Above: a New Yorker cartoon by Julia Suits. I'll admit I don't get the joke.
There's that saying that 90% of the people who read The New Yorker look at the cartoons first. The other 10% is lying.
Now, who knows how many people look at a New Yorker gag cartoon and just do not get the joke?
In today's Bloghorn blog entry titled Don’t get it? New Yorker explains itself, cartoonist Royston Robertson acknowledges the problem, and links to the Magazine's new cartoon IQ test.
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18 comments:
I dunno, I don't think you want to make cartoons too easy or over explain for a reader, but I think you have to be careful on the other side too. Obtuse isn't funny either.
Isn't this just a sex joke?
I'm pretty sure it's a take-off on the old "John!... Marsha!" routine, where two lovers call out to each other in increasingly passionate voices. The male "John" plug is calling to the female "Marsha" outlet.
Why she is cheating on him with another plug escapes me. I guess the cartoonist felt he had to close one of the openings.
This gag is too fraught with problems. I would have rejected it in favor of the good ones they reject. But congratulations and good for you, to the cartoonist who sold it.
I just looked at the "IQ quiz". Apparently even the editors at the New Yorker don't get it! The other gas in the test seem to have an answer that is the "real" answer, but this one does not!
I really think my explanation is what Julia Suits had in mind. I'm going to try to contact her...
"gags"
not "gas"
Wow, we're too obtuse even to understand the answers! I thought she was cheating on him.
Well, I got 'em all without having to think too hard. Regarding the plug and socket cartoon, it's evident to me that Ger and Barry have it right: Marsha is cheating on the plug on the left (who is doing the talking) with another plug. Maybe the confusion is that you have to realize that Marsha is the socket, not the other plug.
It may also help to be familiar with the fact that in the electrical, plumbing, etc. trades, pieces with pointy bits are called "male" while those with indented bits are called "female." Since I spent a couple hours this weekend trying to find a "female-female" connector for a video cable, maybe it was on my mind. I have a dirty, dirty mind.
I'm surprised that anyone under the age of 80 nailed it. There was a record or a transcription played on Boston radio in the post WWII period, probably early 1950s, exactly as Mark M. described. It was a big hit in the studio bull pen where I worked, with all sorts of variations of Marsha and John voices to break up the daily tedium of preparing camera-ready from art director layouts.
Well I got it right away. It's not rocket science ya know!
By the way that "John and Marsha" skit was Mike Nichols and Elaine May.
I think skarab meant to say "John & Marsha was a hit 1951 record by Stan Freberg, who did both voices."
http://www.themadmusicarchive.com/song_details.aspx?SongID=5827
But I don't think that's critical to understanding this particular joke.
I did a variation (no "Marsha") of this cartoon back in March on my website thelitestuffcartoons.com
This was prior to the publication of the NY'er cartoon.
Who said "there's nothing new under the sun?"
Mark Doeffinger
Ecclesiastes 1:9
"What has been will be again,
what has been done will be done again;
there is nothing new under the sun."
If sticking a plug in a socket was the accepted universal symbol of intercourse, it would be more easily understood.
Hi there,
It's an electrical version of a standard New Yorker sex joke. Marsha, the outlet, has no relation to Freberg's.
"Marsha" seemed like the silliest name for an inanimate piece of plastic I could come up with.
I'd assumed most viewers would instantly see a surprised 'caught-in-the-act' face in the outlet's slot eyes and little screw nose. I'm glad a few of you got it!
Some might question which act she was engaging in, but I can't answer that...
This is month's later but I;m amazed that so many people were puzzled by this cartoon. Immediately apparent to me that as Ger Apeldoorn quickly said " Isn't this a sex jock?" Just lovely and to the point I thought.
This is month's later but I;m amazed that so many people were puzzled by this cartoon. Immediately apparent to me that as Ger Apeldoorn quickly said " Isn't this a sex jock?" Just lovely and to the point I thought.
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