The comic strip, actually, was a little more than thirty-five years old when I was born…and represented to me, as a boy growing up in the Great Depression… a kind of cultural, comic, cornerstone of my life that allowed my life to be my life because everything else in it was on the downside.
Recorded on November 7, 2009.
From cartoonist Milt Gross to the Marx Brothers, from Popeye and Blondie to Jack Benny and Charlie McCarthy, Depression-era humor channeled the spirit of a nation through hard times to high and silly hopes. Jules Feiffer, Pulitzer Prize–winning cartoonist, playwright, and children’s book author, gives a guided visual tour he describes as “cultural anthropology with laughs” in this time of resurgent interest in the Depression.
The annual Richard Gray Visual Art Series recognizes a significant gift from founding CHF board member and distinguished art dealer Richard Gray.
Teachers' Guide
The Chicago Humanities Festival has prepared a teachers' guide for this program. Download the Jules Feiffer Study Guide now!
