The type of pop culture that is honestly very moving and powerful to me is [when artists] do their homework. They make it real.

The thing that was interesting to me about Relationshapes - as opposed to most of the other cartoons I've ever made - was I knew when one worked and when one didn't work, but I couldn't really explain it.

It would be amazing to tell my grandchildren, like, 'Yeah, I was paid to sharpen 1,000 pencils.'

I have very limited craftsmanship. And a lot of the stuff I make plays on that.

I assumed that the pencil market was collapsing, but then it turns out that from 2010 to 2011 in the United States, pencil consumption went up by over six percent. I mean, those are all foreign-made pencils. Those are probably Chinese pencils, mostly, and Mexican pencils. I mean, it is an archaic communication technology, but it is still ubiquitous.

I would make a comic for Rolling Stone every two weeks, because they're biweekly. And then I would make weekly comics for my weekly papers. It was on two parallel tracks. And then they all got collected in a book.

I have a really analytical approach to art. And the whole idea that you can't analyze what makes a joke funny...I do not agree with that at all.