CARTOONIST MUST HAVE SYMPATHETIC EYE AND MIND, DECLARES BRIGGS

"A keen eye trained to observe the antics of one's fellow men and a fine sense of humor are the prime requisites for a cartoonist," declared Clare Briggs, America's leading cartoonist in an interview with the CRIMSON. Briggs whose drawings are published in over 175 American newspapers, is the author of a number of series of cartoons, among the best known being "Ain't it a Grand and Glorious Feelin'?", "When a Feller Needs a Friend." "Someone is Always Taking the Joy Out of Life", "Mr. and Mrs.", and "Real Folks at Home."

The cartoonist scoffed at the idea that an art school training would be of any great value to a would-be cartoonist. "There isn't much art in a comic strip, and I doubt whether going to an art school could be of much use anyhow. I never went to one, and most other cartoonists I know of never did. Experience and hard work, of course, are necessary preliminaries for a career at the drawing-board.

Idea Necessary

"The most important part of a cartoon is of course, the idea. Its presentation, while important is secondary. There are three main divisions into which cartoons are classified as to their subject-matter naturally fall. There is the political cartoon, the straight narrative cartoon, usually centered around some joke, and the cartoon which is a commentary on some point which is true to life. It is the last group that I place my work.

"The political cartoon is a sort of picture editorial. The narrative cartoon is by far the easiest form. The cartoonist can work a series around the adventures of certain characters, like the Gumps or the Joneses, or use a joke as the basis of the cartoon as Bud Fisher does so often in "Mutt and Jeff." These methods are comparatively simple.

"It is more difficult I think to pick out some trait or characteristic of persons about one, and work it up for a cartoon. I get a laugh myself out of everything I draw. It is a more sincere work than a straight narrative cartoon, and, it seems to me, more a creative one.

"How many cartoons have I drawn in my life? Well. I've been drawing an average of at least 300 a year, and I've been working about 30 years. That makes about 9,000 cartoon, call it 10,000, counting rough drafts and unused ideas and everything."