Murray Ball | |
|---|---|
| Born | Murray Hone Ball (1939-01-26)26 January 1939 Feilding, New Zealand |
| Died | 12 March 2017(2017-03-12) (aged 78) Gisborne, New Zealand |
| Occupation | Cartoonist |
| Notable work | Footrot Flats |
| Father | Nelson Ball |
Murray Hone BallONZM (26 January 1939 – 12 March 2017)[1] was a New Zealandcartoonist who became known for hisStanley the Palaeolithic Hero (the longest running cartoon inPunch magazine),Bruce the Barbarian,All the King's Comrades (also inPunch) and the long-runningFootrot Flatscomic series. In the2002 Queen's Birthday and Golden Jubilee Honours, Ball was appointed anOfficer of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services as a cartoonist.[2]
Ball was born inFeilding in 1939; his father wasAll Black rugby playerNelson Ball. He grew up in New Zealand before spending some years in Australia and South Africa, where he attendedParktown Boys' High School and finished his education. He played for the Junior All Blacks in 1959 as a "first five-eighth" (number 10). As a young man he worked for theDominion newspaper inWellington and theManawatu Times before becoming a freelance cartoonist and moving to Scotland, where he found work with publishers DC Thomson, ofDundee.
He developed his characterStanley and had it published in the influential English humour-magazinePunch.Stanley the Palaeolithic Hero featured a caveman who wore glasses and struggled with theNeolithic environment. It became the longest-running strip inPunch's history, and other English and non-English speaking countries syndicated it. Ball continued to contribute toPunch after returning with his family to New Zealand.
Ball's early cartoons often had political overtones; his mid-70s UK strips includedAll the King's Comrades,Stanley often expresses left-wing attitudes, and he described himself in the introduction toThe Sisterhood (1993) as asocialist, and he was avidly anti-apartheid while in South Africa. Despite this, he has also been accused of racism, and often found himself at odds with contemporary leftists, especially on issues regardinggender identity,feminism,transgenderism, andabortion.[3]
In 2002 Ball was awarded theNew Zealand Order of Merit.[4]
Tributes paid to him included these:[5]
Murray was a great influence to many Australian cartoonists and will be long remembered by his friends across the sea here in Australia.
— President of theAustralian Cartoonists AssociationJules Faber
Ball was funny and goofy and generous, and incredibly serious about inequality
Sheer brilliance
— Charles M. Schulz, talking of Dog
After 1975 Ball wrote several comics in New Zealand (for instance 'Nature Calls'), but it was in 1976 that he first published the stripFootrot Flats in Wellington's afternoon newspaper,The Evening Post. It rapidly led to the demise of his other strips includingStanley, which he was still writing forPunch.
The strip follows the adventures of a working sheep-dog called (if anything) "Dog" or "The Dog" or "@*&#!", his owner Wal Footrot and the other characters, human and animal, that they encounter or associate with. Ball expresses Dog's thoughts inthought-bubbles, though he clearly remains "just a dog" (rather than the heavily anthropomorphised creatures sometimes found in other comics or animation). Dog also has alter-egos including "The Grey Ghost" and "The Iron Paw".
Ball'sFootrot Flats has appeared in syndication in international newspapers, and in over 40 published books.Footrot Flats inspired a stage musical,[6]atheme-park[7]and New Zealand's firstfeature-length animated film,Footrot Flats: The Dog's Tale (1986).Footrot Flats characters include Wal, Dog, Cooch, Cheeky Hobson, Aunt Dolly, Horse, Pongo, Rangi, Charlie, Major, Jess and the Murphy family of Irish and Hunk and Spit.
Footrot Flats features several remarkable traits: its expansive created-universe, complete with ancillary characters, things and places; the fact that the characters slowly but perceptibly age and mature throughout the twenty-year run of the comic; and the gradual encroachment of political themes over the years (particularly environmentalism and gentle parodies offeminism).
Ball said he wanted his cartoons to have an impact. "The heart of a cartoon is the idea, an artist can create a painting, hang it on the wall and be satisfied with what he has achieved even if no-one else sees it. In cartooning, you must get a human reaction to the idea. The task of the cartoonist is to translate his idea into a drawing that will have impact".[8]
Ball lived with his wife Pam on a rural property inGisborne, New Zealand. In an interview onRadio New Zealand National on 27 January 2016, Pam said that Murray's health had been poor for the last six years and that he was suffering from dementia. Longtime friend and collaboratorTom Scott said that on Sunday, 12 March 2017, he had been advised that Ball had died. He is survived by his wife and children.[9]
In addition to his cartoon collections, Ball wrote and illustrated eight books:
Ball also wrote a large-formatillustrated novel whose verse parodied the Australianbush-ballad as popularised byBanjo Paterson andHenry Lawson. TitledThe Ballad of Footrot Flats, it was published in 1996. Originally intended as a second film script, this work was the first newFootrot material which Ball had published since 1994. It was the last of theFootrot series.
Murray Ball andCharles M. Schulz each admired the other's work. OneFootrot Flats strip shows Dog laughing at aSnoopy cartoon. Schulz wrote the introduction to the onlyFootrot Flats published in the United States (it appeared asFootrot Flats there, but asFootrot Flats 4 in Australasia.)
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