Lucy, Charlie Brown, Football Part 11: 1999 The End

1999: Close the Gate



43. October 24, 1999 
At the end of Kafka's "Before the Law" the man from the country is dying. He asks the gatekeeper why no one else has ever sought access to the law through this gate.  I picture this scene as the final panel of a football routine. The Man from the Country assumes Charlie Brown's posture. "He can no longer hold up his stiffening body," so he waves for the gatekeeper.  The gatekeeper leans over the dying man; he has to "bend way down to him."  The gatekeeper shouts his punchline, and it is worthy of Lucy. "Here no one else can gain entry, since the entrance was assigned only to you. I'm going now to close it." What the man from the country thought was an access point to the law was really a blockage. I like to think that his final, unrecorded thought is "RATS!" We are never told what the gatekeeper does after he closes the gate, but we can assume that his job is finished. With no one to seek access through this specific gate, both the gate and the gatekeeper have become redundant.

Charlie Brown and Lucy depend on one another. They, and the football, are all integral to the football routine. The final football routine strip knows this. Charles Schulz, though, resists sentimentality, nostalgia, and closure in this final football strip by interjecting Rerun, of all characters, into the routine. Rerun did not make his debut in Peanuts until March 26, 1973 (even though he was born on May 23 1972). Rerun quickly became the third wheel of the Van Pelt family. He looks like a younger version of Linus, but Lucy never establishes the same antagonistic, loving, complex relationship with Rerun that she has with Linus. Anyway, the first two panels of October 24, 1999 offer no hint that this is a football strip, let alone the last football strip. The first panel shows Rerun standing on the steps of his house call out "Lucy!" She must not here him, because in the second panel he is walking through the grass calling out "Lunch time!" In the third panel he wanders into the football routine. We see Rerun on the left; Lucy is in the center, kneeling with the football, while she makes the usual proposition to Charlie Brown, who is standing on the right side of the panel. Rerun speaks, and since his speech bubble seems to be slightly behind Lucy's, he is probably speaking after her. He says "Mom says to come in for lunch." In the next panel, he tells Lucy "She says right now!" Lucy frowns, shuts her eyes, picks up the football and says, "Oh, good grief!" We next see a close up of Charlie Brown. He says, "That's all right . . We'll do it some other time . ." Will this or will this not be a football routine strip? In the next panel, Lucy says something truly astounding. She hands the football to Rerun and says "No, Rerun can take my place . ." Rerun then tees up the football and Charlie Brown begins to walk away from it. He finds confidence in this new situation. "This time I'll kick it . . Rerun will never pull it away . . . He just wouldn't . ." As Charlie Brown begins to run toward the football he says "So here we go!" And then Schulz pulls the football away from readers. The next panel cuts to Lucy at the table, eating her lunch. Rerun approaches, holding the football in front of him. Lucy asks "Did you pull the ball away? Did he kick it? What happened?" Lucy implies that Rerun knows about the football routine, that he knows that he should have pulled the football away. Did he? Rerun gets the punchline in the final panel. He turns away from the table and says "You'll never know . . ." Lucy can only respond with "Aaugh!" The joke seems to be on her, but I hold that it really is not. Even if Rerun did not pull the football away, even if he let Charlie Brown kick it, there would be little significance to the kick. The whole point of the football routine is that it consists of Lucy, Charlie Brown, and the football. Rerun is a red herring. When Lucy is not around, Charlie Brown has kicked and punted numerous footballs. My 10-year old son Max, who fancies himself the Peanuts expert in our house, pointed me to the strip from September 12, 1956. In it, we see Schroeder teeing up a football in the first two panels, while Snoopy looks on in the background. In panel three, we see Charlie Brown following through on a kick with a solid "THUMP." Schroeder is not Lucy. Rerun is not Lucy. Charlie Brown will never kick a football held by Lucy. The gate is closed.

Lucy, Charlie Brown, Football: Part 10: 1995-1998

1995-1998: Thermodynamics



39. October 29, 1995
1995 starts out in traditional form. Lucy call out "Charlie Brownnn . . ." He responds "Again?" and Lucy makes the same proposition. Like he as often done, Charlie Brown exclaims about what will happen when Lucy pulls the ball away. "I fly through the air, and land on my back, and kill myself . . . That's what happens!" Lucy's rationalization in the next panel has unintended consequences. She says "You could always sue . . ." As Charlie Brown walks away from the football in the second to last panel, he says "If she pulls the ball away, I'll sue!" He has not even turned around to run toward the football yet and we only have one panel left. In the final panel, Charlie Brown runs silently toward the football. He seems to be running slowly. He does not look particularly intent. There are no lines behind him signifying speed. In fact, running close at his heels is the World Famous Attorney (Snoopy in a bowtie and bowler hat, carrying a briefcase). Charlie Brown has lawyered up! The World Famous Attorney, of course, loses all of his cases. We never see Charlie Brown attempt to kick the football in 1995. Unlike previous years, when we did not see the attempted kick but were able to hear it, this year the strip stops in the middle of Charlie Brown's run toward the ball. How will Lucy react to the Attorney's presence? Will she be sued? We will not be told. When Josef K., after his arrest,  talks to the painter who has spent much time around lawyers, K is told that three forms of acquittal are possible: "Absolute acquittal, apparent acquittal, and deferment" (182). K is quickly told that "absolute acquittal" is impossible. "Apparent acquittal" is described as a convoluted legal process that offers little chance of actual acquittal. "Deferment," then seems the best option. In a deferred judgment, the trial is kept open but it never passes its initial stages. Preliminary interviews take place, but the trial never proceeds. As the painter says, "the trial's been artificially constrained inside a tiny circle, and it has to be continuously spun round within it" (192). Josef K. chooses this option, and so does Charlie Brown. From year to year, his straight lines toward the ball become a circle. He kicks; he misses; he kicks again; he misses again. By this point readers do not even need to see the attempt to know that it is always taking place.

40. October 20, 1996

Once again, we start with the giant football. This time Lucy and Charlie Brown appear to be lying asleep on opposite sides of the football. Are they finally becoming exhausted with this routine? Do they just want to rest? Panel two shows Charlie Brown looking to the left. Hand held over his heart, he says, simply, "Me?" We can finally see that Charlie Brown is playing a role just as much as Lucy is. Of course it is you Charlie Brown. Who else could it be? Lucy offers the usual proposition and Charlie Brown responds with the same indignation. To convince Charlie Brown that things might be different this year, Lucy returns to one of Charlie Brown's old themes: symbolism. In 1982, Charlie Brown goes on and on about the symbolism of the routine. He wonders if he has "missed the symbolism." This year, Lucy returns to that theme. "Symbolism, Charlie Brown! The ball! The desire! The triumph! It's all there!" Charlie Brown of course falls for this challenge. He repeats part of what Lucy says and adds "She may be right . . " as he walks away from the football. As he runs toward the football he says "The ball? The desire! I see it!" Charlie Brown feels like he has finally found meaning in the routine at this late date. He quickly sees his error. "Aaugh!" "Wump!" He is on the ground. Lucy has not smiled during this whole routine. In 1982, her reply to Charlie Brown's wondering if he missed the symbolism of the event was a purely literal statement "You also missed the ball, Charlie Brown." It has taken fourteen years, but Lucy finally closes the hermeneutic circle around Charlie Brown's neck. "No, you missed the symbolism, Charlie Brown" First, in 1982 he missed the ball; now he misses the symbolism and the ball. He asks, dizzy and propped on his elbows, "How about the reality?" You, Lucy, and the football are the only reality.

41. September 21, 1997
There are only three football routine comics left. This one starts in the traditional way. Lucy call Charlie Brown. As he walks toward her, he asks "Why me?" He answers his own question, "Because I'm stupid, that's why!" Lucy makes the usual proposition. Charlie Brown looks especially glum, in the fourth panel, as he states what will inevitably happen. His eyes are drawn close together and his mouth is a tight frown. Lucy offers him some hope. "Not necessarily . . . people change . . Times change . . . You can feel it in the air . ." Charlie Brown is convinced. He agrees with Lucy. "I think she may be right . . . I've noticed the same feeling . . " he says, as he walks away from the football. He runs toward the football with confidence, intent to "kick that ball clear over the border!" Are times changing because the football routine is reaching its end? Has Lucy's nostalgia and depression of the last few years led her to rethink pulling the football away? Will Lucy give in to sentimentalism? Not this year. "Aaugh!" She pulls the ball away and Charlie Brown flies through the air. But Lucy has done something different! As she pulls the football away, she turns her head and shouts out "Where? Where ?!" Charlie Brown lands with a "Whump!" The final panel shows Charlie Brown sitting up, a curling line and three stars floating around his dizzy head. Does his sitting up signify that more time has passed than usual? Has he recovered enough that he no longer needs to lie down? As he sits, Lucy kneels next to him and says "Sorry Charlie Brown . . . I thought I heard someone say the millennium is coming . . ." Yes, Lucy has made a Y2K joke, and nearly three years early. She clearly had this one planned out. It is worth noting that this is one of the few times that Peanuts makes reference to a specific year, even as there is nothing specifically millennial about this particular strip.

42. November 15, 1998
This is the penultimate football routine strip. The first panel gives the the final appearance of the giant football. Charlie Brown reclines, his head resting against the bottom of the football. Lucy peers around the top of the football. Is she floating? Is she holding onto the football? All we can see is her head. In panel two, a kneeling Lucy calls out "Over here!" She makes the proposition. Charlie Brown has a new response "I can do that . . ." Lucy looks slightly surprised in the next panel where we see a close up of their faces. "You can?" she asks. "Absolutely! I have a new positive attitude!" Charle Brown answers. Does he truly believe he can kick the football? Or is he trying to outsmart Lucy? Does Charlie Brown believe that his baseball team will win a game? Does he believe that he can fly a kite and avoid he kite-eating tree? Does he believe he will get a Valentine? As Charlie Brown walks away from the football, Lucy says "I can't believe it . . You are truly amazing! You talk the talk and you walk the walk!" Charlie Brown runs silently toward the football. "Aaugh!"Lucy pulls the football away but her face shows little emotion. She is neither smiling nor frowning. She is simply doing what she has to do. In the final panel, she stands over Charlie Brown, who is propped up on his elbows, and says "But you don't kick the kick . . ." Lucy has finally stated the fundamental truth of the football routine.  Charlie Brown will never kick a football held by Lucy. His best chance was in 1979, but he missed. His missing the football is a basic physical truth, like the "Wump!" of gravity made by his falling body. This year's strip omits Charlie Brown's landing. We know it is there, though, just like we know that energy is neither created nor destroyed, only transferred from one form to another, but never from Charlie Brown's foot to the football.

Lucy, Charlie Brown, and 43 Footballs Part 8: 1985-1989

1985-1989: Lucy is Sad



31. October 19, 1986

This year starts off with a contemplative Lucy. Kneeling, with the football in her hands, she stares off into the distance. She looks plaintive, nostalgic. She thinks "Once a year . . . just once a year . . ." The strange thing about this reflection, though, is that there was no football routine in 1985. It has been two years. Did Lucy forget last year? Has she forgotten that she forgot? If Schroeder can forgot Beethoven's birthday--three times, no less, 1957, 1961, and 1967), nothing is impossible. So why is she thinking "once a year" anyway? Somehow, the missed year (and the missing of the missed year--the absence of a football routine in 1985 is never commented on) has made Lucy nostalgic. She will continue in this mood for the rest of the 1980s. This seems like a good place to remember that Charlie Brown has long shown an awareness of the recurrence of the football routine--witness his numerous "again" statements over the years. Lucy has reflected on past years less frequently. Time, as I have frequently discussed, flows strangely in Peanuts. Most of the main characters were introduced as babies or toddlers. When Lucy first appeared on March 3, 1952, she was a toddler who could not even count to two. Charlie Brown was noticeably older than her. In the first football routine in 1952, Lucy is still a toddler, and still noticeably younger than Charlie Brown. By 1956, when she clearly pulls the football away with the intention of making Charlie Brown miss, Lucy has aged to roughly Charlie Brown's age. Schroeder, Linus, and Sally are all introduced as babies. They reach their "mature" age within a few years, and they then stay this age for the next forty or so years. But not all the characters age in the same way. For example, Sally first appears as an infant on August 23, 1959, but she quickly ages to become a first-grader, which she remains until the end of Peanuts. Charlie Brown does not age at all as Sally gets older. The same thing happens with Linus, and later Rerun, in relation to their older sister, Lucy.  While time does not progress chronologically in the strip (it is almost impossible to imagine a 60-year-old Charlie Brown), it does proceed in a cyclical nature. Certain days are noted nearly every year: New Year's, Valentine's Day, Easter, the first day of baseball season, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Beethoven's Birthday, Christmas. Occasionally, previous years are at least obliquely referred to--Linus is  clearly aware that he has waited for the Great Pumpkin numerous times; Charlie Brown remembers past baseball seasons. By 1986, past football routines seem to be weighing on Lucy. Perhaps she is running out of ideas, out of justifications, tricks, and reasons to pull the football away. Or, maybe, Lucy works to conquer her own nostalgia by turning it into one more reason to pull the football away.

By the second panel, Lucy has returned to form. She looks off to the right and sings out "Charline Brownn . .  ." When he appears, she makes the same old proposal, and Charlie Brown offers a similar response. "You must think I'm really stupid!" Lucy then springs her newest trap--she justifies the routine by noting that it is indeed a routine. "Please Charlie Brown . . . I look forward to this special moment all year . . . ." Her ploy works. Charlie Brown turns; as he walks away from the football, he says "I suppose if someone looks forward to something, it's wrong to spoil it . . ." Lucy has convince him. Since they have done this before, they should do it again. "Aaugh!" "Wham!"Charlie Brown's head spins as Lucy kneels next to him. She frowns and says "How depressing . . . You look forward all year to a special moment, and before you know it, it's over!" But, unlike most every other year, Lucy's statement made over a prone Charlie Brown is not the final panel--it's second to last. In the final panel, we see Lucy walking away with the football under her arm. She says, "It's so depressing." Behind her, Charlie Brown rises to his elbows, lifts his head, and says "I can't stand it!" What can't he stand? I think he cannot stand that Lucy has used nostalgia against him. He knows that she does not feel depressed. He knows that this will all happen again.

There is another difference worth noting in this strip. Charlie Brown proclaims that he is going to kick the football "clear to Bullhead City!" this year. While he has claimed that he would kick the ball out of the universe, or the moon (numerous times), Charlie Brown has never said he would kick the ball to a specific city. (He will come back to this idea a few more times). I had to go to my atlas to find Bullhead City. It is in the Mojave desert in Arizona, just across the river from Needles, California, which, of course, is the home of Snoopy's brother, Spike. The specificity of place mentioned here by Charlie Brown emphasizes the non-determined place of Peanuts. Most readers take for granted that it takes place in Minnesota, but we are never told that. Peanuts is often weirdly out of time; it is also out of place.

32. October 4, 1987

Lucy looks happy this year as she calls out "Charlie Brownnn . . . ." with three "n"s. Charlie Brown looks toward her and states, somewhat oddly, "Baseball season isn't even over yet." Charlie Brown's baseball team's season is indeed over; they lost their last game in the strips from September 21-25. Baseball season has been over for almost two weeks. What does Charlie Brown mean? Perhaps he is referring to a different baseball season. The last regular season game for Major League Baseball in 1987 was October 4. Depending on the time of day one read this strip, baseball season may or may not have been over. If you were from  Minnesota, and were a Twins fan, baseball season was in fact, not over. The Twins clinched the American League East on September 28; they had been in first place for the whole month of September, so maybe Charlie Brown is making an oblique reference to the Twins making the playoffs. Of course, the Twins won the World Series in seven games over the Cardinals, so their season did not end until October 25. Has Schulz included a shout out to the Twins?    This year and last year's football routine both reference specific places. Last year, Charlie Brown claimed he would kick the ball to Bullhead City; this year he claims that he will kick it "all the way to
Mount Rushmore." Maybe the "baseball season" line is another real-world place reference. Regardless, both Lucy and Charlie Brown note that they are doing the football routine "kind of early."  A few football routines take place in early October (and a few take place even earlier, in September, and once in August), but many do happen later in October, and even in November and December.  Lucy takes out her calendar and tells Charlie Brown "my appointment book is just about filled . . . " That is all that Charlie Brown needs to hear. As he walks away from the football Lucy says "This is the only time I can really fit you in . ." Charlie Brown replies "I guess everybody is busy these days . . . ." Neither one of them have said that they remember the faith Charlie Brown placed in documents in the 1960s (see especially 1964), but I bet they remember. "Wump!" Lucy is ready with her deadpan punchline. Like last year, she delivers it in the second to last panel, a close up of her from the shoulders up, as she looks at her appointment book. She says "I think I made a mistake . . . I have an open spot during the first part of November . . . Shall we try it again then?" The final panel shows us Charlie Brown lying prone, as he says "November will be fine . . . in the year 2000!" Thirteen years later, this line would have a strange poignancy. The last football routine strip ran on October 24, 1999. Charles Schulz died on February 12, 2000. The last Peanuts strip was published on February 13, 2000. Charlie Brown and Lucy did not meet up in November, 2000.

33. October 23, 1988


This year's routine returns to contemplation, even sadness. Lucy cradles the football and looks off to the right. She does not sing; she does not say anything at all. She is not smiling; she looks somewhat plaintive. Charlie Brown approaches, walking right to left in the next panel. He does not say anything either; he is virtually expressionless. Lucy's and Charlie Brown's eyes  line up across the panels, even as Lucy is kneeling. It weirdly seems like they are making eye contact. Charlie Brown remains silent for the whole strip. Lucy does not speak until the last panel. Her face, especially considering that her eyes are just dots with a line next to them and her mouth is a short straight line, is incredibly expressive in this year's strip. In the third panel, she holds the football ready, but looks at Charlie Brown. He stares at the football. As he walks away, Lucy turns her gaze to the football. She looks sad. She has a small frown and her head is turned down. Charlie Brown looks determined as he runs toward the football. His mouth is partially open; his brow is furrowed. Lucy still looks sad as she pulls the ball away. Her expression has barely changed. She is not smiling; she does not look remotely pleased. Charlie Brown looks shocked as he flies through the air. But he remains silent! He does not exclaim "Augh!" Lucy watches him fall hard to the ground with a body-shaking "Wump" But even the "Wump" has no exclamation point. The final panel returns us to prone Charlie Brown lying on the ground, looking out toward us readers. But, as she speaks, Lucy does not lean over Charlie Brown. She does not even look at him. She kneels to his right, but she is staring into an empty space in front of her face; her look is downward, so she is not looking toward the reader, as Charlie Brown is. She is in her own mind. She says "It's so sad . . . Eventually everything in life just becomes routine . ." I cannot read this as a punchline. Lucy genuinely looks sad. This strip is the saddest of all the football routines.

34. October 1, 1989

Lucy seems to be in a better mood in 1989. She calls out "Charlie Brownnn . . . ." in a sing-songy way; she smiles when she makes the familiar proposition. Charlie Brown seems pretty much normal too. He cannot "believe it . ." when Lucy calls him. He replies to Lucy's proposition in the usual way "You'll pull it away, and I'll kill myself!" Lucy is ready with a response. "But think how the years go by, Charlie Brown . . Think of the regrets you'll have if you never risk anything . . . ." Charlie Brown falls for this speech. He holds his hand to his chin as he thinks about what Lucy says. As he walks away from the football, he says "Maybe she's right . . Before you know it, you're old and you haven't really done anything" Charlie Brown has been the same age since the 1950s; he does not get old. He runs up, planning to "kick the football all the way to the North Pole!" "Aaugh!" "Wham!" But maybe Lucy has not overcome last year's sadness. She has almost the same exact look on her face as she pulls the football away as she did in 1988. And she has no punchline. She does not get a chance to say anything after she pulls the football away. The second to last panel shows Charlie Brown crashing to the ground. The last panel shows a close up of Charlie Brown, propped up on his elbows with his head raised. He does not turn his head toward the reader, nor does he turn back toward Lucy. He looks past the left edge of the panel and says, "On the other hand, maybe it's better to just let the years go by . . . ."  What is Lucy thinking? Is she sad again? She will take 1990 off from the football routine. There are only nine Charlie Brown and Lucy football strips left.

Lucy, Charlie Brown, and 43 Footballs Part 6: 1979

1979: A descent into chaos




25. July 30, July 31, August 1, August 2, 1979

1979 begins a sort of opening out of the football kicking strips. They have always been a two person operation between Charlie Brown and Lucy. They have always taken place on one day, with no lead in or follow up strips; they have always appeared on a Sunday. They could stand alone. Not in 1979.
In 1979, the actual attempt to kick the football develops over four daily strips, from July 30 to August 2. There is also a long setup this year, a story that starts on July 3 (!) during baseball season (!) when Charlie Brown suddenly feels "kind of woozy" on the pitcher's mound. Lucy walks in from right field and says "You've probably been hit on the head with too many fly balls." Things escalate quickly from here. Charlie Brown goes to the "Ace Memorial Hospital" Emergency Entrance by himself because his parents are "at the Barber's Picnic" (July 9). We are never told, and neither is Charlie Brown, what ailment he has. On July 14, he says "I wonder if I'm dying . . . I wonder if they'd tell me if I were dying . . ." as he lies in bed. He continues in the next panel, " I wonder if they'd tell me if I'm not dying . . . maybe I'm already dead." You are not dead Charlie Brown. The next day he seems to have escaped his dread, as he calls himself "Joe Patient." Except for a brief appearance in the first panel on July 22, we do not see Charlie Brown again until Sunday, July 29 when he returns home and greets Snoopy. July 29 also reminds us of one of Peanuts' best running gags--Snoopy does not know Charlie Brown's name. He stares, from the top of his doghouse as Charlie Brown talks to him. In the final panel, Snoopy thinks "Now I remember! He's that round-headed kid who always feeds me. ." (There are two dots after this thought--neither the full-stop of a period or the gesture toward continuation of ellipses.) Snoopy here reminds me of the narrator of Kafka's "Investigations of a Dog" (which becomes a really interesting story if one imagines that Snoopy is the actual writer of the story, but that is for a different post), whose investigations center on "the question [of] what the canine race nourished itself upon." Unlike his fellows, Kafka's dog seeks to know where his food comes from. Snoopy has his own personal answer; it comes from the round-headed kid. Anyway, the two weeks of July 1979 when we do not see Charlie Brown (except for the one panel on July 14 as noted above) focuses on how his friends respond to his hospitalization. Sally, his sister, feeds his dog, but also moves into his room. Marcie and Peppermint Patty are denied a visit to Charlie Brown because they are two young. They instead sit on a park bench outside the hospital, upon which Marcie confesses her love for Charlie Brown and even says "In fact, if he asked me, I'd even marry Chuck!" Peppermint Patty then tries to check Marcie into the hospital for being "sicker" than Charlie Brown.

But what about Lucy? What does Lucy do when she finds out that Charlie Brown is in the hospital? Her first response, when Linus tells her that Charlie Brown is in the hospital, on July 16, is "I'm glad it wasn't me!" She says this with a frown, her elbows perched on the small brick wall that the characters often converse at, her hands at the side of her frowning face. A few days later, on July 19, she is crying on Schroeder's piano. "He's got to get well! He's got to! OH, BOO HOO HOO HOO! SOB!" Schroeder nonchalantly responds to her emotional outburst by saying "It's interesting that you should cry over him when you're the one who always treated him so mean!" Does Schroeder think Charlie Brown is dead? Why does he use the past tense? He does not seem too concerned, as he then tells Lucy "And stop wiping your tears with my piano!" Everybody has their own obsessions. It is just under five months until Beethoven's birthday. Almost a week later, on July 26, Lucy tells Schroeder that she "can't eat or sleep" because she's so worried about Charlie Brown. Lucy is traumatized by Charlie Brown's continuing illness. She lashes out. "Maybe I could send him a threatening letter" she says, as Linus rolls his eyes. Two days later, at home, Linus tells her "I just talked with Charlie Brown's mom . . . He's not any better." Maybe Lucy briefly, or even unconsciously, remembers telling Charlie Brown in 1975 "I'm not your mother, Charlie Brown!" Mouth agape, arms thrown in the air, Lucy has a three panel meltdown. "What's wrong with a world where Charlie Brown can get sick, and then not get any better?" Lucy cares deeply for Charlie Brown. Maybe, Lucy loves Charlie Brown. This month of strips should be read by anyone who complains that the kids in Peanuts are mean and cruel to each other, and especially to Charlie Brown. They might be, but a sense of belonging and togetherness underlies the meanness and cruelty. They know each other; they are friends; they play out the same routines year after with love. Lucy returns to form in the last panel. With a fist raised and sweat flying from her face, she exclaims through an open mouth and clenched teeth "I NEED SOMEBODY TO HIT!!," with the word "hit" nearly the size of her head.

July 27, though reveals the true depth of Lucy's caring for Charlie Brown. In the first panel, Lucy stands outdoors, solitary in a pitch black night. She is in what Maurice Blanchot, in The Space of Literature, calls "empty night," a space of darkness beyond "the first night" of mere darkness and sleep. It is the paradoxical appearance of "everything has disappeared" experienced in the first night. Lucy, in her desperation, meets this appearance of disappearance, embodied by  "apparitions, phantoms, and dreams" with a finger raised and a promise to Charlie Brown. She sees what she fears most--the apparition of Charlie Brown's foot connecting with the football, the dream of the smile on his face when he finally kicks the ball. And Lucy is willing to endure this darkest night for Charlie Brown. Panel two of the comic draws in on her solemn face; we can no longer see the ground, only the black space behind her head. Her eyes are shut in straight lines; her mouth is a small oval, as she raises her right hand and says "If you get well, I promise I'll never pull the football away again!" The repercussions of this promise will echo forward through every strip that follows for the next twenty years. In panel three, Linus walks out of the darkness into the frame and tells his sister "That's quite a promise" With this statement, Linus has become part of the football-kicking routine. He will serve as guarantor of this promise. He has notarized it. The next day, on July 28, Linus asks Lucy to confirm her promise in the mundane light of day. As she sits in her beanbag in front of the television, Lucy once again raises her right hand and confirms "That is my solemn promise!" The very next day Charlie Brown is home; he spends this Sunday strip talking to Snoopy. The beginning of the reckoning will start the next day.

On July 30, Lucy, reclining in her beanbag in front of the television, hears a "KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK" at the door. In the third panel, she opens the door to Charlie Brown's smiling face. She exclaims "Charlie Brown! You're back!! You're well!" Her late-night promise has worked and her happiness at Charlie Brown's return is about to turn into something else. Noticeably, we can only see Charlie Brown and Lucy from the chest up; we cannot see their hands. Panel four takes a wider perspective, and we can see that Charlie Brown is lightly tossing a football up with both hands. His illness, and Lucy's despair at it, are now forgotten. He turns away from her and says over his shoulder "I heard something about a promise . . ." Lucy can only respond with a frown and an "Oh, good grief!" as they both stand on her front porch. Linus has told Charlie Brown about Lucy's promise. But this is not a Sunday strip, so we are left with this scene for a whole day, with the football, Charlie Brown, and Lucy all poised, frozen in the moment before they walk to the grass where the football kicking will take place.

July 31 shows us that Linus has indeed taken an interest in Lucy's and Charlie Brown's routine. He stands on the left side of the first panel, as Lucy, in the middle, kneels and holds the football. Charlie Brown, on the right, points at the football and says what Lucy usually says. "You hold the ball, and I'll come running up and kick it" He does not even need an exclamation point. Lucy stares at the ball. In the second panel, Charlie Brown, in profile, eye closed and finger in the air reminds Lucy of her promise. As he turns and begins walking away from the football in panel three, Lucy, holding the football in both hands, not yet ready to place one end of it on the ground and balance the other end with her finger, asks "Can't I change my mind?" Charlie Brown, once again without an exclamation point, says as he walks, "No, you can't break a promise to a sick friend" Lucy cannot deny her promise and she cannot deny her friendship. Charlie Brown walks off panel and Linus exclaims "Ha!" at his sister, as he asks her what she is going to do. She responds "Quiet! I'm thinking!" She is in trouble. She will not renege on her promise and she has no plan. She has no document, no banana, no sunglasses. She has no verbal weapons to throw at Charlie Brown, no appeals to her innocence, no tears, nothing. She still holds the football in both hands, reluctant to tee it up.

On August 1, she has given up. The football is ready to be kicked. Charlie Brown continues to walk away from the football, with Linus right behind him. Charlie Brown says "This time I'm really gonna kick that football. He is resolute. His hands in front of him, he looks like he is about to clap in anticipation. As if Charlie Brown's doubt cannot be fully erased, Linus embodies it and gives it voice. "You're crazy Charlie Brown! She'll pull it away like she always does! Don't trust her!" he says, his arms spread wide. Charlie Brown must recognize these words as his own from years past; nonetheless, he responds to Linus by spreading his own arms out wide and simply says "But she promised she'd never pull it away again if I got well . ." He starts to run toward the football with confidence. "I feel great! Here I go!!" He voice no hyperbole--he's not going to kick the football to the moon or out of the universe; he is just going to kick it. Charlie Brown, as he always has, trusts Lucy. In the background, Linus covers his eyes and says "I can't look. ." Which is stronger? Charlie Brown's faith in a promise from a friend? Or Linus' doubt of his sister (a doubt, of course, that is well-earned by Linus)? Spreading the routine over four daily panels raises the tensions and the stakes. I cannot even imagine what it was like to read these comics in 1979 in a newspaper. Did the world come to a stop on August 1st? Were people waiting at their doorsteps for the daily paper to arrive early on the morning of August 2? I might  have read these strips in the newspaper; I was eight years old in 1979 and I know that I had been reading Peanuts. I do not remember, though, maybe I was only reading the paperback compilations I checked out of my school library.

August 2, 1979. Lucy, her head framed by three fluffy clouds, kneels in the center of the frame, one end of the football on the ground, one end held by her finger. She looks off to the right and we all know what she sees. The look on her face seems to say that she cannot pull the football away and that she cannot believe that she cannot pull the football away. While every comic panel is a static image, this particular panel seems frozen in time, stuck in the moment before anything happens. And then chaos. Panel two makes no sense, like a hieroglyphic without a Rosetta stone. In the lower left corner, Charlie Brown swings his leg into the air.  The football is somehow behind him. Lucy is flying through the air over Charlie Brown's head, feet facing upward, her screaming "AAUGH!" filling the upper left quarter of the panel. The expected recurrence of Charlie Brown flying through the air, of the football being pulled away by a kneeling Lucy is missing. Its absence denotes its choreography--the curving lines tracing Charlie Brown's ascent echoed by the smaller curved lines of the football as Lucy pulls it away from his foot. Here there is just chaos. Charlie Brown does not ascend; his foot only kicks up to the level of his chest. Lines radiate out from Lucy in three directions. The disjunctions of this panel make me nauseous. . . Panel three offers explanation but not resolution. The football sits unmoving on the ground in the background. Charlie Brown sits on the ground next to it  with a "?" to the left of and slightly above his head. He looks stunned as he sees Lucy in front of him, her head turned back, her mouth agape, her right hand held in her left, as she screams, surrounded by stars, "My finger! My hand! my arm!" She dances in pain. Her words fill the top half of the final panel. "You missed the ball, you blockhead! You kicked my finger! You kicked my hand!" In a smaller speech bubble below this, she screams "Ow! Ow! Ow!" The football lies on the ground, and Charlie Brown sits next to it; he looks down at it with another "?" and a chagrined look. He is tiny in the background, barely taller than the signature "Schulz" that runs up the right edge of the panel next to him. Lucy has kept her promise. She did not pull the ball away. Charlie Brown missed the football and kicked Lucy's hand. On August 3, she says "I kept my promise, didn't I? I didn't pull the ball away" Charlie Brown agrees. We see Lucy's right arm encased by a gigantic cast. Why did Charlie Brown miss the football? Was it an athletic failure, akin to his striking out with the winning run on base in the bottom of the 9th? Was it more of an inevitable turn, like his kite finding its way into the kite-eating tree? Did he miss on purpose, to keep the routine alive? Who knows? What was Charlie Brown sick with? Did Lucy's promise cure him? Have we witnessed a miracle? Is Lucy halfway to becoming a saint? Is Charlie Brown? Is John Coltrane?

Lucy, Charlie Brown, and 43 Footballs Part 5: 1975-1978

1975-1978: Gender and other troubles



21. October 19, 1975
Lucy sings with glee and with four eight notes. Charlie Brown rolls his eyes. Lucy gives him a short version of the proposition. She doesn't say Charlie Brown's name. There are no exclamation points or ellipses in her offer, only a comma as Lucy says with a smile "I'll hold the ball, and you run up and kick it. In fact, the end of her statement has no punctuation whatsoever, a rare occurrence in the iterations of this statement in the football strips, and a relatively rare occurrence in Peanuts as a whole. Charlie Brown responds to this simplicity with utter contempt. He shuts his eyes tightly and scowls; his hair obscures it, but he may be furrowing his brow. He looks disgusted as he says what he always says. This actually seems like a moment when he might just walk away from the scene. But he does not. Lucy waves her arm at him, accusing him of "mistrust." "That's mistrust of me as an athlete, a person, and a woman! Do you mistrust all women?" Then she adds the kicker, "Do you mistrust even your mother?" And she has him. As he walks away from the football, Charlie Brown exclaims "Good grief, No!! If there's anyone in this world I do trust, it's my mother!" Lucy clearly is a psychiatrist; she has, in one panel, convinced Charlie Brown to transfer his trust of his mother to her. Charlie Brown runs silently toward the football. Is he thinking about his mother? We will never know. "WAM!" Lucy's final comment is inevitable. "I'm not your mother, Charlie Brown!" Charlie Brown looks out toward the reader with both eyes open. He knows that Lucy can manipulate him at will. As we have seen in 1968, 1969, and 1971, Charlie Brown cannot handle 1970s-era gender politics. He falls, literally, for Lucy's performative gestures of tears, innocence, and motherhood. Or does he? He does not look stunned in the final panel. There are no pencil swirls, no staring up at Lucy. His look seems knowing, or at least accepting. Lucy has not lied to Charlie Brown. She is not his mother. What about his mistrust of Lucy as an athlete? As a person? Is Lucy an athlete? Is she a person? Is Charlie Brown?

22. September 12, 1976

This one ranks with 1972, the year that neither Charlie Brown nor Lucy admitted their psychiatrist-patient relationship in the context of football, in what is unsaid. The opening panel introduces a variation. Lucy faces to the right, bouncing the football in her hands, and whistling (at least that is how I read the two eight notes speech bubble connected to her closed mouth). Charlie Brown approaches in the next panel. He must see Lucy because his speech bubble is a question mark: "?" Does the question mark signify speech? Maybe, just maybe, it is meant to sound like "huh?" or some other interrogative sound, but it might just be a means of signifying a curious look on his face. Regardless, Charlie Brown does not say any actual words in this questioning panel. Charlie Brown does not say any words in this whole strip, except for the involuntary "Aaugh!" that will come as he is flying through the air.  CHARLIE BROWN DOES NOT VOLUNTARILY SAY ANY WORDS IN THIS WHOLE STRIP. In panels two, three, and four, he looks expressionless. He is drawn in profile each time, but his mouth is not visible. His eyes are just dots. His eyebrows are not visible. The hair on the top of his head curls slightly forward like a question mark of its own. Lucy is brilliant. She describes exactly what she is going to do.  "I'm going to pretend to hold the football, Charlie Brown . . ." she tells Charlie Brown, who looks expressionless at the football. As he turns and begins to walk away from the football, Lucy says "But when you come running up to kick it, I'm going to pull it away . . . Okay?" Charlie Brown does not respond. And, judging by her facial expression, Lucy speaks matter-of-factly. She is not really smiling; her mouth is open just enough for her to say the words. Charlie Brown comes running. "WUMP!" Even as he has moved mechanically through the routine, Charlie Brown still feels the pain of the fall. He hits the ground hard. His tongue, which, remember, has not uttered a word, sticks out. Three lines and four starts radiate outward from his body. The final panel returns to a familiar tableau. Lucy, holding the football under her arm, leans over a prone Charlie Brown, looks him in the eyes, and says " Men never really listen to what women are saying, do they?" Charlie Brown, in pain, two lines near his eyes, can only look up in pain as Lucy offers a gender-inflected comment for the second year in a row. Maybe Charlie Brown thinks it would be better if Lucy said nothing in the last panel. They both seem to know that something more than a gender-difference joke is at stake here. The roteness of this year's routine does not work to alleviate the pain of the fall to the ground. Charlie Brown becomes purely reactive in this strip; he does what he is expected to do, what he expects himself to do, what Lucy expects him to do, with no thoughts and no words. While lying on his back, Charlie Brown should think of Nietzsche's question, "How well disposed would you have to become to yourself and to life to crave nothing more fervently than this ultimate eternal confirmation and seal?" If he thought of this question, he would see the answer when he looks up at Lucy. She calls herself a "fanatic" in 1965. Once a year, all that she craves is the recurrence of these events. Charlie Brown might join her in this affirmation, when Lucy tells him that the "confirmation and seal" was not notarized. Time is the shape of a football.

23. October 9, 1977

Charlie Brown takes the first panel this year. "Not again!" he says, eyes rolled toward the sky. Lucy, holding the football in both hands, calls out from panel two, "Over here! I've been waiting for you!" Has she been waiting a whole year? Maybe. But this year is slightly different. After more than twenty years of wearing the same dress, Lucy wears pants for the first time. But the routine remains the same. After Lucy makes the proposition and Charlie Brown responds with doubt--"Oh sure!"--Lucy offers Charlie Brown a "tip." "Just watch my eyes . . ." Charlie Brown looks her in the eye and says "Your eyes?" Lucy offers up a platitude that she knows will get the job done. "You can always tell what a person is going to do by watching their eyes!" As he walks away from the football, Charlie Brown convinces himself of the truthfulness of Lucy's statement. "Watch the eyes . . . I should have thought of that before . . ." He runs toward the football, exclaiming that he is going to "kick that ball out of the universe!" "WUMP!" He hits the ground hard. His legs fly up; his tongue sticks out of his mouth. FIVE lines and FIVE stars radiate from his body. In the final panel, Charlie Brown is granted the silence that he might have welcomed last year. Lucy kneels, holding the football, and for the first time ever in a football strip, faces directly outward, not in profile like usual, and not even in 3/4 profile like in the panels when she reads a document. Charlie Brown, too, looks outward and lets out a "Sigh." There is no eye contact. Lucy is wearing sunglasses. Specifically, she wears Snoopy's sunglasses, his Joe Cool sunglasses. Has she borrowed the sunglasses from Snoopy? Is Snoopy in on her joke? We do not know. There is something eerie about Lucy's eye-obscured silence. When did she put the sunglasses on? As Charlie Brown was walking away from the football? In the moment he tries to kick it. Once again, we do not know. Unlike every other year, we do not see Lucy pulling the football away. All we see is a panel of Charlie Brown flying through the air with an "Augh!!" Where were the sunglasses before Lucy put them on? I bet they were in her pants pocket. We are still left to wonder what she is thinking in a rare speechless (for Lucy) final panel. If you stare at the final panel long enough, it is haunting. Stare at it for five minutes and see.

24. October 1, 1978

This year starts strangely. Lucy is back to her dress. She holds the football with one finger and calls out "Over here!" But there's something else in the first panel. A banana? Is Lucy becoming a prop comedian? As Charlie Brown approaches, Lucy says "I have a bonus for you, Charlie Brown . . ." The bonus is indeed a banana, which she gives to Charlie Brown during her usual proposition. "I am not only going to hold the ball for you so you can kick it, but I am also going to give you a banana!" In the next panel, Charlie Brown is walking away from the football, holding the banana, now peeled, in his hand. Before he begins his run toward the football, there is a one-panel pause. Charlie Brown eats the banana, and says, inexplicably, "if someone gives you a banana, I guess you have to trust her." As we all know by now, Charlie Brown will accept, and/or create, any justification to run towards the football. He runs. "WHAM!" Tongue out; legs up; body vibrating. Lucy kneels near Charlie Brown in the final panel, further away from him than usual. She does not lean over him; we can only see the end of the football on the right; the rest of it is out of the panel. On the left, we can only see Charlie Brown from the stripe in his shirt to the top of his head. He looks outward as Lucy says "Bananas are high in potassium Charlie Brown, which promotes healing of muscles!" Lucy is not lying. She even acknowledges the physical pain Charlie Brown must endure as part of the routine (foreshadowing 1979!) and offers him a bit of relief. To my great chagrin, I just learned that Groucho Marx never said "Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana." Instead, a slight variation on these sentences first appears in a mundane place: an article called "The Uses of Computers in Science" by Anthony G. Oettinger, in Scientific American, Vol. 215, No. 3, September 1966. The sentences are used as an example of teaching generative grammar to computers, based on work that Oettinger did at Harvard with Susumo Kuno. The gist of the discussion is that "flies" is a verb in the first sentence and a noun in the second, even as the sentence structures look ostensibly the same. Therefore, syntax alone would not allow a computer to understand these sentences. Semantics and context become necessary, which Oettinger says are "all too nebulous" and thus much more difficult to teach to a machine. This post would be funnier if Groucho had said those sentences. What does a football fly like? Nothing, if it's not kicked. Time does not fly either, if Charlie Brown does not kick it. Last year, he said he would kick the ball "out of the universe." This year he talks to the ball and reduces the proposed kicking distance. "Get ready, Ball! You're going to the moon!" The football is sitting on the ground in the last panel. On the earth. Where did the banana peel go? Were we expecting Charlie Brown to slip on it? No. These football comics are not a joking matter. Here is a joke from A Night at the Opera. Groucho says, "That's in every contract. That's what they call a sanity clause." Chico replies, "Ha ha ha . . . There ain't no Sanity Clause." Imagine Lucy saying Groucho's line as she shows Charlie Brown a contract to get him to try to kick the football. Then imagine her saying Chico's line in the last panel. No. Do not imagine that. Lucy does not do accents.  Oettinger tells us "it is, after all, only an accident of nature , or for that matter merely of nomenclature, that there is no species of flies called 'time flies.'" True enough. But there are time lords. And they like bananas. The Tenth Doctor said, "Always bring a banana to a party." Time flies like an unkicked football; fruit flies like a TARDIS.

Lucy, Charlie Brown, and 43 Footballs Part 4: 1970-1974

1970-1974: Three-Faced Lucy

16. October 11, 1970

Some people say that the Altamont Free Concert of December 6, 1969 marked the end of the 1960s. I say it is this comic strip that truly marks the end of that decade. By the end of this strip, Charlie Brown will have given up all hope and all trust that he will ever kick the football. After the familiar preliminaries of the first three panels, Charlie Brown, after looking at Lucy holding the football, an expectant smile on her face, raises both hands to the heavens, turns his head back, and exhorts, "How Long, O Lord?" In words one would more readily ascribe to her younger brother, Lucy instantly recognizes the words. She picks up the football and says "You're quoting from the sixth chapter of Isaiah." She then proceeds to quote more of the verse, one arm held up even as she kneels, her other hand holding the football a bit askew as if it is an afterthought, as Charlie Brown walks away from the football. As Charlie Brown runs toward the football, Lucy performs a bit of biblical exegesis. "Actually there is a note of protest in the question . . . for we might say he was unwilling to accept the finality of the Lord's judgment." "WUMP!" Once again, Charlie Brown lies prone, facing the reader, as Lucy delivers a heavier blow. "How long? All you life, Charlie Brown . . . All your life . . ." Lucy is God. Charlie Brown is Isaiah. Lucy is God. But this chapter of Isaiah tells us that a seraphim has purged Isaiah's sins by touching a hot coal to his mouth. God calls out for a prophet, and Isaiah answers, Here am I! Send me." (Note the Schulzian exclamation point in the New King James Version). God speaks to Isaiah and makes him a prophet. Isaiah prophesies the downfall of many nations and kingdoms, but he also tells of the coming of a messiah. "For unto us a child is born, Unto us a Son is given." O course,  Linus recites a much longer and more palatable version of this prophesy from Luke in A Charlie Brown Christmas, but Lucy and Charlie Brown are more interested in the Old Testament God. And the reason for this is clear. In both Chapter Nine and Chapter 10 of Isaiah, Isaiah says this of an angry God: "For all this His anger is not turned away, But His hand is stretched out still." Lucy is the Old Testament God, holding the football under her outstretched hand; Charlie Brown the prophet cannot but attempt to kick it for all his life. 

17. September 26, 1971

We are back in the secular world, as Lucy cradles the football, shows her teeth in a wide grin, and sings out "Charlie Brownnnn . . ." Charlie Brown repeats three times "I can't believe" that Lucy would think he was stupid enough to fall for the ploy again. Lucy has a new plan this year, one that she must have been thinking about since at least 1963, when she told Charlie Brown that "A woman's handshake is not legally binding." Back in 1971, she tells Charlie Brown that she represents an organization, "And I'm holding this ball as a representative of that organization." That is all the explanation that Charlie Brown needs. As he walks away from the football, he says that as the representative of an organization, I guess she must be sincere . . ." And there is that word again--sincere--signifying for everyone in the world of Peanuts, either a place (a pumpkin patch) or a person (Lucy) who is utterly worthy of trust and free from artifice or pretense. "WHAM!" Lucy leans over a prone Charlie Brown, a triple pencil swirl and a star above his head, an uneven frown on his face, and delivers the punch she has been holding back for eight years. "This year's football was pulled away from you through the courtesy of Women's Lib!" She reveals her earlier gender-based reasonings as ironies for Charlie Brown to consider as he flies through the air with an ""Aaugh!"1963: Why shouldn't a woman's handshake mean the same as a man's? 1968: Why should a woman's "innocent look" engender trust? 1969: Why should a woman's tears lead a man to trust her? Why, Charlie Brown, why? Lucy is a second-wave feminist.

18. October 8, 1972

The two opening panels of 1972 offer a stark contrast. In the first, Charlie Brown's bodiless head becomes the center of an enormous, floating football, a football which we first saw three years ago. In the second panel, Lucy cradles a normal size football and sings out Charlie Brown's name. This year, Charlie Brown has a plan to break the routine. After Lucy lays out the same yearly plan, Charlie Brown says "I can't." In the next panel he explains, "I never do anything without consulting my psychiatrist." Lucy thoughtfully responds that he should indeed talk with his psychiatrist "and see what you want to do . . . okay?" In the next panel, we see that the doctor is in and Charlie Brown must have had five cents. He explains his "strange problem" to his doctor. He tells her "there's this girl, see" who always wants him to try to kick a football and then always pulls it away "and I land on my back and kill myself." His doctor listens attentively, her head resting on her hands, he elbows resting on the surface of the psychiatry booth. She moves her left hand to her right elbow and says "She sounds like an interesting girl . . . sort of a fun type . . ." Her diagnosis is that Charlie Brown should try to kick the football because "in medical terms, you have what we call the 'need to need to try it." This consultation has taken up most of the strip; there are only four panels left. We do not see  Lucy getting the football ready. We do not se Charlie Brown walking away from the football. As he runs toward the football he says "I'm glad I talked with my psychiatrist." "WHAM" Unlike in most of his falls, where Charlie Brown's full body takes the brunt of his fall, this time he distinctly lands on his head, bringing us back to the image of his head in the first panel, as if his mind is heavy with what his psychiatrist has told him. In the final panel, he stares up at Lucy as she says "Your average psychiatrist knows very little about kicking footballs." Charlie Brown has a look of disbelief on his face, as if he was expecting one of them to give up the charade and address the fact that Lucy is both his psychiatrist and the holder of the football. Are they both so driven by the desire to kick the football and the desire to pull away the football that they do not see these basic components of their identity? At this point, I will either stop writing or write a 1000 word Zizekian analysis of this strip. 

19. November 11, 1973

In panel one, a semi-deflated giant football rests atop Charlie Brown's head. From the second panel until the end of the strip, Lucy and Charlie Brown are up to something new. Visually, this strip uses the same visual imagery of every football-kicking attempt strip. But neither Charlie Brown nor Lucy never mention what they are doing. There is no sense of anger or doom voiced by Charlie Brown. Lucy never suggests that Charlie Brown kick the football. She never provides a rational for why Charlie Brown might succeed this year. Charlie Brown never offers a justification for why he might indeed kick the football this year. Instead, Lucy, while holding the football, asks Charlie Brown, "Do you like jokes and riddles?" He replies, "I guess so . . . why?" As the visual logic of the routine continues, Lucy sets up the football and asks her riddle. "What are the three things in life that are certain?" Charlie Brown quickly answers "Death and taxes!!" As he walks away from the football he cannot think of the third thing. As he runs toward the football, he says "It's so aggravating when you're trying to think of something, and you . . ." Here is where Schulz's ellipses come into their own.  He uses them to denote pauses all the time. He uses them to denote a thought trailing off. Here, he uses them to show us a dawning realization as Charlie Brown tries to kick the football.  If last year, Charlie Brown and Lucy were able to not acknowledge their psychiatrist-patient relationship, in this year's strip, they feel free to not even speak of the 19th iteration of their routine. Until the last three panels we might as well be in a world of dramatic irony. In the third to last panel Charlie Brown does not shout out "Augh!" as he flies through the air opened up by his ellipses at the end of the previous panel. He somehow pivots in the air so his face faces outward and  says "Now I remember!" "WHAM!" As he looks up at Lucy in the final panel, all she can say is "It was so obvious Charlie Brown!" It really was, Charlie Brown. 

20. October 13, 1974

After the intricacies of the previous few years, 1974 works almost as a reset to earlier strips. There is no giant floating football in panel one. Lucy sings out Charlie Brown's name. In the second panel, he hears her and says "Again, I can't believe it!" Lucy offers the regular scenario in the next panel. Charlie Brown refuses, eyes shut and mouth frowning. He takes up most of the foreground with Lucy small in the background, as we are given a close up of Charlie Brown's face. He looks dignified in his refusal and seems like he might actually refuse this year. But Lucy is ready; she has a document and by now we all now how much faith Charlie Brown puts in the written word. He should really read some Derrida. I suggest "Signature, Event, Context." Lucy tells him "You can't back out now . . . The Programs have already been printed." Charlie Brown turns back with a start, elbow pointed out, and says "Programs?" Lucy hands him a piece of paper. He then reads the program, with Lucy still small in the background, as if he could still walk away. He reads "At One O'Clock Lucille Van Pelt will hold the football and Charles Brown will run up and kick it." He starts to walk away but he is clearly now walking back to get the space needed to run up. He says "If the programs have already been printed, it's too late to back out . . . " Perhaps the formalism of his name--"Charles Brown"--convinced him of the truth of the program. "WHAM" He hits the ground hard; in the final panel he frowns, as double lines radiate from his eyes and a particularly intense pencil spiral (notice the dot at the bottom of it) topped by a star radiates upward from the area of his neck. Lucy leans a bit more forward than usual and says "In every program Charlie Brown, there are always a few last minute changes!" Like in the other document-based strips, Lucy is technically not lying to Charlie Brown. Derrida knows what to tell Charlie Brown. "Writing is read; it is not the site, 'in the last instance,' of a hermeneutic deciphering, the decoding of a meaning or truth." In other words, words can lie Charlie Brown. And maybe this is the appeal of written words, of documents, to Charlie Brown. Writing can lie while Lucy can tell the truth. She can hold the football and he can try to kick it.

Lucy, Charlie Brown, and 43 Footballs Part 3: 1965-1969

1965-1969: The Girl without Kaleidoscope Eyes



11. October 17, 1965

Lucy has turned this ritual into a yearly holiday as she calls out "It's that time of year again!" She sings with happiness in the first panel with an extended end note on her call to "Charlie Brown-n-n-!" She sings in the second panel as she sets up the football and awaits the answer to her call. "Tum Te Dum Te Ta De Dum" with a pair of linked eighth notes. When Charlie Brown appears and simply says "Okay!" to Lucy's entreaty, we can assume that this year he has a plan. And he does. He walks home and sits in a big comfy chair to make Lucy wait. "If I have to, I'll  sit here in the house until midnight and make her wait!" Lucy has the football set in the next panel, but she knows that something is wrong. Her mouth is a small straight line, and her eyes seem slightly unfocused as she looks silently at the football. Charlie Brown looks out his window, into the darkness, both hands pressed against the window. He is Franz Kafka's man looking out a window in hope of some connection. "Whoever leads a solitary life and yet now and then wants to attach himself somewhere, whoever, according to changes in the time of day, the weather, the state of his business, and the like, suddenly wishes to see any arm at all to which he might cling - he will not be able to manage for long without a window looking on to the street." He sees just what he hopes to see. The full moon has risen; under its light, Lucy still holds the football ready to be kicked, but her eyes are shut and there is a "Z" over her head. She is asleep. Charlie Brown sneaks out, checks that she is indeed sleeping and walks away gingerly to gain the space necessary for his run. As he runs he says "She really slipped up this time!" Lucy simultaneously opens her eyes, smiles, and pulls the football away. "WHAM!" In the final panel, she stands over Charlie Brown, who we can see from the zig zag of his shirt up to his head. Like in 1961, his head is turned outward; he frowns toward the reader, his plan ruined. Lucy looks down and says "We fanatics are light sleepers, Charlie Brown!" Was she truly asleep? Would Charlie Brown's plan have worked if he just been a little quieter in his run up to the football? Unlikely. But who is the fanatic? Fanaticism runs in the van Pelt family; think of all the Halloweens Linus has spent in a pumpkin patch awaiting the arrival of the great pumpkin. Think, too, though, of the number of times he has fallen asleep while waiting. Maybe fanatics are not light sleepers after all. One should also consider why Lucy defines herself as a "fanatic." The simplest answer might be that she feels a compulsion to celebrate this football ritual every year. Of course, Charlie Brown, in his desire to kick the football is also a fanatic. Is the whole football routine a secret ritual between two fanatics? Holidays have been established on less. As I write this, it is 27 days until Beethoven's birthday.

12. September 25, 1966
This year starts of in the realm of the mundane.  For the first time, Charlie Brown stands alone in the first panel. He utters a succinct "Oh, Brother!" The second panel changes the perspective so we can see that he has been looking at Lucy, who has the football ready. She simply asks "Well?" We can not see Charlie Brown's reaction. There is no argument, no attempt to convince. They both know what is about to happen. Lucy finally asks the question, "How about it, Charlie Brown?," with the now familiar grin that accompanies it. He crosses his arm in aggravation and Lucy resorts to a variation of her ploy from 1960. She tells Charlie Brown that only"an involuntary muscle spasm" will make her pull the ball away this year. She continues "the odds must be astronomical against such an involuntary muscle spasm occurring at the very moment you try to kick the ball. . ." Charlie Brown agrees and walks back and begins his run. "WUMP!"In the last panel Charlie Brown lies on his back, his head turned facing the reader, a pencil swirl of disorientation floating just above his ear. Lucy sits, her arm resting on the football, and produces a document from which she reads that the odds of an "involuntary muscle spasm occurring at that precise moment were ten billion to one!" Let us put aside the question of how Lucy was able to look up this fact and produce a document in the brief moment when Charlie Brown flies through the air and lands with a wump. More importantly, in the third to last panel, the one where Lucy pulls the football away, something happens for the first time in 1966. Lucy is not smiling. She looks perplexed; her mouth is a small line and her eyes look at Charlie Brown in the air with surprise. Every other year, Lucy has looked gleeful, with a smile, usually an open-mouthed grin on her face as she pulls the football away. She has only looked perplexed twice before, both in 1952 when she does not intentionally pull the football away. Even then, though, she grins at the result of Charlie Brown flat on his back. Here, her perplexed look continues as she reads aloud from her research in the final panel. Either Lucy is a very good actor, or she actually had an involuntary muscle spasm at the exact moment Charlie Brown tried to kick the football. By this point, though, we know that if Charlie Brown's and Lucy's actions are not voluntary, they are at least compulsory.

13. October 1, 1967

The summer of love has just ended and Lucy looks ecstatic as she holds the football with two hands and with eyes closed sings out "Charlie Brownnnnnn." She continues to smile as Charlie Brown heeds her call and responds "Oh, No . . . Not Again!? But Lucy tells Charlie Brown "I have a surprise for you this year." Charlie Brown holds his hand to his chin and smiles. He takes her promise of a "surprise" to mean "she isn't going to pull it away." He smiles in profile as he leans forward with determination as he walks away from the ball. He runs toward it, teeth bared in intensity while Lucy sticks her tongue out of the corner of her mouth, concentrating as she adjusts the ball. The Beatles released the song "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" in 1967. John Lennon claims that the song's title has nothing to do with LSD. Instead, he found his inspiration in a drawing done by his three year-old son Julian. "My son came home with a drawing and showed me this strange looking woman flying around," Lennon said. When asked what the drawing was, Julian told him "It's Lucy in the sky with diamonds." Paul McCartney has compared Julian's drawing to a Chagall painting "with people floating around . . . I think it's something to do with kid's not realizing that people have to be put on the ground." Oh. Wait. Lucy is a child but she is not a flower child. She knows that people have to be put on the ground. Her surprise is of a different sort. The last panel shows us a television monitor connected to a camera. Lucy says, "And now for the surprise . . . Would you like to see how that looked on instant replay?" Charlie Brown lies on the ground like last year, a pencil swirl above his head. Even with the tools of mechanical reproduction at hand, neither Lucy nor Charlie Brown will be satisfied with the repetition of instant replay. They will come back, again and again, to produce both repetition and difference.

14. September 29. 1968

Once again cradling the football, Lucy gleefully sings out "Charlie Brownnnn" with three eighth notes in her speech bubble. We actually see Charlie Brown walking toward her this year in the second panel, even as he says "She must think I'm the most stupid person alive." After the usual exchange, Lucy tries a new appeal. "Don't I have an innocent look about me?" She leans on the football, looks up at Charlie Brown with a smile and continues "Look at the innocence in my eyes . . ." Charlie Brown is convinced. "She's right . . . If a girl has innocent-looking eyes you simply have to trust her . . ." But he does not look convinced. He says these lines with a neutral expression as he walks away from the football, standing straight and neither smiling nor frowning." He begins his run toward the ball with a determined look but with nowhere near the intensity of 1967. "Wham!" For the first time in a few years, Lucy leans over a prone Charlie Brown in the last panel. She tells him that what he has "learned here today . . . will be of immeasurable value to you for many years to come." Charlie Brown responds with a "Sigh!" He knows the game is not over. There are no high-growing flowers or rocking horse people here. It is a mistake to try to ground the kicking of the football in a world of love and innocence. Or is it?

15. September 28, 1969

In the most despairing and unrealistic opening panel yet, Charlie Brown stands in the shadow of a giant football at least three times his height. Panel two brings us back to the real world. Lucy holds a regular football and with a small grin simply calls out "Charlie Brown?"She doesn't sing or string out her pronunciation of his name. She makes the same proposition; Charlie Brown rejects her with the wave of a hand as he turns away. And then things really turn. Lucy turns her head toward the sky; her mouth becomes a gigantic black shape as she cries out "WAAH! YOU DON'T TRUST ME!"Charlie Brown stops abruptly and turns his head, seemingly in shock at Lucy's emotional reaction to his words. He kneels down next to here, arms out, and says "I'm sorry . . . Please don't cry." He begins to walk away, and stunningly, he says Lucy's words for her, with only a change in pronouns. "You hold the ball, and I'll come running up and kick it." In response, Lucy can only "Snif." The panel of Charlie Brown running toward the football is drawn smaller, as if from a further distance than usual. He says nothing as he runs. Lucy's smile returns as she pulls the football away. "WUMP!" Another pencil swirl floats above Charlie Brown's head, this time punctuated with a single star, he looks outward, confused, as Lucy leans in only slightly and says "Never listen to a woman's tears, Charlie Brown!" She offers him a variation on last year's point. The world is changing. Women and girls are neither innocent nor weak. The 1960s are over. The attempt to kick the football is not. And to jump ahead to the 1980s and 2010s for a moment, these 1960s strips show why putting Smith's lyrics into the voices of Peanuts characters is neither clever nor telling. I love the Smiths, but Charles Schulz had mastered maudlin irony long before Morrissey had ever found a job.

Lucy, Charlie Brown, and 43 Footballs Part 2: 1960-1964

1960-1964: From Epistemology to Legality



6. October 16, 1960

As Lucy promised just over a year ago, she sees Charlie Brown in the same place a year later. They both start coyly. Lucy holds the football and asks "Is that about right?" and Charlie Brown answers "Is that about right for what?," as if they both do not know what is about to unfold over the next few minutes. Charlie Brown resists and begins to walk away; Lucy pulls him back with a bit of statistical analysis. She tells him "The odds now are really in your favor!" Charlie Brown falls for it, even though you would think a baseball player would know what a small sample size is. He is about to make only his sixth attempt to kick the football. Odds account for chance occurrences. When Lucy says "One of these times I may not jerk the ball away!" This statement is true only in the sense that one of these times a bolt of lightning might strike her dead or a hole in the ground will open up and swallow Charlie Brown. Lucy has zero intention of not jerking the ball away. "WHAM!" Lucy has told a double truth. 1.) We are exactly back where we were a year ago when she promised to see him "next year". Charlie Brown lies prone looking up into Lucy's face while she holds the football in her left hand. 2.) She simply states "I'm sorry . . . this wasn't the time!" And it wasn't. They both know it never will be. And they both know they will be back next year.

7. September 10, 1961

Lucy starts with some complacency, asking the same question she asked last year as she positioned the football. "Is that about right?" Charlie Brown finds himself absorbed into the repetition. He cannot even get angry. There's no wide open mouth, no leaning aggressively forward and shouting. He turns away from Lucy, his mouth a straight line, and just thinks to himself "She must think I'm a complete fool!" He cannot even say it aloud. He knows there is no point. He walks away from the football and turns with grim determination, his teeth showing in an angry grin as he declares that he will not "be fooled" this year. He runs toward the football. But he is early. We are only in the middle of the strip. He stops his run short, just out of kicking distance. Lucy does not flinch. She says "Well?" Charlie Brown can only respond with a nonverbal "?" and a look of surprise as he holds his arms up at his sides as if he might take the next step necessary to be close enough to kick the ball. Lucy stares at him . Charlie Brown turns his head away and looks directly out at his invisible audience. His mouth is a short, straight line. The strip comes to a stop while we all wonder what will happen next. What will Lucy say to make him try again? She shames him. She's insulted. He walks away from the football chastened, a frown on his face and his hands in his pockets. As he starts his run back, Lucy asks him "Has your mind become so darkened with mistrust that you've lost your ability to trust people?" The combination of shame and the accusation of Charlie's Brown's lost trust in people works. He comes running in. "WUMP!" But,  as Lucy asks "Isn't it better this way Charlie Brown? Isn't it better to trust people?," the final panel undergoes a radical change from every past year. Charlie Brown does not look up at Lucy. He turns his head outward, once again towards the reader. And what do we see? His one hair is disheveled. Double lines radiate out from each eye. His collar is slightly askew. Has Lucy shaken him up with her questions. Is it better to trust people and accept the hurt they will inflict on you? In his turn away from Lucy, Charlie Brown deflects these questions to the readers of Peanuts. It is better this way. We will see you here again next year Charlie Brown.

8. September 30, 1962

Lucy starts off enthusiastically this year, waving the football and asking Charlie Brown if he is interested in "a little 'kicking-off' practice?" His subtle eye roll tells us he is not buying this offer. But he agrees to the normal terms, and says "Okay . . . It's a deal" when Lucy makes the same "I'll hold the ball [. . . ] offer of previous years. As he walks back to get the space needed to run up, he tries to outthink Lucy. He thinks she "has a different idea" to trick him by not jerking the football away. He states what he thinks he knows. "She knows I know she knows that I know she knows I know what she's going to do . . ." As he begins his run he gleefully declares "I'm way ahead of her!" But he could not be on shakier epistemological ground. Of course Lucy knows everything he knows. "WUMP!" Charlie Brown lands harder than he ever has before, the ground shaking his body so much that he is almost unrecognizable. Lines of force darkly flow out from his impact points and three stars of pain shoot upward. All he can do is lie prone and look up at Lucy's face as she tells him that she had known, and will always know, what he knows. This whole routine is not a battle of knowledge. Everybody knows that knowledge will produce the same result, again and again. No football will be kicked. In the words of the late Leonard Cohen, from a song not released until 1988, "Everybody talking to their pockets / Everybody wants a box of chocolates." Desire--Charlie Brown's to kick the football; Lucy's to jerk it away--drives this story. Or maybe, their collective desire is  to play out the scenario forever, with only minor variations. "Everybody knows the fight was fixed." But everybody still wants a box of chocolates, except for the coconut ones.

9. September 1, 1963

Here we return to the complacency of 1961. As Lucy asks if the football is "about right," Charlie Brown cannot even be bothered to move, let alone say or even think something. He stands immobile for the first three panels. He rejects her promise not to pull the ball away with a "Ha!" Lucy raises the stakes of trust with a handshake that will prove her "sincerity." As Linus could tell us, "sincerity" is an almost sacred concept in the van Pelt household, as he carries out his yearly failed search for the most sincere pumpkin patch from which to greet the Great Pumpkin. Charlie Brown can only get ready to kick the football after the handshake; he trusts fully in it as a social convention. "If someone is willing to shake on something, you have to trust her." "WUMP!" Charlie Brown is especially shaken up in the last panel. He no longer lies rigid like in previous years. His head bends forward, his chin on his chest. His arm rests on the ground, his shoulder hunched up near his ear. A spiral of pencil line above him signifies his disorientation. He is not even looking in Lucy's eyes when she says "A woman's handshake is not legally binding!" Is he shocked by her invocation of the questionable legality of handshakes? Or is he taken aback by Lucy's assertion that her gender makes her handshake  proof of nothing? According to the Catholic writer Barbara A. O'Reilly, who has studied women's contributions to Catholicism, Lucy may not be wrong in her statement. According to O'Reilly, "Lucy's remark is rooted in fact. In Biblical times . . a woman was considered 'a perpetual minor child,' and as such, was incompetent to give evidence in court and could not defend herself." Has Lucy been talking to her theologian brother? Regardless, Lucy has brought their discourse about the football into two realms that it will often return to: ancient religious law, and jurisprudence. In other words, she has called, among others, Franz Kafka onto the playing field. Lucy has also begun a long feminist game.

10. October 4, 1964

Lucy makes her usual offer and holds the football out to Charlie Brown. Charlie Brown responds, "you must think I'm really stupid." But Lucy has learned from her handshake agreement of 1963 and has come prepared. A sheet of paper lies on the ground in the first three panels. Lucy tells Charlie Brown that she knows "you don't trust me." In the fourth panel, she picks up the piece of paper. It is, as viewers of It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown will surely remember, "a signed document testifying that I promise not to" pull the football away. She offers the document to Charlie Brown who responds with a "?" Nonetheless, he begins walking away from the football, a sure sign that he intends to gain the space needed to run up and kick it, at the same time he reads the document. As he begins to run toward the football, the signed document in his left hand, he assures himself "if you have a signed document in your possession, you can't go wrong." "WUMP!" Lucy's right hand covers the pulled away football, and the signed document gently floats down to her outreached left hand. Lucy avoids lying to him with another legal technicality. "Peculiar thing about this document . . . It was never notarized!" The final panel is noticeably different. Instead of standing over a prone Charlie Brown, Lucy kneels near him, the football on the ground at her side, and reads the document. Charlie Brown, like in 1961, turns his head outward. He looks resigned more than shaken up this time. Only one line borders each eye; his hair looks less disheveled. Most importantly, we see him "sigh" in a slightly deflated thought balloon, with pencil marks on either side of the "sigh." He is resigned toward Lucy's turn toward legalistic tricks, but he knows that she knows such tricks are not necessary. Lucy is making the game more elaborate; she seems to not want to lie to Charlie Brown, only to withhold a small piece of key information until it is too late to act on it. Before the law, stands a gate keeper, who will have a lot more to say. Charles Schulz has brilliantly laid the groundwork for 35 more years of this event.