By Murray Ball (Orin Books)
ISSN: 0156-6172
You may or may not have heard of Footrot Flats. For one of the most successfully syndicated strips in the world, it seems to have passed from memory with staggering rapidity. Created by Murray Ball on his return to his homeland of New Zealand, it ran from 1975 to 1994, with the first strip compendium released in 1978.
The feature ran in newspapers on four continents until 1994 when Ball retired it, citing reasons as varied as the death of his own dog and the state of New Zealand politics. Thereafter books of new material were released until 2000, resulting in 27 daily strip collections, 8 volumes of Sunday pages known as “Weekendersâ€, and 5 pocket books, plus ancillary publications such as “school kitâ€. There was a stage musical, a theme park and a truly superb animated film Footrot Flats: The Dog’s Tail Tale.
The well travelled and extremely gifted Mr. Ball had moved to England in the early 1960s, becoming a cartoonist for Punch as well as drawing strips for DC Thompson and Fleetway and producing a regular strip in Labour Weekly. After marrying he returned to the Old Country and resettled in 1974 – but not to retire.
Ball was busier than ever after he bought a small-holding on the North Island and farmed in his spare time (for anyone not brought up in the countryside that last bit was called “Sarcasmâ€). This inevitably led to the strip under review. Taking the adage “write what you know†to startling heights, the peripatetic artist promptly gave up sleeping altogether to craft these wickedly funny episodes about the highs and lows and especially “weirds†of the agricultural life as experience by the earthily metaphoric Wallace Footrot Cadwallader: one oaf and his dog.
Wal is a big, bluff farmer. He’s a regular bloke, likes his food; loves his sport – Rugby, Football and Cricket; each in its proper season. He owns a small sheep farm (the eponymous Footrot Flats) best described as “400 acres of swamp between Ureweras and the Seaâ€.
With his chief – and only – hand Cooch Windgrass (a latter-day Francis of Assisi), and a sheepdog who calls himself “Dog†Wal makes a living and is his own boss. Dog is the star (and narrator) of most of the strips: a cool know-all and blowhard, he’s utterly devoted to his, for want of a better term, Master – unless there’s food about or Jess (the sheepdog bitch from down the road) is in heat again.
Dry, surreal and wonderfully self-deprecating, the humour comes from the perfectly realised characters, human and otherwise, the tough life of a bachelor farmer and especially the country itself.
The cartooning is absolutely top-rate. Ball is one of those gifted few who can actually draw funnily. When combined with his sharp, incisive writing the result is pure magic. In the UK Titan Books published three volumes in the early 1990s and foreign editions have been released in German, Japanese, Chinese and American, but the same material is readily available from a number of publishers and retailers; here more than ever the internet is your friend.
The dry dramas and funny old businesses generally unfold as big lazy softie Dog, eking out his daily crusts (and oysters and biscuits and cake and sheep tails and scraps and chips and…) interacts with the sheep, cows, a bull, goats, hogs, ducks, bugs, cats, horses, geese and the occasional visiting relative) just trying to get by. He loves Wal but will always try to thwart him if the big bloke is trying to do unnecessarily necessary chores such as chopping down trees, culling livestock, or trying to mate with the pooch’s main rival Darlene “Cheeky†Hobson, the local town hairdresser.
This extra-large (262x166mm) landscape monochrome fourth volume covering strips from 1978-1979 comes from the Australian editions series and introduces still more unique characters with Ball hitting a creative peak and new heights of manic zaniness. There’s also a lovely section of new material created especially for this edition.
Wal’s prickly little niece Janice – known to all as Pongo – was now a regular as was the formidable and unflappable Dolores Monrovia Godwit Footrot, AKA Aunt Dolly, but new characters here include wise guy kid Rangi Wiremu Waka Jones, Dolly’s spoiled Corgi Prince Charles, and Pew, a sadistic and inventive magpie obsessed with revenge after Wal cut down his favourite tree.
Of course the big scene stealer is as ever Horse, a monstrous and invulnerable farm tomcat who terrifies every carbon-based life-form for miles around…
As well as a splendid selection of pieces which include Wal’s problems with Clydesdales (like horses but much bigger), calving season, the weather, Dog at the circus, possum trapping, the art of being manly, the horror of fencing posts and the Dog’s campaign against bloodsports, this tome also includes some too-rare huge single-panel gags showing the artist’s facility with zany, action-packed comedy set-pieces and his sheer cartoon inventiveness.
This collection is utterly captivating; expansive, efficient, exciting and just plain funny.
If I’ve convinced you to give the Dog a go, your favourite search engine will be all the help you need… Go on. Fetch!
© 1981 Murray Ball. All Rights Reserved.