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The Wavy Rule, a Daily Comic by Paul Morris: Plewd Awakening

Filed under: The Catbird Seat: Friends & Guests Tagged: Andy Borowitz, cartoons, comics, Mort Walker, Paul Morris, The Wavy Rule, TOTT

In today's installment, Paul pays tribute to Mort Walker (whose "Beetle Bailey" was fleetingly mentioned in this 2003 Talk of the Town by Andy Borowitz). Click to enlarge!

Paul adds: Back in 1980, Mort Walker, of "Beetle Bailey" fame, wrote a book called Comicana, a set of international symbols and names denoting the various visual devices frequently used by cartoonists. For example, the sweat droplets that fly out of a character's head Walker called "plewds," the clouds of dust emanating from a runner's feet are "briffits," and my all-time favorite: "grawlixes," that bubble of violent symbols indicating that a cartoon character is cussing up a storm. This Wavy Rule is in honor of Walker's creation. Also, check out this article on the Lexicon by Stacy Conradt.

More by Paul Morris: "The Wavy Rule" archive; "Arnjuice," a wistful, funny webcomic; a smorgasbord at Flickr; and beautifully off-kilter cartoon collections for sale (and free download) at Lulu.

4 comments

Comments

These are so funny. You know I love the retrox!

EmilySeptember 19, 2008

My favorite's the ironicon.

Benjamin ChambersSeptember 19, 2008

Thanks, guys! I'm sweating plewds of gratitude!

PaulSeptember 19, 2008

I love the warpies! It's so funny!

CarmenSeptember 19, 2008

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Emdashes, founded in 2004 by Emily Gordon, is a place where keen and dedicated readers of The New Yorker, past and present, can find related news and commentary: about people, subjects, and ideas within the magazine, and events and conversations outside its pages. Learn more about us and our contributors.

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Some writing by Emily Gordon

Review: A Gate at the Stairs by Lorrie Moore (for Newsday)
Annotated slide show: a wet, festive 2009 Coney Island Mermaid Parade (for nycgo.com)
Proposal: A better-looking MetroCard (for A Brief Message)
Feature: Muslim immigration iconography in the Netherlands, and an interview with Ayaan Hirsi Ali (for Print)
Review: Does a redesign of The New Republic mean a change of tune? (for Print)
Interview: four online obsessives and visual cataloguers, Kate Bingaman, Nicholas Felton, Ellie Harrison, and John D. Freyer (for Print)
Review: King's Gambit: A Son, a Father, and the World's Most Dangerous Game by Paul Hoffman (for Newsday)
Interviews: winning New Visual Artists Eleanor Grosch, Zigmunds Lapsa, Christian Cervantes, and Kate & Camilla (for Print)
Profile: lindy hop legend Frankie Manning (for Newsday, with Robert Fouch)
Feature: Rea Irvin, illustrator, bon vivant, and The New Yorker's first art director (for Print)
Profile: screenwriter and novelist Joe Keenan (for Newsday)
Review: My Tiny Life: Crime and Passion in a Virtual World by Julian Dibbell (for Newsday)
Review: Charles Dickens by Jane Smiley (for Newsday)
Review: Jayber Crow by Wendell Berry (for Print)
Report: Learning to read with comic books edited by Françoise Mouly (for Print)
Report: The New Yorker's redesigned website (for Print)
Interview: James Surowiecki on what's next for the wisdom of crowds (for Assignment Zero)
Review: The Complete New Yorker (for Print)
Interview: Matthew Diffee on the appropriately inappropriate cartoons of the The Rejection Collection (for Print)
Interview: Roz Chast on Brooklyn, pysanky eggs, and animation (for Newsday)
Review: books about various New Yorker cartoonists by Liza Donnelly and Iain Topliss (for Newsday)
Review: Charles Addams: A Cartoonist's Life by Linda H. Davis (for Newsday)
Interview: Edward Gorey (for Newsday)

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