Arnold Zwicky's Blog

On the heels of my 3/14 posting “Seeking a penguin caption” (in which the birds are ubiquitous), there come two penguin cartoons in the April 2026 issue of Funny Times: one by Bill DeMain in which the birds are iconic, one by Vaughan Tomlinson in which they are (memically) indistinguishable.

iconic. Bill DeMain’s cartoon:

(#1) Understanding the cartoon requires that you recognize the figure on the right — as not just a penguin, but as a penguin logo (a creature inclined to make book recommendations), as here:

(#2) The Penguin Books logo since 2003 (from Wikipedia); earlier versions were similar

About cartoonist Bill DeMain: he’s a Nashville songwriter and music journalist as well as a cartoonist (he’s from Mendham NJ, moved to Nashville in August 1988).

indistinguishable. Vaughan Tomlinson’s

(#3) The memic joke is that even penguins can’t tell one bird from another; they’re all black and white, with pointy little beaks

Vaughan Tomlinson is a South African cartoonist and illustrator based in New York City. Yet another displaced artist.

This entry was posted on March 17, 2026 at 9:05 am and is filed under Books, Cartoonists, Comic conventions, Linguistics in the comics, Logos, Penguins, Signs and symbols, Understanding comics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.