Penguins among the asparagus

Two Charles Addams cartoons from New Yorkers of years ago: a penguin-themed one from 4/27/57 and an asparagus-themed one from 5/25/63:

(#1)

(#2)

“You telephone ‘Better Homes & Gardens.’ I’ll start making the hollandaise.”

(Both cartoons scanned in from the big 1991 volume The World of Charles Addams (p. 160 and 187, respectively), lent to me by Juan Gomez, who recently got a used copy through Amazon.)

#1, captionless, is so far as I know the only Addams cartoon on a penguin theme. Another take on the Indistinguishability of Penguins cartoon meme.

I came across #1 in paging through the volume in search of #2, having failed to find #2 in the complete cartoons of The New Yorker (shoddy searching on my part, I guess). Why was I interested in #2? Because a recent posting of mine discussed giant phallic agaves (in the asparagus family) and Robert Coren wrote the following comment on that posting:

The photo and remarks on the very phallic agave remind me of a Charles Addams cartoon that appeared in The New Yorker many decades ago: A couple looking out in the gray dawn on their suburban front yard, where enormous (say, more than human-height) asparagus spears have apparently emerged overnight; he says, “I’ll call the botanical society, you go in and start making hollandaise.”

My apologies to Robert, whose memory turns out to be sharp. (Hardly anyone remembers cartoon captions exactly, unless they’re very short.)

3 Responses to “Penguins among the asparagus”

  1. Robert Coren Says:

    Hardly anyone remembers cartoon captions exactly, unless they’re very short.

    Well, I’m about 5’7″, so…

    Oops, sorry about that. Anyway, I’m glad my memory was, in fact, based on something I’d seen.

  2. BGarelick Says:

    Glad you found the asparagus cartoon. I saw it years ago and loved it. Like you I thought I’d find it in the New Yorker collection but it is not there, so it wasn’t shoddy searching on your part.

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