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For those thinking of brightening up somebody's day for the years to come (provided that person has a sense of humor) this book falls nothing short of perfect. Rich with history (and a great intro.; despite what others might say) that special someone's coffee table will forever be the sanctuary of the party when things start to mellow down. Must buy.
"The Complete Cartoons of the New Yorker" is a wonderful collection of consistently funny cartoons that, more times than not, make us laugh at our own short-sightedness and habits. My only complaint, and the only reason I didn't give this five stars, is that the resolution of the images on the included DVD-ROM is not that great. In some cases, it's a bit difficult to catch the "sight gag" in the illustration- unacceptable. Too bad- a little more care in this department would have made this a near-perfect volume.
The disc is broken down into decades, and those decades are broken down into specific years. I've been quite a fan of cartooning for a number of years - from modern strips like the Far Side and Calvin & Hobbes to the classic cartoons of Esquire and the New Yorker, and of particular cartoonists (such as Peter Arno and, more recently, Charles Addams, of "The Addams Family" fame). In this book are collected a massive "best of" selection of New Yorker cartoons from 1925 on through 2006; additionally included are comments and biographies (usually 2-page spreads) on artists (Arno and Addams among them) as well as certain themes that continually crop up in the cartoons - television, for instance, or the space race. Essentially, it isn't as easy to search for the cartoons as you might hope. Also, while the PDF format allows you to enlarge the cartoons, you can't make them much larger than 100% without them beginning to get fuzzy. This, however, is only scratching the surface.
While this may seem like a quibble (I mean, really, they're giving you all of their cartoons - for less than $30). I was searching one day for a book on New Yorker cartoons over the years, and was greatly pleased to have found this - "The Complete Cartoons of the New Yorker" is as good as its title suggests (up to 2006, that is).Here's what is included: a hefty volume of phone-book proportions (670 pages) in large format (suitable for a coffee table or a good, sturdy bookshelf), on good, glossy, quality paper. As far as I've been able to ascertain, you can only search for the cartoons of a particular artist within a certain year - you can't, for instance, just type in "Sid Hoff" and come up with all of his cartoons ever published in the New Yorker; you have to find a particular year and search for him within it. Within the front cover, in a little transparent plastic sleeve is a DVD-ROM disc, which contains each and every one of the more than 70,000 cartoons published in the New Yorker up through 2006. The cartoons are set up in a PDF format (no worries - if you don't have Adobe Acrobat, the disc allows you to download it) for easy reading and access.I have very few qualms about the book itself; I am, however, a little disappointed with the DVD-ROM. it is rather disappointing, and makes it difficulty to pick and choose what you want.
Overall, anyone interested in comic art, American culture, or a good, educated laugh will appreciate this book and this disc; those who are not very tech-savvy, however, may want to think twice.
i got this for my 20something son and he enjoys it. great conversation for a party.
I have no idea what the other reviewers who see a "low resolution" image are talking about. The cartoons on the CD in PDF format and anyone who can run Adobe Reader can easily increase the zoom level. The pics are quite clear in all their glorious hilarity. The introductions for each decade are basic but to "get" some of the puns, one may need to research a bit into the parlance of that era especially those of us born a generation or two after the publication date.
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