James Thurber: In the Office of Dr. Nuss

A drawing by James Thurber set in a doctor's office was sold at auction on Tuesday by Heritage. The name Dr. Nuss is on the door, the letters reversed except for the pesky N. The patient, a woman, is speaking to the attentive doctor, but no caption is provided by the auction house. The drawing is dated 1932. Maybe that's a clue.

James Thurber
Heritage Auctions, August 25, 2023

https://fineart.ha.com/itm/mainstream-illustration/james-thurber-american-1894-1961-doctor-s-office-dr-nuss-1932-ink-on-paper-8-1-2-x-14-inches-216-x-356-cm-sheet-sign/a/8114-71041.s?ic16=ViewItem-BrowseTabs-Inventory-BuyNowFromOwner-ThisAuction-120115

The hammer price was $2,000 plus a 25% buyer's premium.

The drawing, it turns out, is actually a published New Yorker cartoon from, yes, 1932. It was reprinted in editor Michael J. Rosen's Thurber collection People Have More Fun Than Anybody (1994). Like most New Yorker cartoons, it's better with the caption.

"Then I get this feeling that my feet are trying to tell me something but can't."

James Thurber

The New Yorker, September 24, 1932, p. 13

"Then I get this feeling that my feet are trying
to tell me something but can't."
James Thurber
Original art
The New Yorker, September 24, 1932, p. 13
Thurber, James, and Rosen, Michael J., ed. People Have More Fun than Anybody: A Centennial Celebration of Drawings and Writings. Harcourt Brace, 1994, p. 128

Cartoons by Alan Dunn and James Thurber

https://archives.newyorker.com/newyorker/1932-09-24/flipbook/012/

I wish I'd known about this Alan Dunn cartoon in the summer of 2019 when a certain U.S. President proposed buying Greenland from Denmark.

"You see, political economy is Glenn's hobby. Now he
wants to carve up Greenland."
Alan Dunn
The New Yorker, September 24, 1932, p. 12

Note:  My thanks to New Yorker cartoonist Michael Maslin for his Sherlockian ability to track down a ninety-year-old Thurber drawing without the aid of a caption.

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