Bill Schorr Discusses His Return to Editorial Cartooning

By: E&P Staff After one of the briefest retirements on record, Bill Schorr has returned to editorial cartooning. Daryl Cagle, whose syndicate, Cagle Cartoons, Inc., will now carry Schorr's work, made the announcement on his blog Monday.

"We're very excited," Cagle told E&P Online. "He's a star. I read him as a kid growing up in L.A., and we're delighted to have him."

The news is a swift turnaround from this past March, when United Media, Schorr's previous syndicate, announced that Schorr would no longer draw editorial cartoons, though he would continue to draw his comic strip, "The Grizzwells," which is syndicated by United Media's Newspaper Enterprise Association.

"It was nothing personal against United," Schorr told E&P Tuesday. "The editorial cartoons just weren't bringing in any income. My client list got cut back severely -- probably they all went over to Daryl -- and it just wasn't generating any income. By the end, I was only making a couple hundred dollars a month."

However, Schorr says that life away from editorial cartooning didn't quite suit him. "At first I was relieved. I don't think I read a newspaper or watched a political show for about three weeks [after leaving]. It was a nice breather. But very quickly I found that I was starting to miss politics."

Schorr and Cagle crossed paths at the National Cartoonists Society (NCS) Convention in late May in Los Angeles. "He told me he missed it," said Cagle, who convinced Schorr that latching on with his syndicate could be more profitable. After sending Cagle two months' worth of test drawings and evergreen panels, Cagle announced Schorr's return to editorial cartooning Monday.

According to Cagle, Schorr will "get a lot more exposure. He'll be syndicated in close to 850 papers."

"[Cagle] made me an offer I couldn't refuse," said Schorr with a laugh. "It's a chance to work at my pace, without the pressure of just starting out. We'll see how it goes."

Schorr began his career as a cartoonist for the Kansas City Star in 1973 before joining the Los Angeles Herald Examiner in 1978. After returning to the Star in 1988, he joined New York's Daily News as a staff cartoonist from 1997 to 2001. He has won two NCS Awards for Best Editorial Cartoon, once in 1993 and again in 2008.

To see Schorr's first cartoon for Cagle Cartoons, go here.