PhD Dropout / Master sounds better than Doctor anyhow, right? / Comics / Illustrated Read-alongs / Currently The Anatomy of Melancholy
When a giant angry turnip was elected president of the United States in the apocalyptic year that was 2016, I started to feel a little down. Naturally my response was to buy an unabridged copy of Robert Burton’s The Anatomy of Melancholy. My get-out-of-bed-without-crying-plan is to read a little piece of this gargantuan lump of knowledge daily, and I will illustrate it as I go.
Charlie and Potato is now available at a book store near you!* *If you happen to live near the following bookstores in Seattle, WA, that is: Ophelia’s Books, Third Place Books (Ravenna store), Phinney Books You can also buy a copy online here!
Q I seem to still be only halfway through this “overmuch study” section, which now seems to be about “not enough study.” “And so they bring up their children, rude as they are themselves, unqualified, untaught, uncivil most part. Quis e nostra juventute legitime instituitur literis? Quis oratores aut Philosophos tangit? Quis historiam legit, illam rerum […]
I made a few of these little drawings-plus-quotes for Inktober last year, so I’m gradually posting them here. This one is from “Failing and Flying” by Jack Gilbert, one of my favorite get-through-life-without-constant-crying poems. Poetry is good for that. You can read the full poem here: https://poets.org/poem/failing-and-flying
Someday I’ll write a book about a squirrel and a sasquatch and how they learn to be friends. That’s the closest thing I have for an explanation of why on earth I drew this one. Also I was feeling squirrely from being stuck on the couch with a tibia fracture. This post is NOT part […]
This section is a real goldmine of insults, or more specifically: insults against greedy ecumenical scholars. I don’t know any of those, not being very godly myself, but still these might be useful the next time you get a bad grade in an English class, and also for instructors to use the next time time […]
“For my part, though I be not worthy perhaps to carry Alexander’s books… but I replied still with Alexander, that I had enough, and more peradventure than I deserved… I had as lief be still Democritus Junior, and privus privatus, si mihi jam daretur optio, quam talis fortasse doctor, talis dominus [an obscure individual, if […]
“Saturn and Mercury, the patrons of learning, are both dry planets… Poetry and beggary are gemilli, twin-born brats, inseperable companions.” There might be an awful, awful lot of drawings for this subsection, partly because it is the longest so far (ten times as long as the others) but also mostly because I strongly identify with […]
Caption Contest! I’m working on a birthday card, because melancholiacs, Goths, and ghosts have birthdays too. (Or do they…?) I guess it could work for ghosts who are graduating from high school and college too. Comment with your best caption for this festive ghost birthday card. If I use it, I’ll send you one for free […]
This subsection is the longest subsection. Marsilius Ficinus de sanit. tuend. lib. 1, cap. 1, 3, 4, and lib. 2, cap. 16, gives many reasons, “why students dote more often than others.” The first is their negligence; “other men look to their tools, a painter will wash his pencils, a smith will look to his hammer, anvil, […]
You know who else is mad with vainglory and philautia? Monks! Hypocritical monk self-love is one of the most vexing problems facing the modern world. Monks are “insensibly mad, and know not of it, such as contemn all praise and glory, think themselves most free whenas indeed they are most mad.” I’m mostly kidding about […]
Writers don’t escape Burton’s condemnation, even though he is one. Quoting Cicero: “There was never yet true poet nor orator, that thought any other better than himself.” At least I think he’s quoting Cicero there, but honestly his attribution is confusing and I narrowly avoided falling down a weird Atticus/Tully/Cicero rabbit hole. Okay so I […]
Whatever you call it, “overmuch Joy” and love of “immoderate applause” being my personal favorites, pride is no good thing: “This acceptable disease, which so sweetly sets upon us, ravisheth our senses, lulls our souls asleep, puffs up our hearts as so many bladders.” I really wanted to draw a puffed up bladder for this […]
“They do persecute beasts so long, till in the end they themselves degenerate into beasts.” Once again, I was about to move on from this section and make some goddamned progress, but then I didn’t because I drew another goddamned picture. Maybe “immoderate desire of hawking and hunting” is an archaic source of melancholic debauchery, […]
I knew it was probably coming sooner or later: Misogyny. I was still hoping that Burton might be ahead of his time with women-hating like he was with mental health awareness, or that he might at least ignore the other gender completely, but oh my no. No, we definitely do not have nice things to […]