Watterson, Bill
Entry updated 8 January 2024. Tagged: Artist, Author, Comics.
(1958- ) US cartoonist and author, known almost exclusively for his influential Comic strip, the Calvin and Hobbes sequence, which debuted on 18 November 1985 and ended (by his decision) on 31 December 1995, with a famous closing panel showing the real boy Calvin and the imaginary tiger Hobbes tobogganing off into an unending sublimity of winter whiteness, an off-frame "magical world, ol' buddy" (see Slingshot Ending). Various segments of the series were released at various points [they are not listed in full below]; the series as a whole is best represented by The Complete Calvin and Hobbes (graph coll 2005 3vols). Genre tropes frequently appear in Calvin's vivid imaginings as he fantasizes about being a rampaging Dinosaur or his recurring Pulp-sf alter ego Spaceman Spiff; to his mind's eye a cardboard box becomes a "transmogrifier" for Shapeshifting, or a Matter Duplication device that produces multiple Calvin Doppelgangers.
Watterson is of some direct sf interest for The Mysteries (2023 graph) with John Kascht, a concise heavily illustrated fable-like narrative, in which the never-identified eponymous Mysteries, serve as lodestone and omen for humans on this planet, from fantasy-like Arthurian times to what seems to be a Near Future depopulated after one or more Disasters. Climate Change is hinted at but not addressed directly. The text is by Watterson; the illustrations are in collaboration with Kascht.
For his comics work Watterson was inducted into the Will Eisner Award Hall of Fame in 2020. [JC]
William Boyd Watterson II
born Washington, District of Columbia: 5 July 1958
works (highly selected)
Calvin and Hobbes
- The Complete Calvin and Hobbes (Kansas City, Missouri: Andrews McMeel Publishing, 2005) [coll: graph: published in three volumes: Calvin and Hobbes: illus/hb/Bill Watterson]
individual titles
- The Mysteries (Kansas City, Missouri: Andrews McMeel Publishing, 2023) with John Kascht [graph: illus/hb/Bill Watterson and John Kascht]
links
previous versions of this entry