During my Austin years, I was drawing a regular strip for the University Of Texas newspaper, going to school, delivering blood, and trying to change my approach and "style" as much as I could, since I knew that I'd calcify as I got older.

Lately, I can't shake the feeling that I've been living a dream for the last 10 years or so; I can't account for most of my 20s, and I have to continually remind myself that certain people are dead now and many of my friends have children.

Comics, at least in periodical form, exist almost entirely free of any pretense; the critical world of art hardly touches them, and they're 100% personal.

I prefer to imagine that my wife, a few friends, and occasionally my mom are the only ones who read what I do, though I realize that this is somewhat unrealistic.

During my Austin years, I was drawing a regular strip for the University Of Texas newspaper, going to school, delivering blood, and trying to change my approach and "style" as much as I could, since I knew that I'd calcify as I got older.

Sometimes I get worried I'm getting too caught up in the nauseatingly oily smoothness of my own line, when all I'm trying to do is make it as clear as possible.

I don't think there's any independent cartoonist whose stuff I don't like or respect in at least some way or another. We're all marginal laborers - we're practically medical oddities - so I don't see why we can't all be nice to each other.

I think it has most to do with the way in which a story is told, whether it feels real either via the music of the telling or the 'honesty' of the story.

I guess I just don't like being physically in front of people I don't know very well, because I expect to be "seen through," or, even worse, instantly hated.

The thing I don't understand is why so often one hears discussion of the fruits of human labor as if it's all the creation of some alien race.

Mostly, I was only interested in television as a kid, and the majority of reading material I collected was an adjunct to that central concern, comic books and magazines included.

No one blames themselves if they don't understand a cartoon, as they might with a painting or "real" art; they simply think it's a bad cartoon.

As I've gotten older I've occasionally found myself nostalgic for earlier periods of solitude, though I realize that's also likely a false nostalgia, as I know there was nothing I wanted more during those periods than to not be alone, whatever that means.

Cartoons are not real drawings, because they are drawings intended to be read.

Drawing on a computer doesn't make any sense to me. It's not intuitive.

During my Austin years, I was drawing a regular strip for the University Of Texas newspaper, going to school, delivering blood, and trying to change my approach and 'style' as much as I could, since I knew that I'd calcify as I got older.

I believe that the development of language - of naming, categorization, conceptualization - destroys our ability to see as we age.

I can definitely say that of all my friends who I consider to be really great cartoonists, we're all trying to aim at basically the same thing, which is an ever closer representation of what it feels like to be alive.

I don't think of myself as an illustrator. I think of myself as a cartoonist. I write the story with pictures - I don't illustrate the story with the pictures.

I guess I just don't like being physically in front of people I don't know very well, because I expect to be 'seen through,' or, even worse, instantly hated.

I have a preponderance to look smug in photos; something to do with the way my mouth turns up at the corners.

I still can't get over the idea that respectable adults now go to see superhero movies and that such films get reviewed in the 'New Yorker.' Clearly, I am seriously out of step with the times.

My grandmother was an unparalleled storyteller who gave me a preview of how life might turn out, and also fortified my empathy.

My head looks like an uncooked ham with glasses.

My mother was always encouraging about my wanting to be an artist.

My wife has joked that if anything ever happened to me, she'd gladly live out her life without anyone else around. I think it bugs her I'm home all the time; such is the life cycle of the cartoonist, however.

No one blames themselves if they don't understand a cartoon, as they might with a painting or 'real' art; they simply think it's a bad cartoon.

The first thing I do when I get up is I look out the window. I've been looking at the same image for six years. It's imprinted in my mind like an afterimage template.

There seems to be such a laziness in - and I hate to use this phrase - the modern world. Everything is pumped out so quickly so that you can read it while passing by, like billboards or those flashcards before movie shows.

Well, there are better cartoonists now than there ever have been. I firmly believe that. There's some amazing work being done.

When I was 11 years old, I thought, 'All I really wanna be able to do is my own comic book,' and I'm doing it. I don't have any other real ambitions. I have nothing to conquer at all.

Twice a week I would receive injections or IV's of Factor VIII which clotted the blood and then broke it down.

Whenever the pressure of our complex city life thins my blood and numbs my brain, I seek relief in the trail; and when I hear the coyote wailing to the yellow dawn, my cares fall from me - I am happy.

Keep your blood clean, your body lean, and your mind sharp.

My great religion is a belief in the blood, the flesh, as being wiser than the intellect. We can go wrong in our minds. But what our blood feels and believes and says, is always true. The intellect is only a bit and a bridle.

The anguish of the neurotic individual is the same as that of the saint. The neurotic, the saint are engaged in the same battle. Their blood flows from similar wounds. But the first one gasps and the other one gives.

I had no blood relatives till I made some.

I know that I'm very lucky to be alive. For 35 or 40 years I've spilt my blood and broke my bones and spent years in hospitals.

Don't forget that the only two things people read in a story are the first and last sentences. Give them blood in the eye on the first one.

It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, more vengeance, more desolation. War is hell.

No one will ever know what 'In Cold Blood' took out of me. It scraped me right down to the marrow of my bones. It nearly killed me. I think, in a way, it did kill me.

Some people say my work is often depressing and pessimistic, with the emphasis on death, blood, overcrowding, strange beings and so on, but I don't really think it is.

I say to you that the price of liberty is and always has been blood, human blood, and if our liberties are lost, we shall never regain them except at the price of blood. They must not be lost.

Once blood is shed in a national quarrel reason and right are swept aside by the rage of angry men.

I would give up everything rather than have the blood of white men upon the hands of my people.

I don't need power at the cost of spilled blood.

There are two times of the year that stir the blood. In the fall, for the hunt, and now for lacrosse.

It has been said that the position of woman is the test of civilization, and that of our women was secure. In them was vested our standard of morals and the purity of our blood.

It consists entirely of people who are not related by blood, many of whom can't stand each other.