NEW YORK, Sept. 16, 2007
Roz Chast's Artistic Anxiety
The New Yorker Magazine Cartoonist Worries That Something Might Go Wrong
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Play CBS Video Video Life Through Roz Chast's Eyes Much of New Yorker cartoonist Roz Chast's work is based on her life and experiences. She tells Charles Osgood that, in her mind, she will always be a "short, frizzy-haired 12-year-old."
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Family angst is just one of the targets of Roz Chast's New Yorker cartoons. (CBS)
Chast shares her home with husband Bill Franzen, a humor writer, and two teenage children. They weren't around when Osgood stopped by, but they often show up in her cartoons. One called "When Moms Dance" features her daughter:
"And so, one time she was in the living room and she had some music on," Chast said. "And I kind of came in, and I was like, yeah, moving to the music a little bit. And she just looked at me. And she said, 'Mom, stop. You're hurting me.' And it was such a good line. It was such a good line. I really didn't have to change a word."
Chast grew up in Brooklyn, the only child of two high school teachers. She says she found her calling at age 8. She was alone in a library, and says she saw some cartoons of Charles Addams.
"For one thing, I got his cartoons," she said. "That was a big part of it. Not only did I get them but there was something slightly transgressive about them. I mean, just the whole family - the aunt that was pouring that cauldron of boiling oil on the carollers. I could look at it again and again and just die."
Chast went to college at the Rhode Island School of Design. She wanted to become an artist, but says she didn't think she was good enough, so she switched to cartooning.
"I doodled all the time in school - that is what kept me from going completely out of my head," she said.
Her drawing is as unique as her humor, and Chast cartoons have gone from magazine pages to gallery walls. Her latest work adds yet another dimension. Inspired by Ukrainian pysanky eggs, she designs her own eggs with various humorous themes.
"This one is for forbidden words of childhood," she said. "And I was thinking that when I was a kid, the words that I was not allowed to say: 'shut up,' 'stupid,' and 'idiot.'"
Neither fortune nor fame has changed Chast but sometimes she worries that her ideas, ability and inspiration will someday jus disappear.
"When I sit down, I always feel I will never have another idea again," she said. "That is it."
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I would greatly appreciate it if you could provide a web address to contact Roz Chast. Her mother was my eighth grade teacher in 1954, and I would love to share the appreciation and gratitude I feel for the positive, continuing, influences she has had on my academic successes and my self image.Were it not for her caring and guidance,I would have not achieved the success that I have attained in my life. katladie02@aol.com