September 23, 1952: Coconut, bleah

The clever thing about this strip is that it's hard to tell just from looking at her if Patty purposely chose coconut to spite Charlie Brown. She is poker-faced while ordering.

September 22, 1952: Linus' second strip

Not much to say here, except it contains the second through fifth drawings of one of the strip's major characters.

Sunday, September 21, 1952: Man's Superiority Over Beast

I love this strip:

Lucy saying "Oh, my, yes!" in the second panel. No one says "Oh my!" anymore. It makes me want to revive it.

Snoopy's laughing poses in the last three panels show considerable visual ingenuity. The second panel there could be a counterpart for WEIRDSNOOPY. Snoopy has gone back to being small again in this strip, even though panel seven would probably read a little better if he were longer.

The funniest thing about this strip, I think, isn't Snoopy's laughing, or Charlie Brown's disgruntlement, but Lucy's silent watching of the hilarified dog. "This certainly is an odd thing that is happening to that animal. I should quietly observe the situation."

September 20, 1952: Snoopy the Daschund

Snoopy gets longer when he runs or lays down. Look at his appearance two days ago:



He has a much greater volume when he's in motion! It's easier to draw a larger animal when moving; it's hard to picture a little lump like Sitting Snoopy getting up and having a stroll. I expect that Schulz noticed this too, which may be why the dog gradually increases in size.

The strip itself is another on the theme of Snoopy steals something then eludes his human pursuers in some manner. Kind of light as far as gags go.

The "YIPE!" is a little interesting. Schulz has been using these outline letters for onomatopoeia for a while, and they, like the fancy question-marks, are a subtle trademark of the early strip. They're fairly striking.

September 19, 1952: Linus' first strip

And here's Linus. This puts the breaks on the introduction of new characters for a little while I think. So far that makes, in order of introduction: Shermy, Patty, Charlie Brown, Snoopy, Violet, Schroeder, Lucy and Linus.

Linus is a little rancorous at the beginning, but settles soon into his Wise Soul persona, which pares nicely with Lucy's developing belligerence. Notice he doesn't start out with his blanket.

Linus doesn't undergo the drastic redesigns the other characters have, and are still having, but he still has some developing to do. Notice his hair, while unruly, has more structure here that it does later on.

September 18, 1952: Snoopy and the Radio

Snoopy leaps up and sticks out his tongue at Charlie Brown. It's not yet a "BLEAH!" but it's a step there. How does he do that with his ears?

It's a lot of fun to look at Snoopy in weird poses like this one, and I imagine it must have been a lot of fun to draw.

September 16, 1952: Schroeder's dad is awesome

Watch Violet's arms in this one. Posing them in a way that looks natural and relevant to the scene is harder than it looks. There is an exaggeration to them here, but it's not too exaggerated.

September 15, 1952: The blue cup or the red cup?

Here Charlie Brown and Lucy reenact a shot from The Matrix that was left on the cutting room floor.

Seriously, it's another strip of Lucy asking for a drink of water from Charlie Brown, a scene that Schulz gets a surprising amount of mileage from.

Lucy's becoming more willful. While it's kind of sad that the sweet little girl is becoming more demanding, she becomes a much better, much more fun character when she grows into her full crabbiness. In a way, Lucy is just as iconic to Peanuts as Charlie Brown and Snoopy.

Sunday, September 14, 1952: I'm a success!

This is one of the best early strips I think, it's just really funny and original IMO, despite a couple of pretty weird quirks. Its action can occur only because Lucy never looks down. The really weird thing about it is how Charlie Brown doesn't tell Lucy the cause of her "success," that she was being held up by Snoopy. The whole thing has an air of allegory about it.

Lucy's phrasing "I'm a success!" is very odd. It's funny partly because of its oddness, but it is oddly specific, like it might be a reference to something in Schulz's life.

September 12, 1952: Seven Spades

If you have a strong hand of one suit in Contract Bridge, you can bid strongly in it and try to make it trump. If you have seven cards of a suit, then the most any other player can have is six, guaranteeing you one trick and probably worth several more. And Spades is the strongest bidding suit, beaten only by No Trump.

Snoopy's reaction here is great.