Calvin and Hobbes is not an obvious choice for this blog, "Brave New World Notes."  It was inspired by Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World" novel* and its theme is the current USA presidential contest.  But (you may have noticed)  that theme is tiresome.  Without relief it is unbearable.  This post is that relief.




*  Notes:

I found the novel and the comic collection at about the same time among books I am sorting out of our long term storage (boxes  in closets), one of my periodic efforts to "declutter."  I had never read - or seen - either before.

"Brave New World" was first published in 1932.  My geeky friends in high school read it and were enthused in the 60's, but  I never got around to it.  It is famous, clearly part of the occidental canon.

In the forward Huxley wrote for a new edition in 1946 he says, "Remorse, for example, is as undesirable in relation to our bad art as it is in relation to our bad behaviour."  I was hooked as soon as I read that.   But I didn't begin to think of it as germane to our presidential election until page 101 when a new character is described as follows:

Given  my current monomaniacal obsession, I read this as a close description of Donald Trump.  Had the Warden also been irrational and uninformed, the portrait would have been perfect.  The book is about a dystopian world in which an elite of well meaning people tells everyone else how to live.  That is the Clinton connection.  

As to Calvin and Hobbs:  The cartoonist, Bill Watterson, says that Calvin was named for the 16th century theologian who believed in predestination, and that Hobbs was named for the 17th century philosopher who had a dim view of human nature.  My two favorite people!  What more can one say?

Below is the first comic shown in the Calvin and Hobbs 10th Anniversary Book:  

It is good to know that I am not the only grandpa who disapproves of what passes for comics today.  But I do resent the allusion to nursing homes.