by Second Story Books on May 17. It had been collected by Neil and Susan Sheehan, she a writer for the magazine. One imagines they both appreciated the singular perspective on marriage the artist expressed in this drawing.
William Steig Original art The New Yorker, November 22, 1969, p. 57
The Motion Picture Association of America introduced its voluntary film rating system in November of 1968. The four original ratings were G (for general audiences), M (for mature audiences), R (restricted, persons under age 16 not admitted without a parent or guardian), and X (those under 16 not admitted). Edward Koren's cartoon, on the page opposite the Steig, provides the artist's take on the new ratings one year in.
In The New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest #992 from the issue of June 1, 2026, two rats stand outside of a laboratory maze. The rat who is speaking opens a jewelry case to reveal an engagement ring. My submission is shown below. The drawing is by Benjamin Slyngstad, whose work is new to me.
In the CartoonStock Caption Contest number 206, a man with an apple obscuring his face right out of a René Magritte painting is being wed in church to a woman with a fruit basket on her head à laCarmen Miranda. The cartoonist is Felipe Galindo, but his proper married name is Feggo.
Dearly beloved, this time around the rules of the monthly cash prize contest have changed: Five dollars will still buy up to three entries but now three additional dollars can optionally buy a fourth entry, and so forth ad infinitum. Real cash prizes are fifty percent of the total prize pool (previously $500) for first place and ten percent of the prize pool (previously $100) for each of five runners up. As of this writing, I've put $255 into the first fifty-one pay-to-play contests and this fifty-second challenge brings my total cash outlay up to $260. Having achieved runner-up status with three previous entries, I've collected $300 from CartoonStock, so I'm still playing with the house's money, thank you very much. The contest, though, is no longer subsidized by cash from the vast coffers of CartoonStock, making the contest's odds less favorable, I would think. To be sure, the odds may still be generally considered favorable if enough people feel inclined to pay $3 for additional entries, especially ill-considered ones, or if an entrant is generally superior at this captioning game than the average contestant.
Here's how the prize pool accumulated over time:
The prize pool as of May 11, 2026
The Prize Pool as of May 24, 2026
The Prize Pool as of May 25, 2026 before I purchased my entries
To my surprise, the full $5 entry fee was credited to the prize pool, not a percentage with fees removed. Therefore, I have no idea where the odd pennies in the pool are coming from. I would think the pool would be a sum of $5 and $3 entry fees, with no pennies.
The Prize Pool as of May 25, 2026 after I purchased my entries
If the prize pool comes to exceed $1,000, the potential take would then be greater than in previous contests.
My three entries this round are unveiled below:
"They found true love at a farmers' market." "May you kiss the bride?" "And do you promise to avoid food fights?"
June 7, 2026 Update: The Winner
Magritte's painting Le fils de l'homme (1964) is known as The Son of Man in the English-speaking world.
The Judges Deliberate
Of the judges, only the cartoonist Feggo had the good sense to choose one of my captions for his top ten. He listed it at no. 9. I'll take it. Lawrence Wood still wouldn't deign to mention it in his commentary:
As noted by Victor in the comments below, the final prize pool came to $933.22, not too far down from the old $1,000 prize before CartoonStock complicated everything with its cost-cutting. At the beginning of the video, Trevor Hoey confirms that the odd 22 cents came about as a result of foreign exchange rates.
In The New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest #991 from the issue of May 25, 2026, a castle is under siege. One of the warriors, sword in hand, does a ballet leap above the battle. Up in the turret, one of the castle's defenders speaks. My submission is shown below. The drawing is by Hartley Lin.
"That's another way to keep above the fray."
I don't think this one quite works:
"They said to prepare for battle, but he's dyslexic."
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