“And with this sort of increased visibility, there’s more money going around in the industry, and it changes a lot, in terms of who gets into the business as a creator, who sticks with it, and who gets pushed out.”

But there are definitely pros and cons. You could also look at it as bringing in a more diverse crowd.

I feel like if people are going to go to the effort to get a stamp and, you know, put it on an envelope that, you know, it’s a big effort these days. So I often write back.

Whereas the graphic novel is now being held up as something to aspire to and as something that’s respectable for adults to read.

Underground and alternative comics existed in a vacuum for years, where money really wasn’t an issue.

I get the impression from some people that unless they get direct access to characters’ thoughts and realizations.

I think there’s this general hunger for greater diversity, where publishers are really excited about finding different voices than what has been done.

No one would get into doing a black-and-white comic because they thought it might be a route to riches.

“What you do for a living?” It used to be easier just to tell people that I was a magazine illustrator than try to explain that I did comics.

I’m also probably one of the few remaining holdouts who hasn’t consented to making the e-book versions of all my work, which is annoying to some of my publishers.

If you’re changing diapers and going to the playground, any ambitions of being a cool guy have to fly out the window.

And now people even of our parents’ generation are familiar with the term “graphic novel,” which is kind of amazing.

The loner – it can have a real impact on the art when they realize, I have friends, I’m married, or I have kids. That’s certainly happened to me.

But my impression is that the main impediment to progress in that regard is the number of people who are choosing to make a go of it.

I started publishing my comic while I was still living with my parents.

Who was trying to be cool by writing about young people and a certain kind of Bay Area culture that I was tangentially a part of.

You start to feel very weighted down sometimes.

The principle of order in me, around me, and in the world… I would watch the buds swell in spring, the mica glint in the granite, my own hands, and I would say to myself: “I will understand this, too, I will understand everything.

I don’t believe in reincarnation at all, but if all that stuff is true, then he might have been on his last time around.

Many, many individuals will report starting to form their lifelong interests around adolescence. Why that is, researchers don’t fully know. But if you can take a trip down memory lane and see what interested you, that’s at least a clue as to where your interest may begin to develop.

Who’s the world going to revolve around now?

The truth is, normal might take years. Normal might never happen. But its definitely not going to happen if i lounge around here watching soaps and avoiding life. Im going to school today, end of story.

The circle of an empty day is brutal and at night it tightens around your neck like a noose

You know, sometimes I feel like I walk around with a target on my back with the films I make.

I kind of do the drawing with the painting in mind, but it’s very hard to guess at a size or a color and the colors around it and what it will really look like. It’s only a guess at the beginning, and then I try to refine it.