Drawing Opportunities: Bill Watterson and Success
A story of rejecting commercialism to build success of another kind.
By Elijah Sams | Business Major, Bethel University
Bill Watterson takes a deep breath in, hesitates for a moment, then lets it out in a short sigh. Decades after quitting cartooning, the time had come for him to finally give an interview that would lay to rest once and for all any theories and spotty biographies anyone had tried to write before. Everyone would finally know who William Boyd Watterson II really was. They’d know his whole life story. They’d know about the small midwestern town he grew up in, the backyard that was functionally more of a forest and the creek that inspired so much of the Calvin and Hobbes universe. The world would learn why he refused licensing and syndication. Anyone else would be awfully nervous. But Watterson just looks down at the simple table, sits down, and takes a long sip from the black coffee they gave him. The journalist eyes him for a moment, then asks, “To get started, can you describe what it was like to grow up in northeast Ohio?”. Watterson ponders for a moment. “Well….”
Bill Watterson grew up in rural Chagrin Falls, Ohio. His parents, James and Kathryn, moved to Ohio when Watterson was young to be closer to their family and to raise their kids in the Midwest, which has always been renowned for quality schooling. His childhood hometown is considered to be the biggest inspiration for the setting of his most famous cartoon — Calvin and Hobbes. Calvin and Hobbes wasn’t his first cartoon, Watterson started drawing and writing his own cartoons at age 8. Without any more information than that, one might think that Watterson became such a titular cartoonist because of his artistic talent, dry wit, and hard work. But it’s important to recognize that Watterson’s success didn’t just happen. Watterson’s family background, unique opportunities, and cultural legacy combined with a concept of meaningful work contributed to his development as an artist, instilling in him the characteristics that would lead to a rejection of commercialism, the key factor in his journey to success.
What makes an artist successful? More importantly, what makes a cartoonist like Watterson successful? You might be tempted to say that it’s because their inborn talent, skill with a pen, or that a knowledge of how to put their ideas into writing and art that puts them a head above the rest. Author Malcolm Gladwell would beg to differ. In his National Bestselling book, Outliers: The Story of Success, Gladwell presents several determining factors that come into play when looking at the success of an individual. They vary from person to person but are undoubtedly recognizable as traits of success. As Gladwell puts it, “People don’t rise from nothing. We do owe something to parentage and patronage…” (Gladwell 19). In a 1989 interview with The Comics Journal, Watterson, in response to the question “How do you explain the success of Calvin and Hobbes?” responded with “Really, I don’t understand it, since I never set out to make Calvin and Hobbes a popular strip. I just draw it for myself. I guess I have a gift for expressing pedestrian tastes. In a way, it’s kind of depressing.” (West 1). But is there a better way to explain his success? What built Watterson into the man he became when he first put Calvin and Hobbes to paper? In the first chapter of Outliers, Gladwell explains the concepts of family background and cultural legacies. He makes the assertion that the combination of the strong family and cultural values, things like a present and supportive father, the “it takes a village” principle, and more, work to ensure the success of the child. A good family background can get you interviews, guaranteed jobs after college, and supportive parents can do more for your career than almost any single other person. For example, Gladwell uses figures such as Bill Gates to explain his main ideas. He gives the reader the Gates success story, but waits until the very end to explain how his success was the result of 10,000 hours of practice (Gladwell 50), but it isn’t until later that it’s made clear that 10,000 hours isn’t necessarily the only trait present- after all, how would Gates have been able to garner 10,000 hours of practice if it wasn’t for his supportive mother, who took part in school groups to raise money for the computer club? So, when we look at someone like Watterson, who built success as a cartoonist despite refusing commercialism and licensing his creation for monetary gain, how do we pick apart his life and determine at what points he benefited from these “Gladwellian” traits?
“Watterson’s family background, unique opportunities, and cultural legacy combined with a concept of meaningful work contributed to his development as an artist, instilling in him the characteristics that would lead to a rejection of commercialism, the key factor in his journey to success.”
Watterson claims to have been about Calvin’s age when he started to draw birds and dinosaurs. “I was generally a quiet kid. I lived in my head, like Calvin…” (Watterson 2), a trait that was found to be present in only 44% of eminent writers and related artists in a study conducted by Bernadette F. Strykowski & Herbert J. Walberg for the Roeper Review. This isn’t quite enough to imply that Watterson was himself an outlier in his field, nor a recipient of statistical advantages. However, in his interview with Jenny Robb in April of 2014, when asked “Your parents were encouraging?” he replied “Yes, very encouraging, very supportive. My mom was basically my audience until I went to college and my Dad often introduced me to art supplies.” (Watterson 2). Referring back to the Roeper Review study, “Encouragement by Father” as a trait in eminent writers, is only found in 59% of children. “Encouragement by Mother” being even less, at 45%. Lesser still sits “First Born”, at 35%. So how does one interpret this? What does it mean specifically for interpreting Watterson’s success? Well, here’s the catch. It doesn’t really mean anything, not yet. Does it mean he was a statistical outlier, someone who beat the odds that are evidenced in a peer reviewed survey to be stacked against him? Out of over 2000 “outstanding adolescents”, 59%, 45%, and 35% is quite a fair number. It may not be the majority, but it ties nicely into Gladwell’s Outlier Theory, and his idea that behind every successful man and woman, there are numbers and statistics that ensured their success. Watterson didn’t beat any odds. But this is still very telling of Watterson’s future at the time, as being raised by two supportive parents, in addition to being intelligent, liked by teachers, and successful in school (which each make up 100%, 83%, and 91%, respectively) bodes very well for a young Watterson as a future successful artist. As the Roeper study concludes “The childhood shows the man, as morning shows the day, wrote John Milton in 1667. Our research on childhood traits of highly eminent people confirms the poet’s wisdom. Outstanding traits and conditions of childhood can be identified. They foreshadow the degree and the kind of eminence that history records.” (Strykowski, Walberg 6). Watterson was the beneficiary of a strong family background. His parents supported him in his art and encouraged him to pursue it. This is significant because Watterson’s early encouragement led to his being an early academic success as well. In their article, Supporting Early Childhood Social-Emotional Well Being: The Building Blocks for Early Learning and School Success, John Vacca and Aparni Bagdi reported on their study in which they concluded “Parents’ encouragement pattern has significant effect on the achievement motivation of the adolescents in academic area…” “…There exists a difference in the parental encouragement of adolescents with high and low achievement motivation.” (Bagdi, Vacca 76). Thus, the first “Gladwellian” trait, family background, is revealed in Watterson’s life at a very young age. If we were capable of watching his childhood, we could likely pinpoint specific examples of times when his parents used another “Gladwellian” trait, concerted cultivation, to ensure that a young Watterson grew up to be the intelligent, artistic, and successful cartoonist that he turned out to be. But family background is only one factor, and certainly not enough to build a successful cartoon empire out of. Based off what information on him is publicly available, Watterson would most certainly have had to have been the recipient of another type of Gladwellian trait — cultural legacy.
“It takes a village to raise a child” is an old proverb that has never been truly nailed down to any specific culture or period, although it was famously popularized in Hillary Rodham Clinton’s 1996 book, It Takes a Village: And Other Lessons Children Teach Us. The idea behind the phrase is that children are not just raised by their parents or whoever is directly responsible for their upbringing. Children are also the product of their environment, their culture. Society as whole, even. This means that a cultural legacy is a key factor in determining how any given person will behave and react to the world around them as they develop. This is exactly what Gladwell defines in Outliers, no doubt he would very much agree with what Mrs. Clinton had to say in her book. Gladwell defines his idea of cultural legacy as a success trait by saying, “We are so caught in the myths of the best and brightest and the self-made that we think outliers spring naturally from the earth. We look at the young Bill Gates and marvel that our world allowed that thirteen-year-old to become a fabulously successful entrepreneur. But that’s the wrong lesson” (Gladwell 50). Because chance alone is not the determining factor- it’s the culture you were raise in, and how you were raised in it. But how does that apply to Watterson? Chagrin Falls, Ohio. That’s where William Boyd Watterson II grew up. Watterson frequently talks a lot about how his childhood was a huge source of inspiration for Calvin and Hobbes. In many of his interviews, he’s spoken about how his childhood home (and specifically, his backyard) were some of the biggest sources of inspiration for the setting of his strip. That’s all well and good, but to answer our question, we must dig a little deeper. The Midwest is categorized as one of four geographic regions defined by the United States Census Bureau, of which Ohio is part of. That doesn’t mean much initially, but anyone from the Midwest will tell you that the midwestern culture is vastly different from its surrounding areas. There’s a larger emphasis on welcoming, acceptance, meaningful work, and family values. Nothing too extreme, but everything pleasant. As the Ohio State University Humanities Institute puts it- “their local pride is all about exemplifying the best of America. The Midwest is the Heartland, the nation writ small, the great middle, lacking extremes, lacking diversity” (Cayton, Sisson, Zacher 1). The state, the county, even the city where Watterson grew up in benefited from Midwestern values. Watterson grew up in a culture that accepted his talents and chose to make use of them, allowing him success in his field of expertise rather than focusing him on hard labor that didn’t suit him. Work that’s important to you, that is meaningful to you and meaningful to others, and allows you to make a difference in another individuals life, is yet another Gladwellian principle — “Meaningful Work”. But knowing that your work affects someone else positively isn’t a success builder all on its own either. Watterson was the beneficiary of at least one more Gladwellian idea. Some might call them lucky breaks, some would even call them acts of God. Gladwell calls them “extraordinary opportunities”.
“We are so caught in the myths of the best and brightest and the self-made that we think outliers spring naturally from the earth. We look at the young Bill Gates and marvel that our world allowed that thirteen-year-old to become a fabulously successful entrepreneur. But that’s the wrong lesson” (Gladwell 50)
Watterson attended Kenyon College, a small liberal arts college in central Ohio. Now, Watterson didn’t care for majoring in art or seeking out cartooning classes. According to him, “cartooning was something you did to avoid classes” (Watterson 3). But as it just so happened, prominent political cartoonist Jim Borgman, who at the time ran the show when it came to cartoons in the school paper, The Kenyon Review. Lucky for Watterson, Borgman happened to be a senior, just about to graduate. The Review needed a cartoonist, Watterson wanted a chance to see how everyone that wasn’t his family responded to his work, and history was made. Watterson got to see his first published cartoons in his school paper, and he continued to build from there. Soon enough, his work would evolve into the titular Calvin and Hobbes. Eventually, he’d go on to be accepted by various local papers based on his existing influence at Kenyon. When he was approached in 1989 by The Comics Journal, he was struck with a realization when interviewer Rich West gave him his observation, “I think this strip is about friendship”. Watterson hadn’t thought of his work in those terms. He realized that his work was very much alive, and that he wasn’t writing his ideas, he was writing exactly what the characters would do (Watterson 13). Watterson discovered the meaning his characters held in others from an offhand comment made during an interview.
Hidden opportunities tend to stare you right in the face without your knowledge. In Outliers, Gladwell explains “lucky breaks don’t seem like the exception with software billionaires and rock bands and star athletes. They seem like the rule.” (Gladwell 56). Watterson did not develop expensive technology. He didn’t lead a rock band. And he never played on an all-star team. In fact, Watterson hated being in the spotlight. He hated it so much, that he outright refused any offers he received to license his art, he never “sold out”, so to speak. For that reason, you’ll never find any sort of official Calvin and Hobbes merchandise anywhere. A newspaper once produced a small amount of semi-official C&H Sunday strip calendars. But no more than that. That’s why there exists so little information on Watterson. Not much else is known about his life. In recent days, it’s up to speculation as to whether he’s still alive. But while Watterson’s career is over, his work remains. In a short strip from Calvin and Hobbes dated July 17, 1995, Calvin can be seen tearing down a hill in his wheelbarrow, the enigmatic stuffed tiger Hobbes in the backseat. Calvin states, “Nothing is permanent. Everything changes. That’s the one thing we know for sure in this world.” The scene changes, now following the pair as they leave the reader in their dust. Calvin leaves us with “…but I’m still going to gripe about it.” (Watterson 89). How interesting that Watterson would directly benefit from so many hidden opportunities in his life yet refuse the opportunities that were handed to him on a silver platter. It’s almost as if he believed he should be giving more than he received, a sort of 80/20 input/output principle. In his book, aptly titled The 80/20 Principle, Richard Koch explains, “We tend to assume that 50 per cent of causes or inputs will account for 50 per cent of results or outputs. There seems to be a natural, almost democratic, expectation that causes and results are generally equally balanced” (Koch 10). But as he goes on to explain, this logic is fallacious, and lacks application in the real world. In reality, you give more than you get. It seems fairly clear that Watterson understood this and applied it to his own life, especially in moments like when he jokes during his interview with Jenny Robb, “I developed a reputation as a hermit recluse, and that’s worked so well in my favor that it’s something that I try to live up to” (Watterson 31).
“Nothing is permanent. Everything changes. That’s the one thing we know for sure in this world. But I’m still going to gripe about it.” (Watterson 89)
The impact left by Watterson’s art still resonates today. Nevin Martell, author of Looking for Calvin and Hobbes: The Unconventional Story of Bill Watterson and His Revolutionary Comic Strip put it very eloquently, “The true measure of art intended for children is whether it resonates on a deep level when you interpret it as an adult. J.R.R. Tolkien’s books, Walt Disney’s movies and the soundtrack to Yellow Submarine all took on a new life when I crossed the threshold from youth into relative maturity, and so did Calvin and Hobbes.” (Martell 2). Watterson may have received a lot of hidden benefits throughout his life that spurred him towards his career, sure. In the end, the most important idea to take away from Watterson’s story would be the reasons that he chose to remove himself from the world of commercialization and syndication. Integrity, independence. The combination of extraordinary opportunities, strong family background, and cultural values that only strengthened his ability to say “no” to syndicated greed. Watterson’s seclusion may not have been purposeful at first, but his reasons for doing so are clear now. They can be best summarized with what Calvin said in the final panel of his October 8th, 1995 Sunday strip, “The world isn’t so bad if you can just get out of it” (Watterson 93).
Works Cited
Bagdi, Aparna, and John Vacca. Supporting Early Childhood Social-Emotional Well Being: The
Building Blocks for Early Learning and School Success. Early Childhood Education Journal, Vol. 33, №3, Dec. 2005
Bernadette F. Strykowski & Herbert J. Walberg. Psychological traits and childhood environments of eminent writers. Roeper Review, 6:2, 102–105, 1983
Cayton, Andrew R.L., Sisson, Richard, and Zacher Christian. “The Midwest: An Interpretation” The American Midwest: An Encyclopedia. 2006.
Gladwell, Malcom. Outliers. Back Bay Books, 2002.
Martell, Nevin. Looking for Calvin and Hobbes: The Unconventional Story of Bill Watterson and His Revolutionary Comic Strip. The Continuum International Publishing Group Inc, 2009
Koch, Richard. The 80/20 Principle: The Art of Achieving More with Less. New York: Bantam, 1998
Watterson, Bill. Exploring Calvin and Hobbes: An Exhibition Catalogue. Andrews McMeel Publishing, 2014.
West, Richard. “The Bill Watterson Interview”. The Comics Journal. Dec. 6, 2013. Pp. 11+
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Elijah Sams
Elijah Sams, a sophomore from Lincoln, Minn., seeks to broaden his scope as a business major with an emphasis on marketing by working with advertising firms as an intern and continuing the practice of Theater Arts at Bethel University. Sams enjoys spending time out on the lake where his family runs Campfire Bay Resort, goofing off with his friends by doing something ridiculous (like getting into lightsaber duels in public), and playing video games inside on a rainy day. He also wrote a short story once.
WHAT I’VE LEARNED
Don’t take shortcuts, dummy. Too often I find myself tempted to take the easiest way to do something — like this paper. Don’t do that. It’s not worth it.
Name Dogs. I don’t own a dog, because I never could. I grew up at a resort, and we had a “no pets” policy. That means that if we owned a dog, we’d be breaking that rule. The dog would be all over the resort all the time, and anyone who had dog allergies would get very unhappy. Now, what did I just do? I gave a detailed example of something you otherwise wouldn’t have cared about. That’s what “naming the dog” is all about.
Going on “autopilot” can be a good thing. Just remember to come back when you’re done to give it the ol’ once-over and edit, edit, edit.
Finish where you started. Eric Adler and Malcolm Gladwell taught me that through this class. Good writers always start and finish in the same moment, or the same idea.
Good writers drop you into a moment. A lot of movie critiques hate it when a story isn’t set up “properly” at first- but Gladwell taught me that a good writer knows that dropping into a moment is the best way to grab your audiences attention.
An Outlier isn’t someone who’s found success, it’s someone who made use of their many opportunities. Being successful isn’t necessarily about being smart or talented- its about recognizing all your advantages and disadvantages and using them correctly.
Do things your own way. Bill Watterson taught me that whenever you’re creating something, you shouldn’t listen to every voice telling you how to do it. Find your own niche and work with it.
Success isn’t about making the most money. Watterson taught me that, too. He rejected licensing because he didn’t care about making a lot of cash, he just wanted to preserve his artistic integrity.
The smallest step, taken in the right direction, makes all the difference. Gladwell shows us this in Tipping Point, that ideas can be weaponized, so to speak, and grow to change an industry. I find I can apply the same thing to my writing. Even so much as starting at the right time or finding the perfect source can get the ball rolling.
God shouldn’t be your crutch, but he can be your foundation. This class taught me that. I can’t rely on God to get me through every assignment or every trivial problem. But I can use the talents and skills he’s given me, combined with my advantages and desirable disadvantages to find my own success.
You can make mistakes, but only if you learn from them. Everyone makes mistakes. We’ve had that principle pounded into our brains since we were children. But no one ever really told us that you’re supposed to learn from every mistake, and apply that knowledge to every “next time”. As Albert Einstein defined it, insanity is “doing the same thing over and over and over again, and expecting things to change”.
Keep yourself on top of everything. Just being a student taught me that lesson. When I was in high school, taking online post-secondary classes, I let whole assignments slip through my fingers. I would spend more time watching YouTube videos and Netflix than doing my biology labs, and that caused me to miss out on better financial aid when the time came to pick a college. Now, no matter how difficult they may be, I never let an assignment go unfinished. I set alarms, I meet deadlines as soon as I can. And I’m doing better in school than I ever have before. If I apply this same logic to my life after college, I have no doubt in my mind I will build my own success.
Picture this: Elijah Sams, sitting on his roommate’s leather couch, in his dorm room, writing a paper on his laptop. His fingers strain from the 3085 words that he spent the last 2 hours typing. He glances at his cell phone, and feels the urge to step away for a moment to watch a video, or check his social media. Now, maybe a year ago, he would have. But not anymore. Instead, he grabs a bottle of water, absolutely inhales the entire thing in seconds, and keeps writing. You just read the product of that night. And the culmination of all the ideas and principles that the GES160–8 Inquiry Seminar class taught him.
