Alison Stewart: This is All Of It on WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart. The New Yorker magazine is known for its serious reporting, cultural coverage, fiction, interviews, but for many it is beloved for its cartoons. Now a new book is spotlighting the people behind the art in honor of the institution's 100th birthday. It's titled At Wit's End: Cartoonists of The New Yorker. For example, there's a picture of people walking their dog and then you realize one is a kangaroo and the woman says, "It has pockets," or the lumberjack who fells a tree and it's supposed to show the rings around it, but it shows Munch's The Scream.

It is filled with striking portraits of well-known cartoonists such as Harry Bliss, Roz Chast, and [unintelligible 00:00:55] Liza Donnell. There's recognition of those who have like Michael Crawford, who was known for his ability to capture cultural moments before anyone else, and Ed Fisher, who reportedly contributed more than 700 cartoons. In the print magazine it called the book an, "Elegantly designed showcase." The authors join me now in studio to discuss. Michael Maslin is a cartoonist and contributor to The New Yorker. Michael, welcome.

Michael Maslin: Thank you.

Alison Stewart: Also joining us is Alen MacWeeney. He's a world-renowned photographer. Nice to meet you.

Alen MacWeeney: Thank you.

Alison Stewart: You have your camera with you.

Alen MacWeeney: I have the camera with me, that's it.

Alison Stewart: Listeners, are you a fan of The New Yorker? What was a comic that made you laugh or made you think about a social issue or topic in a way you'll never forget? Our phone lines are open. Give us a call. 212-433-9692. 212-433-WNYC, or you can reach out to us on social media @AllOfItWNYC. Call or text. 212-433-9692. 212-4330-WNYC.

You have had a decades-long career at The New Yorker, Michael. When you think about the role of cartoons in society, what is it today?

Michael Maslin: I think it's as important today as it has been for 100 years at the magazine. We're still doing the same thing in a different way, in a more modern way of course, than we have always done. That is that we look around us and it goes through our cartoon brains and then something happens on paper. Hopefully, people find it either relevant or at least amusing. Our job has remained the same. I hope that we are still successful. I think we are.

Alison Stewart: What has changed a little bit? Things have to have changed a little bit over all this time.

Michael Maslin: Oh yes, well, plenty has changed. Styles, of course, have changed. The actual number of cartoonists that we have has changed in a huge way. It used to be a very small shop and now it's hundreds of people. It used to be maybe 30 or 40, so that's a huge difference.

Alison Stewart: Alen, when did you start taking pictures of these cartoonists?

Alen MacWeeney: 1978.

Alison Stewart: Wow. Wow.

Alen MacWeeney: An assignment from another magazine, actually Esquire magazine. Bob Ciano, our designer of the book, assigned me to photograph half a dozen cartoonists. They never actually ran in the magazine because he had left sometime shortly after that, but he persisted in wanting to do a book with the photographs. He used those same six photographs that I did then whenever he redesigned a magazine. They were always the ones he used.

It drippled on a little bit. Then it got going more quickly. In 2012, I began approaching The New Yorker to run a cartoonist every week as the hidden asset of the magazine. They'd never been seen before, so I thought this would be a good idea. Anyway, they didn't have photographs in the magazine when I first approached. Then went through another couple of editors. Eventually, I was assigned to photograph eight cartoonists for a special issue, that was in 2014. It kind of accelerated from that time. Then we got an agent and then the agent got us a contract and then we started getting down to it.

Alison Stewart: What's unique or different about taking a photograph of a cartoonist?

Alen MacWeeney: That's really a tough one to ask me. Michael is here. I couldn't say in front of him.

Alison Stewart: [laughs]

Michael Maslin: Go ahead, speak your mind.

Alison Stewart: What's something that's unique about that?

Alen MacWeeney: There's always a resource of humor in every cartoonist, even if they seem gloomy and rather nihilistic at first meeting but things change. We had a great time and I've enjoyed it. Mostly, I've really enjoyed photographing them. Everyone is totally different, obviously, and everyone has a different way of thinking. It's that sliver of difference that I hope to find in taking a portrait.

Alison Stewart: Let's take some callers. Richard is calling from Armonk. Hi, Richard, thank you so much for calling WNYC.

Richard: Hi, Alison, I've listened to you for years. I love you. My first time ever calling into a radio show. My favorite cartoon is two snails are looking across and they see a Scotch tape dispenser. One of them says, "I don't care if she's a tape dispenser, I love her."

Alison Stewart: [laughs] Such a good one. Thank you so much for calling. I know the one exactly he's talking about.

Michael Maslin: Sam Gross, I believe.

Alison Stewart: Oh, very good. This is a text. "On the internet, nobody knows you're a dog." Jack from Brooklyn. When you entered this project, Michael, what were some of the conversations you had about who to include in the book? What to include in the book?

Michael Maslin: Oh, that was a lot of conversation. We- I don't know if the word is struggled- but we spent a lot of time thinking about who should be in-- To go back to your first question, one of the things about The New Yorker now is that it changes more quickly than it used to change. The New Yorker was known for its glacial progress. It's not glacial anymore, it changes very quickly. One of the things I think we were concerned about was, "Let's find people who we think will be around for a while." That was on our minds. So far so good, I think, with everyone.

Alen MacWeeney: Yes.

Alison Stewart: Some of the photos, Alen, are just really funny. Some of them are hilarious. There's Gahan Wilson getting a haircut, but he looks anxious. Barry Blitt, he's peeking over a desk with his nose on the surface of the table. How did you decide-- You could have just taken formal photographs, formal portraits, but you chose not to?

Alen MacWeeney: No. Well, I mean, there was kind of an idea in the background that they should be humorous, the photographs, but actually, I don't think I ever take humorous photographs. Things are certainly somewhat whimsical, sometimes theatrical. The haircut, Barry Blitt's nose on his drawing table, and his false teeth. The false teeth? Whatever they are, not the false teeth, beside him, just seemed-- It's just catching a spirit of the moment, really, in a photograph. Sometimes when I had an assistant, it was easier. Sometimes I was alone and it was slower. We kind of figured it out. We're all more or less in the same boat.

Alison Stewart: Michael, what did you want to make sure that people could understand about the cartoonist from the essays?

Michael Maslin: Often when I read things, I like to read things and think, "How would I have done it to make it interesting for myself?" That's what I did with these. I approached each one of them as a brand new thing as if the others didn't exist. I thought, "What do I want to know about these people?" I looked at their work, I read up on them. I looked at videos, if there were videos. I looked at Alen's photos and I thought, "What do I want to know more about these folks?" That's how I approached each one. It was a new challenge. There was no format. In fact, we talked about format in the beginning. I said, "I don't want a format. I want to stay away from that. I want to be surprised as I go into each one." I'm hoping that my fascination with each of these people carries through to everybody else.

Alison Stewart: Photographer Alen MacWeeney and cartoonist Michael Maslin are here to discuss the new book profiling cartoonists of The New Yorker. It's titled At Wit's End. Listeners, are you a fan of The New Yorker magazine? How long have you been a reader? What was a comic that made you laugh or made you think about a social issue or a topic in a way that you won't forget? Please call us or text us. 212-433-9692. 212-433-WNYC. We're getting a lot of calls. Let's talk to Nick from Manhasset. Hi, Nick.

Nick: Yes, hi. Mine is a cartoon. It's a man sitting at a desk and he's speaking on the telephone. The caption says, "How about never? Does never work for you?"

Alison Stewart: [laughs] Tell us why you like that.

Nick: Well, it's kind of iconic. It's just timeless. It's economical in terms of the words, but it just says so much. I think it resonates with me at this time in our history. It's snarky, but it's witty. As I said, it's kind of evergreen. It's not tied to a specific point in time. Do either of your guests know the name of the cartoonist that created that?

Michael Maslin: Yes, we both do.

Alison Stewart: Both nodding.

Alen MacWeeney: Yes, we both do.

Michael Maslin: Go ahead, Alen.

Alen MacWeeney: Bob Mankoff, the former cartoon editor of The New Yorker, was probably his signal cartoon.

Michael Maslin: Absolutely.

Alen MacWeeney: That will be memorized for forever.

Alison Stewart: It's sort of funny. Back in the day, back in 2008, I think it was Bob came on my NPR show. It was a thing called a podcast they used to call them back then. We did New Yorker cartoonists that didn't make it right.

Alen MacWeeney: Oh.

Alison Stewart: We would do fake voices. We thought it was hilarious. What does it take to make it as a New Yorker cartoon?

Michael Maslin: Lots of luck.

Alison Stewart: Lots of luck, yes.

Michael Maslin: Lots of luck and persistence. Those are the two big ones, I think. Luck really is huge. I've been through four or five sets of editors, and your life at The New Yorker is dependent on getting through the first editor, the cartoon editor, and then, of course, the senior editor. I've gone from William Shawn and Lee Lorenz up to who we have now with many configurations in between, so luck.

Alison Stewart: Luck.

Michael Maslin: Luck.

Alison Stewart: Let's talk to Charlotte from New Jersey. Hi, Charlotte. Thank you for calling WNYC.

Charlotte: Hi. I grew up with The New Yorker. My parents loved it. My father especially just loved it. One of his favorite cartoons, he's long gone but was George Booth's-- Loved all his cartoons, which always had sort of manic women and befuddled husbands sitting in big armchairs and watching these wives go crazy. My favorite one, and his was racing across the living room, a woman with a spray can in her hand going, "Aphids on the heliotrope," and that was it. He was a gardener, so it spoke to him.

Alison Stewart: Thank you so much for calling. You can hear people are just laughing as they're recalling the cartoons, which is such a great thing. Let's talk about some of the cartoonists. We'll start with Roz Chast. Her first drawing was Little Things in 1978. What was interesting about her work?

Michael Maslin: Well, it was completely different than anything the magazine had seen before. That's why we all know her. When someone comes along that's that different, like Steinberg or Charles Adams or Peter Arno, James Thurber, we remember the firsts. She's in her own little thing there, Roz is. She doesn't have any-- As far as I know. I don't think there's anybody around that's doing her. She's just this wonderful cartoonist who gives us- I'll use it just once, I hope- world. She gives us her world, and it's funny as heck.

Alison Stewart: All right, I'm going to ask you about the picture I have of Roz.

Alen MacWeeney: Yes.

Alison Stewart: She's a bird; a real bird, on her finger. Tell us a little bit about this picture.

Alen MacWeeney: Well, I photographed her in her studio first, which is full of interesting religious icons. One photograph is in the book of that. Then we went down. She has a marvelous collection of art and also had a parrot. Obviously, the parrot sparked things up a bit. I think that's how that picture came about.

Alison Stewart: This text says, "My favorite cartoon is a picture of a human [unintelligible 00:14:31] ziti on the phone saying, "Fusilli, you crazy bastard! How are you?" Over the years, nothing has made me laugh harder. This scene, surly waiter leaning down on a customer at the table saying, "It's Brooklyn clam chowder. You got a problem with that?"" Now, it's funny, there's no accent, but I read it like I'm from Brooklyn.

Michael Maslin: Jersey accent you need.

Alison Stewart: Oh, yes, Well, I got that, too. Let's talk about Ed Koren, who passed away in 2023. He contributed for six decades. Is that right?

Michael Maslin: Yes.

Alison Stewart: What was his mark at the publication?

Michael Maslin: Well, just like Roz and all those other people I mentioned, I was very pleased to have been friends with him for a long time. We had lots of phone calls in the last year or so of his life. It occurred to me at one point to tell him I had never really thought about it before. People talk about the change in the mid-'70s, but he started in the early '60s. I said, "I think you actually were the pioneer who really changed what had been to the modern times," because no one had ever had these big giant, furry beasts before doing things and acting as people. That was hugely different. I started thinking about it. I was really surprised that James Garrity, the art editor at that time, that he welcomed Ed in. I thought, "Wow, how great." It was really new. It was really different. Again, his mark is that he has done work that we will always remember. You look at any fuzzy beast and you know it's Ed Koren.

Alison Stewart: Let's talk to Marcia from Manhattan. Hi, Marcia.

Marcia: Hi. Glad to be on your program. I love it, Alison. A cartoon that I remember from many, many, many years ago, a justice sitting on the Supreme Court in his full black robes, holding a daisy and pulling the petals and saying, "It's constitutional, it's unconstitutional. It's constitutional, it's unconstitutional." That stayed with me.

Alison Stewart: Thank you so much for calling. Let's talk to Fatima from Manhattan. Hi, Fatimah.

Fatima: Hi, how are you doing?

Alison Stewart: Doing great.

Fatimah Gilliam: My mother is such a fan of cartoons and The New Yorker, and she's always sending me pictures of what she's seen in The New Yorker and cartoons all the time. That sort of inspired me. I wrote a book that came out earlier this year on racism called Race Rules: What Your Black Friend Won't Tell You. I made sure that every single chapter has a visual representation. That is impacted by my mother always sending me these cartoons and just recognizing that so much more can be conveyed through the visual representation than just the text on a page. I was inspired by that.

I'll just say like one of my favorite cartoons, or rather illustrations in my book, I have a chapter that talks about most racists look like your everyday person. It starts out with two people in a museum looking at a portrait on the wall. It's a guy who looks like he's from the 1700s. Underneath it, it says, "Portrait of a racist." Then the one guy is saying to the other guy, "He looks like someone I know." Then the other guy says, "Who?" But then the guy who says, "Who?" looks just like the guy in the portrait, except he's wearing contemporary clothing.

Alison Stewart: Fatimah, thank you so much for joining. Do people write about what the cartoons mean to them? Do they write to the magazine?

Michael Maslin: That I don't know. I know that there used to be either fan mail or whatever the opposite of fan mail is. I haven't gotten a letter in years, so I don't know.

Alison Stewart: That's interesting. Let's talk about Maggie Larson. You have a picture of her here. She's against this-- looks like a board of--

Alen MacWeeney: A refrigerator.

Alison Stewart: A refrigerator./

Alen MacWeeney: Yes.

Alison Stewart: Very funny. Then the next picture of her- there's two pictures- and it's a picture of her holding up something she drew with a special pencil. Yes?

Alen MacWeeney: I'm not sure she actually drew that because basically, it's what's called horror vacui. Every inch of space off the canvas or the paper is filled with drawing. I thought it was such an unusual piece that was in her apartment that I asked her to take it down.

Alison Stewart: Oh, that's interesting.

Alen MacWeeney: That was the process of taking the photograph.

Alison Stewart: Let's talk to Chris on the Upper West Side. Hi, Chris. Do you have Chris for me? Yes? No? Maybe? Yes, there you are Chris. Hi.

Chris: Hi. I requested a subscription to The New Yorker magazine when I was 13 and I've been subscribing ever since. I remember a particular cartoon of two women sitting in a very cozy, padded restaurant booth with cocktails in their hand. One woman leans forward and says, "God, is there anything more seductive than passion?" I love that cartoon because I had just met my to-be-husband and he was the most passionate man I ever met in my life. It's a tribute to him and I've never forgotten that photograph.

Alison Stewart: Thank you so much. Let's talk to Marianne from Manhattan. Hi, Marianne.

Marianne: Hi. One of my favorite cartoons that's on the wall of my office is two Godzilla beasts trampling Manhattan. They've got handfuls of human beings in their fists. One turns to the other and says, "Of course you feel good, these things are full of antidepressants."

[laughter]

Alison Stewart: That's so funny. The truths that we learn about ourselves. Right? What's one thing you want people to understand about the folks who contribute to The New Yorker who are cartoonists? What do you think, Alen?

Alen MacWeeney: It's sort of like the underside of what we expect. It's the flip side of life, and we don't expect it. It's only that that wakes us up in the morning when we open the magazine. What do you do? You look at the cartoons-

Alison Stewart: True.

Alen MacWeeney: -before you read it. That kind of stirs you up and encourages one to read. It's [crosstalk] pleasure.

Alison Stewart: Michael, what do you think?

Michael Maslin: I'm still thinking about underside of-- going to ask you to define that. I think that's good. I like what you said.

Alen MacWeeney: Come on. You don't have to agree with me.

Michael Maslin: No, I do. I do. No, I do. Actually, I was thinking also of an earlier question. If I can just quickly say it.

Alison Stewart: Sure, please. Go for it.

Michael Maslin: When you were asked what it was like seeing people in there, maybe they were a little surly or something. You have to understand, most of us work at home alone, and we're not used to somebody looking at us, especially really looking at us. It was probably difficult for a while until you eased in, had some coffee--

Alen MacWeeney: [unintelligible 00:22:04] Except for the invasion.

Michael Maslin: Yes, yes.

Alison Stewart: [unintelligible 00:22:06] Except the invasion.

Michael Maslin: Yes, exactly.

Alison Stewart: The name of the book is At Wit's End: Cartoonists of The New Yorker. It's really quite beautiful. My guests have been Alen MacWeeney and Michael Maslin. Thank you for coming in.

Michael Maslin: Thank you.

Alen MacWeeney: Thank you very much.