A 1996 letter from cartoonist Eldon Dedini (1921-2006) to California school teacher Bruce Becker (1930-2022) gets right to the heart of Dedini's attitude toward his craft. Unfortunately, we don't have Becker's original letter that prompted this fascinating response. Apparently, some of Becker's students expressed doubts about cartooning as a profession, feeling "society places little importance in cartooning," much of the great work has already been done, and thus the the profession may not have a great future and its practitioners may not meet with financial success. Dedini's response is more than thoughtful; it seems to reflect a career's worth of rumination about his art form. The letter is just too good to paraphrase:
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| Eldon Dedini eBay listing accessed April 28, 2023 |
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| Eldon Dedini eBay item description |
Note: At post time, this inspiring note is still available on eBay. I have seen few letters from cartoonists that do such a fine job of articulating a philosophy of cartooning. Perhaps readers would like to share other correspondence of this sort here. This is your blog too, you know.
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