Bruce McCall

Bruce McCall is a Canadian author and illustrator, currently best known for his frequent contributions to The New Yorker.

Related Topics:
Canadian - The New Yorker

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Born and raised in Simcoe, Ontario, he was always fascinated by comic books and showed an early aptitude for drawing fantastical flying machines, blimps, bulbous-nosed muscle cars and futuristic dioramas.

Related Topics:
Simcoe - Ontario

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While his older brothers were outside playing hockey on the local ice rink, McCall stayed locked indoors, his boyhood imagination soaring with dreams of becoming a famous illustrator.

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According to his memoir, Thin Ice (1997), he was never good at physical activity as a boy, but could count on his mother to encourage his youthful creativity.

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But the McCall family had secrets. McCall's father T.C. was imperious and unemotional, who left his wife, Peg, a struggling alcoholic, without the attention she desparetely needed and deserved. Turned into a golf widow, T.C. enjoyed the company of his country club cronies rather than his wife's company and the warmth of the family hearth. His children tried to find an attachment to him, but his stormy moods pushed them away.

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Such a dysfunctional household and lonely childhood appear to be a clue to McCall's reliance on humour as a way of providing him with the means of self-expression that uplifted his spirit during dark and depressing times.

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Without any technical training or higher education, McCall began his illustrious illustration career drawing cars for Ford Motor Company in Toronto in the 1950s, but after several decades in the ad business, he grew tired of the job and looked forward to other opportunities in publishing.

Related Topics:
Ford Motor Company - Toronto

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Before long, he broke out to New York City, where he landed work with National Lampoon and quickly made a name for himself as an artist an intelligent and whimsical funny bone.

Related Topics:
New York City - National Lampoon

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His magazine covers, which appear regularly in The New Yorker and other titles, are one of a kind, almost a marvel in quality. Perhaps no illustrator in the United States is as recognizable as McCall's work, both for its ability to story-tell and its art-deco styling, with a brilliant use of colour. He has been a contributor to the magazine since 1979 and hasn't fallen into the trap of succumbing to off-colour and venal gags, now so popular among another less talented generation of scribblers.

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But McCall is also a skilled humourist, and has wordsmithed essays upon some of the funniest social ironies of modern life. He writes frequently for the Shouts & Murmurs section of The New Yorker and has a large following of fans.

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McCall lives on the Upper West Side, near Central Park.

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