Bob Mankoff picks his 11 favorite New Yorker cartoons

Cartoonist Bob Mankoff has built up a stable of his own favourite New Yorker cartoons over the years. Here are 11 of them, complete with his insightful comments.

“Cartoons are either in the realm of reality or fantasy. Everything about this can’t possibly happen;
 it defies logic and reality and yet it leads to hilarity,” says Mankoff.
 “‘Fusilli’ sounds like an Italian piece of pasta, but they’re both crazy, because they’re pieces of pasta.
 Is that ‘Rigatoni’ calling? I don’t know, but it’s one of my all-time favorite cartoons.”
Charles Barsotti, November 21, 1994

“This takes an empty-headed cliché and adds a little bit of scatological reference.
The two associations make this a great cartoon,” says Mankoff, who adds musingly,
“We definitely don’t want cats to think outside the box.”
Leo Cullum, November 30, 1998.

“This is a simply perfect cartoon; it’s perfectly constructed,” says Mankoff.
“We have no empathy or sympathy for the pain-in-the-ass old biddy.
Then there’s this guy, this shoe salesman, bringing out hundreds of shoes.
We think he’s reaching for another black shoe and it turns out he’s reaching for a gun.
But this is important: we know he’s not going to kill her. If he shot her, it’d be horrible.
This is fantasy, not reality.”Chon Day, December 14, 1946.

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