Pogo: We Have Met the Enemy and He is Us by Walt Kelly

Pogo: We Have Met the Enemy and He is Us Reviews

• 
  Arthur Finch

  what a fantastic book, beautifully illustrated, extremely funny and whacking in some heavy commentary about the environment and politics of the time
  
  also the best onomatopoeias i’ve ever heard:
  “ROWR BAZZLE”
  “EHEU”
  “WUMP-KA-BUMP”
  
  thank you cally!
• 
  Charissa

  My dad turned me onto Pogo years and years ago. One evening laying around his front room (which I am told is no longer called a parlor because of the Influenza epidemic of 1919), I spied (with my little eye) the spine of this Pogo book on his shelves. An hour later and my sides hurt from the laughing.
  
  "Ah Pogo, the beauty of the forest primeval get me in the heart."
  
  "It gets me in the feet, Porkypine"
  
  (they look out at a forest full of junk and garbage dumped all over)
  
  "It *is* hard walkin' on this stuff"
  
  "Yep, son, we have met the enemy and he is us."
  
  I was brought up a feral, hippy, enviro Nazi, so this appeals to me greatly. When we were kids we used to drive up the 101 to Leggett and camp out in the undeveloped lands of Usal Creek. Now it has been declared part of the Lost Coast and is protected, but in those days it was being encroached upon by Evil Loggers, and the Even More Evil BLM (which when I was 6 years old was difficult to distinguish from BM - short for bowel movement - and therefore ever after all logging companies and government agencies were poppyheads). We would see redwood logs on trucks being shuttled off to the mill and shake our fists at them and shout "Boo!" out the window.
  
  My dad has retired up to the northern California coast now and writes regularly to the editor of the local paper about various, cranky environmental concerns he has. Sometimes he writes spoof letters, such as the one about proposing there be a government program to give occupational therapy to skunks, opossums, and raccoons so they would stop crossing the roads in front of cars and getting squished. He says he doesn't think the editor got his sense of humor on that one, and the piece never appeared in the letters to the editor section. He suspects they have started a file on him, which has been added to the one the FBI has from his days in the Peace and Freedom Party with the Black Panthers et al. The salmon disaster of the Klamath River about killed him I think. It's small comfort that Al Gore has now made being an environmentalist all hip and groovy. Things have degraded much from when Rachel Carson first blew the whistle.
  
  But things like Pogo lighten my heart and remind me to keep laughing regardless. I learned that early from my dear old dad. You gotta take the bitter with the sweet. Now that he looks like the Travelocity gnome the glint of mercurial mischief in his eyes is even funnier.
  
  I go Pogo, you can too!
• 
  Dominick

  Meh. I'm a Walt Kelly fan, but late Pogo is a shadow of itself. The opening pages are original to the book, a rather plodding anti-pollution sequence. The strips that follow recount a minor narrative of an attempt to kidnap the pup dog, mixed with irrelevant other satirical matter, at least pertaining to that narrative. Does not really work as a coherent book.
• 
  Craig Werner

  Walt Kelly wades into the political and environmental muck of the Nixon era. Funny and sobering, as usual.
• 
  Micah

  I’ve been wanting to read Pogo for years now, as Bill Watterson always mentioned Walt Kelly along side comic artists like George Herriman and Winsor McCay as the true greats that defined the extreme artistic capabilities that can be developed in a syndicated strip comic.
  
  Kelly cut his chops animating on Pinocchio, Fantasia, and Dumbo and it shows. His art style immediately ranks among my favorites, ultra cartoony and remarkably clear in stylization. Pogo is much more oriented toward stories than gag, with running dramatic stories peppered with quirky interactions and funny interactions. I’m almost certain that Jeff Smith took 95% of his inspiration for the Bone series from Pogo, even down to the cigar smoking, slang, and wise-cracks. Kelly stories are sometimes political in a Doonesbury style, sometimes oriented toward ecological concerns, sometimes just pure drama. Regardless of the subject matter, Pogo keeps a swamp full of characters interesting to follow at every turn, with engaging illustrations and enjoyable plots.
• 
  James

  POGO is so beautifully artistically executed by Walt Kelly. It's beautiful to look at and is cleverly written. This small compendium is a bit frustrating in the way it is constructed, however. It follows an environmental theme and then slam bangs into two storylines about two swamp denizens who think they kidnapped a valuable 'pup' dog, but actually have nabbed a baby skunk AND the other story is founded in Nixon era circa 1972 politics.
• 
  Kenneth

  Pogo was one of the great cartoon strips of the mid 20th century, lampooning the foibles of our political class, among other things. The characters of the strip are unforgettable, set in the Okeefenokee swamp.
• 
  Michael Beyer

  Walt Kelly is a cartoon master. The political humor is a little dated and mocking people like Spiro Agnew and J. Edgar Hoover. But the humor is timeless. And the art is as charming as the best of Disney, whom Kelly once worked for. I can't recommend this old book highly enough. A masterpiece!
• 
  R David Foster

  Awesome !!!
• 
  Professor

  
  Pogo is a character that I've heard a lot about, but, other than the odd stop-motion animation film that was made of the character, I knew almost nothing about. This collection, which I happened upon in my library, makes me want to read some more of his work. On the one hand I think that the specific story here, which is mainly reflecting the early environmental movement, is a bit too pat and "both sides are wrong/you need to start with changing yourself" for my taste, but there are still many amusing moments sprinkled throughout. The rich universe of Pogo's swamp is populated with creatures that poke fun at figures in every walk and position of life, clearly coming out on the side of the little guy.
• 
  James

  Wonderful - pithy humor skewering the Nixon administration, so relevant again today it's spooky. The characters representing Agnew, Hoover and Mitchell could just as easily be stand-ins for various members of the Bush executive branch. It was funny partly because they took themselves so seriously while acting so crazy, and we have the same thing going on now.
• 
  Keith

  Yeah, I bet you've always wondered where that phrase came from. It was Pogo.
  
  Walt Kelly can't be beat, and he's being unbeaten again in this collection of Pogo strips from the 70s, dealing with pollution (back when we discovered such a thing existed) and assorted schemesters making mischief in the swamp.
• 
  Bird

  Walt Kelly was a philosopher, commentator, and cartoonist, but very subtle. This is set in the 50s and I don't get all the characters/lampoons, but, damn, it's fun. All of the Pogo series are delicious. I Go Pogo!
• 
  Stephen

  I always liked Kelly's attention to detail in things like backgrounds, flora, furry textures...but I never really got the characters or believed that Kelly understood anything about a swamp setting as a whole.
• 
  Dave Schaafsma

  Dominick just reviewed this and I actually own it, and found it on my shelf. 1972! An original paperback (okay, I have a lot of originals from those days, so no biggie, really...). And agreed with him, not as good as earlier Pogo. But if you don't know Pogo, check him out!
• 
  Acton Northrop

  My first time reading the "third-greatest comic strip of all-time on every poll ever". It may be great cartooning but it's also cutesy and smarmy and self-satisfied. Ernie Bushmiller may be a hack but he can mop the floor with Walt Kelly any day of the week in my book.
• 
  Ckg

  Pogo is Pogo! Timeless and entertaining from cover to cover.
• 
  David

  This is the political, dark, moody Pogo. For Sunday funnys try other books.
• 
  Brent

  Late-run Pogo still beats all.
• 
  Freder

  Nearing the end of POGO's run, Kelly could still draw like God -- but the satirical element was getting away from him. Happy to read some POGO again after many, may years away, but this does not represent the strip at its best.