MILTON CANIFF (1907 1988) You mean you want me to comment on

Sale 2673 - Lot 20

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Estimate: $ 1,000 - $ 2,000

MILTON CANIFF (1907-1988)
"You mean you want me to comment on how to save the 20th century?" Full page comic strip print for Steve Canyon, 1968. Ink inscription on comic strip print. 13 x 17 in 21 x 25-inch frame. Signed in first panel. Inscribed and dated, "For Jules, who always surprises me by the depth of his interest in my work. Milton Caniff, NY August 1969." Refers to Feiffer in the 2nd panel: "Do you really want me to stand up here like a Jules Feiffer character made of coat-hanger wire - getting his jolls telling how lousy the world is because my love life has freaked?"

Provenance: From the collection of Jules Feiffer.

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Feiffer commentary: I never got "Steve Canyon." I never liked "Steve Canyon." I believed "Terry and the Pirates" completely in everything. The whole storytelling and the characters. It could be real life, as far as I was concerned. "Steve Canyon" seemed like he was doing it for the money. He switched from "Terry" to "Steve Canyon" to get his own financial independence. He wanted to own the comic strip because he did not own "Terry". I never felt that "Steve Canyon" had the characters or the storytelling. The artwork was beautiful because Caniff drew beautifully. It never had the conviction that I felt in every daily strip of "Terry" and on the Sunday pages. It was a huge difference and I remember the first "Steve Canyon" came out on the Sunday page, and I was very excited to get it. But it was a big letdown always. My first grownup lesion that heroes could let you down. Fuck!!
Caniff was a very sweet, lovely man. I liked him very much. His politics were awful. He was pro-Vietnam, pro-military and everything. He couldn't at all figure out why with my track record as a well-known lefty cartoonist, why I would want to bother with him. But he was very amused and taken with it. When I had a play opening, I would invite him to the opening, and he would come. I was happy that we were, in that way, friends.