Home / Authors / Jim Woodring Books

Jim Woodring

Jim Woodring Books

Cartoonist

Jim Woodring, born on October 11, 1952, is an American cartoonist and illustrator known for his unique style and profound storytelling. His most famous work is the 'Frank W. Waterson' series, which is celebrated for its surrealistic style and philosophical depth.

No books found for this author.

Related Quotes

“People aren't interested in seeing themselves as they really are.”

Author:Jim Woodring

“Comics could use more creators with something worthwhile to say.”

Use Creator Worthwhile

Author:Jim Woodring

“It takes more drawing to tell a story in pantomime.”

Stories Drawing Pantomime

Author:Jim Woodring

“Doing a story about my mundane, waking life, how much I don't like my job, or breaking up with someone, I don't think so. Those stories don't interest me that much as a general thing.”

Thinking Stories Jobs Interest Waking Mundane Waking Life

Author:Jim Woodring

“I'm not a freak. I'm not really crazy or anything. I don't think I'm really abnormal. It's just, like anybody else, I have interests I cultivate, and one of my interests is not getting too used to things. I've sacrificed a lot of things in my life in order to keep that sense of things being unfamiliar.”

Thinking Used Order Interest Crazy Freak Unfamiliar Abnormal

Author:Jim Woodring

“When I started formulating the first Frank comic, I knew I wanted it to be something that was beyond time and specific place. I felt that having the characters speak would tie it to 20th-century America, because that would be the idiom of the language they would use, the language I use.”

Firsts Character Use Would Be Wanted America Speak Language Felt Century Comic Ties Frank 20th Century Idiom

Author:Jim Woodring

“When I was a kid, I used to see apparitions and have hallucinations, and my entire perception of the world was badly disoriented. And I had kind of a chaotic childhood because of that. I've really hung onto it, though. Because I actually like those feelings.”

World Kind Feelings Kids Used Childhood Perception Hung Chaotic Hallucinations Apparitions Perception Of The World

Author:Jim Woodring

“One of the best memories of my life is contemplating that first finished drawing and realizing I had cracked the code, that I could make drawings like this whenever I wanted.”

Firsts Wanted Life Is Realizing Memories Finished Drawing Code Contemplating Cracked Best Memories

Author:Jim Woodring

“Consensus reality seemed like a dull, dead-end street compared to the intense, mutable reality of visions or whatever they were - neurological misfires. I expected life to be full of sudden, inexplicable surprises. When these things didn't happen for a while, life seemed dull and painful.”

Ends Reality Happens Vision Streets Surprise Painful Expected Intense Dull Consensus Inexplicable Dead Ends

Author:Jim Woodring

“If I had learned how to get along in the quotidian world while keeping up the search for the hidden realm, I might have gotten more out of life. But I believed I was doing hugely important work. I was elitist about it.”

Ifs World Important Might Realms Elitist Important Work

Author:Jim Woodring

“I wanted to be a pariah, because all my heroes were cult artists, people who devoted their lives to poking into very narrow, very deep corners - Erik Satie, Alfred Jarry, Malcolm Lowry - people who suffered in order to express their vision of life.”

People Wanted Artist Order Vision Hero Corners Devoted Cult Very Deep My Hero Vision Of Life Pariahs

Author:Jim Woodring

“I never experienced anything in my natural state that was as shocking as salvia divinorum`s effects. The condensed extract is murder. I'd smoked some plain leaf and experienced a very alien, very physical sensation, like wheels grinding against each other all over my body. Odd, not pleasant, but not overwhelming. Someone sent me some extract, and I took a big lungful, started counting, and before I reached twenty I was suddenly and without preamble in a completely altered state.”

States Body Bigs Natural Effects Murder Twenties Aliens Odd Pleasant Wheels Sensations Overwhelming Leafs Shocking Counting Altered Altered States Preamble

Author:Jim Woodring

“I think that cartoons have a lot more power than they're given credit for.”

Thinking Given Credit Cartoon

Author:Jim Woodring

“I have a personal definition of cartooning, which is, simply, "imaginative drawing." Anything you're drawing that is not in front of you but is a mental construct that you want to express in a drawing is, to me, a cartoon.”

Want Fronts Definitions Drawing Cartoon Constructs Imaginative

Author:Jim Woodring

“To my way of thinking, the concept drawings that Rembrandt did, the drawings he made that he used to model his artists, to work out the compositions of his paintings: those are cartoons. Look at his sketch for the return of the prodigal son. The expression on the angry younger brother's face. The head is down; the eyebrow is just one curved line over the eyes. It communicates in a very shorthand way. It's beautiful, expressive, and, in a peculiar way, it's more powerful than the kind of stilted, formalized expression in the final painting.”

“The fiction I tend to like is nothing like my own work. I like the kind of writing that shows me things I don't know about, and what I don't know about is the everyday, normal world.”

Knows World Writing Kind Shows My Own Fiction Normal Everyday Show Me

Author:Jim Woodring

“I've often thought I would like to try to write a conventional novel, but I just don't know enough about the real world to write one.”

Knows World Writing Trying Real Enough Novel Real World Conventional

Author:Jim Woodring

“I could never write about the sort of people John Cheever or John Updike or even Margaret Atwood write about. I don't mean I couldn't write as well as they do, which of course I couldn't; they're great writers, and I'm no writer at all. But I couldn't even write badly about normal, neurotic people. I don't know that world from the inside. That's just not my orientation.”

People Knows World Writing Wells Mean Courses Normal Neurotic Orientation Great Writers

Author:Jim Woodring

“The books that I do, the stories I write - I'm glad I'm able to do them, but they will quickly be swallowed up by the sands of time. Sometimes it frustrates me that I'm not able to do bigger, more important, more significant things. I guess you have to be content to do whatever it is you can do.”

Writing Important Book Sometimes Stories Able Can Do Bigger Glad Significant Sand Significant Things Sands Of Time

Author:Jim Woodring

“I do sort of feel like I'm building my monument with what I do, but it's pretty small and inconsequential compared to real works of genius like this, which are giving vast inspiration to humanity. But I guess I shouldn't even say that. It's ridiculous to say that. You are what you are. My stature suits me.”

Giving Feels Real Inspiration Humanity Building Genius Ridiculous Suits Monument Stature Inconsequential Real Work

Author:Jim Woodring

“Cartoons are perhaps a bigger part of art than is generally realized, and they influence people in ways that are not always recognized. But creating a monumental work of architecture, or writing a great symphony, is something else. It's a higher order of creation.”

People Way Writing Art Order Influence Creation Higher Creating Bigger Architecture Cartoon Symphony Influencing People

Author:Jim Woodring

“When I was setting out to be an artist, I said: If I can just produce one work that some people think is good, if I can become an obscure cult artist, that's all I want. Well, I attained that. I'm an obscure cult artist, and I think now, Why didn't I say I want to be another Picasso or something? What other options were open to me? But I was convinced I couldn't achieve great things because I don't have a steady-state mind.”

People Ifs Thinking Want Mind Wells Said I Can States Artist Achieve Produce Convinced Setting Great Things Settings Steady Obscure Cult

Author:Jim Woodring

“A mind in control is always better than a mind out of control. For one thing, a controlled mind can learn much better and go much further than a chaotic one. A person with a steady-state mind has the potential to exit this life with a much greater understanding than someone who is continually learning and forgetting, gaining and misplacing knowledge.”

Mind Persons States Understanding Forget Greater One Thing This Life Controlled Steady Chaotic Exit Continually Learning

Author:Jim Woodring

“People for whom art is religion can say, "What I love about art is that it points to a higher reality." Well, fine, but the time comes when the smart thing for such a person to do is to let go of the fun of the art and get into the hard work of attaining and understanding that higher reality, unmixed with worldly games.”

People Wells Persons Art Hard Reality Games Fun Understanding Hard Work Fine Higher Letting Go Smart Art Is Worldly

Author:Jim Woodring

“I don't believe in art like I used to. I believe in something beyond it, something that contains art and everything else. But I just don't quite have the nerve to chuck drawing and painting. Part of it is that I enjoy it too much, and part is that I don't have the courage to renounce the world. I don't want to move out of this nice neighborhood so that I can live in a shed and devote myself to meditating and touching something I can't feel. I'm addicted to the fun of playing in the world.”

“That Moorish architecture is all over the place, of course. It affects me everywhere I see it, as it does so many people. But Brand Library was a special place to me, and I know I've paid homage to it many times in my drawings.”

People Knows Doe Courses Special Paid Library Architecture Drawing Brands Homage Special Places

Author:Jim Woodring

“Alternative cartoonists have to rely on comic book stores to get their stuff in the hands of readers.”

Book Hands Stuff Reader Stores Comic Alternatives Rely Comic Book Cartoonist

Author:Jim Woodring

“Oh, I was never a very big Jim Woodring fan. I've never thought his work was that great.”

Author:Jim Woodring

“A tree is an incomprehensibl e mystery.”

Nature Mystery Tree

Author:Jim Woodring

“Every time I write something down I check it to see if it has that telltale glow, the glow that tells me there's something there. If it glows, it stays. Everything is either on or off.”

Ifs Writing Time Checks Glowing

Author:Jim Woodring

“I've heard that Alfred Hitchcock said that by the time he was ready to shoot a film, he didn't even want to do it any more because he'd already had all of the fun of working it out. It's the same thing with these Frank comics.”

Want Said Film Time Fun Heard Ready Working It Frank Hitchcock

Author:Jim Woodring

“Real shapes and real patterns are things you would observe in nature, like the marks on the back of a cobra's hood or the markings on a fish or a lizard. Imaginary shapes are just that, symbols that come to a person in dreams or reveries and are charged with meaning.”

Persons Real Dream Shapes Mark Patterns Fishes Symbols Imaginary Hood Reverie Lizards Cobras

Author:Jim Woodring

“Leslie Stein's comics give readers privileged access to a complete and wholly original world of gently skewed wonders.”

World Giving Wonder Reader Originals Access Privileged Leslie

Author:Jim Woodring

About the Author

Born: October 11, 1952
Known for: Cartoonist
Quotes: 33

Related Topics

People World Drawing Writing Thinking Cartoon Knows Used Want Art

Popular Topics

People Ifs Thinking Knows Men World Way Want Love Life Inspirational Needs Giving Feels Should Writing Trying Years Mind Firsts

Books & Sources

Similar Authors

Nicolas de StaelBrowse related quotes
Robert MankoffBrowse related quotes
Raymond PettibonBrowse related quotes
Brooke McEldowneyBrowse related quotes
Deanna PetherbridgeBrowse related quotes
John French SloanBrowse related quotes
QuinoBrowse related quotes
Terry MosherBrowse related quotes
David HockneyBrowse related quotes
Ollie JohnstonBrowse related quotes