Editoonist Walt Handelsman on Retirement and The Future
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Editor & Publisher reporter and cartoonist Rob Tornoe interviewed Walt Handelsman, who recently retired after forty-five years as a salaried editorial cartoonist for newspapers, most of that time since 1989 with The New Orleans Times-Picayune and The Advocate.
As expected two editorial cartoonists talking makes for a fascinating dialogue about the state of the art.
Handelsman, a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, has witnessed it all. But after covering six different presidents and drawing cartoons featuring an uncountable number of local politicians, he retired his pen and walked away from a profession that had changed dramatically over the span of his long career.
“I am optimistic about satire,” Handelsman said. “The real question is, how do you make a professional living doing it.
It’s not that cartoons are any less popular. Social media has become an ever-growing platform for humor and political thought, but news organizations have found it challenging to convert that engagement into revenue.
The present and the future includes fainthearted newspaper publishers and editors:
WH: I’ve been fortunate to work for papers with a strong voice, and they’re not afraid to have a cartoonist and to say tough things.
I do think the business model has obviously struggled, and when you look around at the Gannetts of the world [now rebranded as USA TODAY Co.] and other newspaper chains, they don’t really want to anger their readers with strong, hard-hitting cartoons and opinion content daily. What other explanation could there be? Because I know cartoons are popular with readers.
What it’s like to no longer wake up and draw a cartoon for his newspaper:
WH: It’s hard for me not to come up with ideas just by reading the news. That’s the way my brain is trained. For the first few weeks, I made notes because I’ve been making notes for years. I’ve stopped doing that now.
But to answer your question, it’s been okay. I am way more relaxed now.
Local cartooning versus syndication:
WH: I’ve always believed there should be a rhythm to cartooning when you work for a daily newspaper. I want to connect with readers, and I live in a city where the Saints are so popular when they’re doing well, and such a part of being here.
Local cartoons hit home with readers in a local area. That’s one of the great things about having a local cartoonist. I live here.
Read the entire interview here.
p.s.: possible good news:
Even at The Times-Picayune, which has thrived under local ownership and still publishes seven days a week to a print-devoted audience in New Orleans, it’s unclear if Handlesman’s role as a local cartoonist will be filled. But at least there’s some hope the paper could buck the industry’s sad trends.
“He will be very difficult to replace, but we’ll try,” said Rene Sanchez, editor and vice president of news for The Times-Picayune, the Advocate and NOLA.com.
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