Walt Kelly Quotes

Walter Crawford Kelly, Jr. , commonly known as Walt Kelly, was an American animator and cartoonist, best known for the comic strip Pogo. He began his animation career in 1936 at Walt Disney Studios, contributing to Pinocchio, Fantasia, and Dumbo. In 1941, at the age of 28, Kelly transferred to work at Dell Comics, where he created Pogo, which eventually became his platform for political and philosophical commentary. Wikipedia  

✵ 25. August 1913 – 18. October 1973

Works

Pogo
Walt Kelly
Walt Kelly: 23   quotes 1   like

Famous Walt Kelly Quotes

“We have met the enemy and he is us.”

This is derived from the famous statement of Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry on the "War of 1812": "We have met the enemy and they are ours". It appeared in a "modern day" poster for the first Earth Day in April 1970, and next in the comic strip itself in August 1970 in Porky Pine's mouth, and was re-used by Kelly in a subsequent Earth Day poster (1971), and further strips and in the title of the book Pogo : We Have Met the Enemy and He Is Us (1972).
A similar statement was actually used by Kelly many years earlier in his introduction http://www.igopogo.com/we_have_met.htm to The Pogo Papers (1953) which he closes with these comments:
:Traces of nobility, gentleness and courage persist in all people, do what we will to stamp out the trend. So, too, do those characteristics which are ugly. It is just unfortunate that in the clumsy hands of a cartoonist all traits become ridiculous, leading to a certain amount of self-conscious expostulation and the desire to join battle.
There is no need to sally forth, for it remains true that those things which make us human are, curiously enough, always close at hand. Resolve then, that on this very ground, with small flags waving and tinny blast on tiny trumpets, we shall meet the enemy, and not only may he be ours, he may be us.
:::Forward!
Pogo comic strip (1948 - 1975), Pogo

“Don't take life so serious, son, it ain't nohow permanent.”

Pogo comic strip (1948 - 1975), Porky Pine

“Some is more equal than others, as is well known. It ain't that your majority is outnumbered, you're just out-surrounded.”

Tammananny Tiger (to Pogo)
Pogo comic strip (1948 - 1975), Others

Walt Kelly Quotes

“If you gotta be wrong 'bout somthin', that's 'bout the best thing they is to be wrong 'bout.”

Pogo comic strip (1948 - 1975), Porky Pine
Context: (After Pogo says, Eventual Porky, I figger ev'ry critter's heart's in the right place., Porky responds:) If you gotta be wrong 'bout somthin', that's 'bout the best thing they is to be wrong 'bout.

“Eventual Porky, I figger ev'ry critter's heart's in the right place.”

Pogo comic strip (1948 - 1975), Porky Pine
Context: (After Pogo says, Eventual Porky, I figger ev'ry critter's heart's in the right place., Porky responds:) If you gotta be wrong 'bout somthin', that's 'bout the best thing they is to be wrong 'bout.

“I been readin' 'bout how maybe they is planets peopled by folks with ad-vanced brains. On the other hand, maybe we got the most brains…maybe our intellects is the universe's most ad-vanced. Either way, it's a mighty soberin' thought.”

The Honolulu Advertiser (20 June 1959) https://www.newspapers.com/image/259239643/?terms=Pogo, cited in "Pogo on intelligent life in the universe" by Garson O'Toole, in Archive of the American Dialect Society listserver (16 February 2017) http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2017-February/146520.html, and in 'Pogo Comic on Extraterrestrials: Either Way, It’s a Mighty Soberin’ Thought", The Quote Investigator (18 February 2017) http://quoteinvestigator.com/2017/02/18/space/. This has often been paraphrased as: "Thar’s only two possibilities: Thar is life out there in the universe which is smarter than we are, or we’re the most intelligent life in the universe. Either way, it’s a mighty sobering thought."
Pogo comic strip (1948 - 1975), Porky Pine

“Halp! My powerful brain is blowed itself up!”

Albert Alligator in a thinking contest (after Howland Hoo Owl fires the starting gun)
Pogo comic strip (1948 - 1975), Others

“Foo, a beautiful gal wastes her time gracin' up this swamp.”

Miz Beaver
Pogo comic strip (1948 - 1975), Others

“God is not dead — He is merely unemployed…”

A response to Time magazine's cover story of 8 April 1966, which asked, "Is God Dead?" This, in turn, came from Nietzsche's famous quote, "God is dead." It appears on page 96, the final panel in The Pogo Poop Book (1966).

“Ever since I heard you is got a million dollars I notice you is fraught with perspicacity.”

Uncle Baldwin (speaking to Churchy)
Pogo comic strip (1948 - 1975), Others

“So we got fifty percent. Babe Ruth didn't do no better. — Did you mean hittin' it… or throwin' it?”

The three bats (Bewitched, Bothered and Bemildred)
Pogo comic strip (1948 - 1975), Others

“Is we runnin' TO it or FROM it?”

In response to being awakened from sleep by a stampede of animals and being told "The DAM is bust".
Pogo comic strip (1948 - 1975), Beauregard

“I'll tell you, son, the minority got us out-numbered!”

Congersman Frog
Pogo comic strip (1948 - 1975), Others

“Looking back on things, the view always improves.”

Impollutable Pogo (1970)

“Not all segregationists are lunatics, or even dishonest men.”

Ten Everlovin' Blue-Eyed Years With Pogo (1959); an aside while recounting the 1954 shooting in the US Congress public-viewing gallery. Kelly noted that the shooters were not lunatic-fringe segregationists, then added the aside in a footnote.

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