I do believe that to be the case, and it was fascinating to come across a recent essay by Malcolm Gladwell that essentially expands on this idea. In this excerpt from his new book “Outliers”, Gladwell pinpoints the exact measure of what makes a genius. The secret to genius, it turns out, is pretty well measurable as 10 thousand hours of practice at something. Well worth a read.

It’s vacation week, but Daughter is making sure to get in her reading. Here Wife helps her out with some logic puzzles.

I now know that Schulz was a huge influence on Watterson. Of course, I was immediately struck by the very strong similarities between the strips. Both, obviously, put the words and thoughts of grownups into the mouths of child characters. I expect Calvin (who is six) is about the same age as Charlie Brown (at least during the 1950′s strips). Both are ostensibly about the everyday lives of children, yet manage to sustain some degree of social critique (this critique is more implied in Peanuts, quite explicit in Calvin and Hobbes). Both deal a lot in the themes of the innocence of youth and (paradoxically) the cruelty of children.

But Calvin’s world seems more real than Charlie Brown’s. More real because we see more of Calvin’s life. We meet Calvin’s parents, his teacher, his principal, his babysitter. We go with him on vacation, see his daily routine laid out in a single Sunday strip. His life seems more normal and well-rounded than Charlie Brown, who exists in an adultless world of children. Charlie Brown strips are closer to vaudevillian comic exchanges rather than any attempt at describing a real life. Also, probably because the strip’s run was much shorter (only 10 years for C&H compared with a half-century for Peanuts), Calvin’s behavior is much more consistent over time. Charlie Brown evolved quite a bit in the early years, sometimes a mischevious prankster, sometimes a loser, sometimes a confident know-it-all. Calvin is complex, but he’s the same Calvin through the strip’s run. One other way that Calvin seems more real: we frequently enter Calvin’s imaginary life (as Spaceman Spiff, or as a Tyranasaurus) in a way that we never do Charlie Brown’s.

Of course, the imagination of a young boy is at the very center of Calvin and Hobbes. While Peanuts is all about the social interaction between Charlie Brown and his friends, Calvin’s only friend lives only in his imagination. The only other children in the strip are Suzie Derkins, who Calvin taunts and teases, and Moe, who taunts Calvin. While a recurring joke in Peanuts is that Charlie Brown is excluded by the other children, in fact we see him play with them all the time. Calvin rejects other children (by choice, it seems) and keeps company exclusively with his Tiger. In fact, it’s pretty striking to me, right now, to realize that during Calvin and Hobbes’s numerous adventures on the red wagon, Calvin is really playing all by himself. In Peanuts, the characters complain about their isolation, but they are not nearly so alone as Calvin.

By the way, if anyone ever wants to get me a magnificent gift that I can share with my family, you could do worse than The Complete Calvin and Hobbes.

For my recent Cape trip, I brought along a very special book: Complete Peanuts Volume 1 (1950-1952). It was the perfect light reading for a mellow vacation, and it turned out to be a very special treat for me to share these strips with my children. As has been often observed, Peanuts is enjoyable by all ages, and it’s really true. It’s loaded with physical humor and deals often with playground situations and the interactions between children, situations that children can really understand. For example, Lucy is picky about having her “bread and budder sandwich” folded over, not cut; what child does not does not relate to having peculiar food preferences? But Schulz often sneaks in some kind of implied social critique that adults can appreciate.

However, some clarification is in order regarding my opinion of Peanuts …

During my childhood and early adulthood, I hated the Peanuts strip. Peanuts cartoons from the late decades (70’s and 80’s, basically) were conservative, repetitive, unimaginative, highly formulaic, predictable. Schulz seemed stuck in the past with constant references to World War II. I thought Peanuts was the worst strip in the paper, and Schulz a sellout. His characters were merchandised to death, even to the point of being mascosts for an insurance company. An insurance company? What could be more sellout than that! I had a hard time understanding why Peanuts, and Schulz, were so beloved and respected. The Far Side was cool, Calvin and Hobbes and Bloom County were cool, but Peanuts was dull, boring mainstream pap.

Imagine my astonishment when, as a small boy, I managed to find a few Peanuts paperback collections from the early decades (1950’s or maybe 60’s). These were very different from the Peanuts comics from my contemporary era. They were witty, clever, funny, insightful. The humor was timeless, but it frequently had an edge. The characters weren’t such one-sided characatures. Snoopy in particular was more doglike, less of a Saturday morning cartoon and more of a … real-ish dog who occasionally has thought balloons but just as often merely says “arf”. There were characters I had never seen before: Violet, Patty (not Peppermint), Shermy. There was no Woodstock, no Sally, no Spike (all characters whom I loathe). Lucy and Linus were obviously younger than the other children (I had always thought them the same age). The kids all look different than they did later (Lucy, for example, looks like a toddler).

And the drawings. Early Peanuts’ drawing style was different, more detailed, than the later strips. Schulz’ style in the later days grew tired, all the strips looked the same, even long before his shaky hand could no longer draw a straight line. No, the early strips are a model of elegance. Schulz tried more experimentation with different perspectives, bold groupings of characters. Yet almost every panel is an exquisite exercise in simplicity. Schulz had an amazing eye for for design, a superb sense of balance and line. Those early strips are so very precious and beautiful for all of these reasons.

I was surprised to find out that in its heyday Peanuts was considered a hip, underground phenomenon. It was part of the counterculture, ingrained into the Beat generation and well-loved by college students of the time. Peanuts was even on the cover of Time magazine in 1965. Peanuts, in short, was genuinely cool.

This discovery goes a long way toward explaining the legendary status of Charles Schulz among cartoon afficianados. Putting knowing, adult words into the mouths of children was (apparently) a new and surprising concept at the time; giving them cynicism and worldliness during the supposedly optimistic post-war years was downright revolutionary. Many of the strips are actually rather dark. They are about alienation, defeat, and the cruelty of children, all masquerading as humor. Not every strip is brilliant, but together the early strips are highly interesting and entertaining, even somewhat mysterious and magical to me.

Today Son reached a significant milestone: he read the entirety of “Green Eggs and Ham.” He had a bit of assistance, and it took him about a half hour. It took real persistence and attention; it’s the first time he’s read a book of this length. I’m very proud of him.