Strip Search: Cathy
On alternating Thursdays, Jennifer M. Babcock reviews and recommends comic strips available in print and on the web.
by Jennifer M. Babcock
I have a confession to make. I get Cathy e-mailed to me every day.
I don’t subscribe to Cathy because I feel like it is relevant to my life or because I necessarily enjoy it. No, I’m a regular reader because ever since Cathy and Irving got engaged on Valentine’s Day, 2004, I’ve been curious if the strip’s character dynamics were going to change accordingly. After all, one of the founding concepts behind Cathy for over 25 years was the protagonist’s “singledom” and struggles as a working woman who can’t lay off the potato chips.
When the strip first appeared in 1976, women’s rights were being newly asserted at work and in relationships; Cathy’s character was supposed to reflect that generation’s working, single, independent women along with their fears, uncertainties, and challenges. The concept was quite novel for the time – how many mainstream newspaper comics in the 1970s addressed women’s rights or even had a single, working woman as the main, and in this case, title character?
Guisewite was offered a contract seemingly instantaneously from Universal Press Syndicate. You know why? Because “they thought [her] work had an emotional honesty that men just couldn’t approach.” [Italics mine] Does anyone else see the irony in that statement? Ms. Guisewite doesn’t even seem to see it even though she keeps talking about how Cathy is like a microcosm of the woman’s lib movement: were her editors implying that women are somehow more sensitive or in tune with their emotions? Doesn’t that assumption play into traditional stereotypes about men and women?
Women = emotional and therefore irrational beings.
Men = emotionally clueless but at least logical — most of the time — at least, more so than women.
Anyway, I digress… for this blog isn’t about Guisewite perpetuating gender stereotypes (there are at least hundreds of other articles and blogs about that). This is about Cathy’s relevance today and how it has moved on from its original premise.
Most of the first Cathy strips were about a woman’s right to have a job. Thanks to the women’s lib movement, however, that discussion has become pretty obsolete in America today. As such, Cathy moved from being a more edgy (some would call “revolutionary”) strip to one that was a bit more quotidian, but at least had some unique place in the funny pages (even today, there isn’t a huge selection of strips that address the life of single, working women).
Then Cathy went and got married in 2005. What the hell.
What’s even more mind-boggling is that 3 years before Cathy and Irving’s marriage (and 2 years before their engagement), Ms. Guisewite said herself that she wouldn’t ever marry Cathy off:
“I feel like the single women of the country would come and kill me if Cathy ever got married. I was single for too long, and it was hard enough to see all my friends get married without having to deal with Cathy getting married.”
Apparently, the single women of America have been ditched by a cartoon character.
But not really.
Surprisingly, the majority of strips that I have seen in the past 4 years don’t even include Irving. Yeah, there are three holidays in the year that have to include Irving and make mention of married life: Valentine’s Day, and especially Thanksgiving and Christmas. During these times of the year, the strip is at its stalest and looking like any other family strip in the newspaper.
And maybe that’s the reason why Cathy hasn’t switched gears and completely embraced married life. In an effort to set itself apart, Cathy is in a rut.
Have no fear though! I have the perfect solution that will put Cathy back in the limelight of edgy topical discourse: a messy divorce.
Cathy can then relive her single days in the new millennium, cougar-style.
Now that’s something I would enjoy reading.
Jennifer M. Babcock holds her MA in art history and is currently pursuing her doctorate in Egyptology from NYU’s Institute of Fine Arts, where she is also known as a comics scholar. A creator herself, she is the artist and writer behind C’est La Vie, which is syndicated by Universal Press Syndicate and available at http://www.gocomics.com/cestlavie.
Your CATHY synopsis/summary cracks me up. I enjoy reading about Donna, Mona, Pierre et al. It was Margueritem or some other close person who mentioned the strip that first drew my attention to it. In the early 70s I was drowned in the women’s movement in Social Studies class by a Mr. Buscaglia. I’ve often wondered if he was related to the “hugs” guy or was even him; under cover as a middle school teacher in western New York. He was an engaging individual. John Lennon’s IMAGINE was a milestone for me, before Zappa’s DYNAMO HUM/DON’T EAT THE YELLOW SNOW records. How you manage all that schooling and do the strip amazes me and puts a smile on my face. Here’s to “A” level overachievers. Cheers- Gordon.