Scott McCloud Quotes

• Learn from everyone. Follow no one. Watch for patterns. Work like hell.

  Scott McCloud

  Watches, Patterns, Hell

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• Creator and reader are partners in the invisible creating something out of nothing, time and time again.

  Scott McCloud

  Creating, Invisible, Partners

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• Today, comics is one of the very few forms of mass communication in which individual voices still have a chance to be heard.

  Scott McCloud

  Communication, Voice, Today

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• Art, as I see it, is any human activity which doesn’t grow out of either of our species’ two basic instincts: survival and reproduction.

  Scott McCloud

  Art, Two, Survival

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• A medium is a bridge between two minds.

  Scott McCloud

  Bridges, Two, Mind

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• Nobody knows what will work until they try it. Some of comics' biggest success stories in recent years have explored subjects that no one was writing about at the time - stories no one had any reason to think would succeed. My advice? Write what you want to read. You'll have more fun doing it - and if all else fails, you'll always have at least one loyal reader.

  Scott McCloud

  Fun, Writing, Thinking

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• By stripping down an image to essential meaning, an artist can simplify that meaning.

  Scott McCloud

  Artist, Essentials, Stripping

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• Space does for comics what time does for film!

  Scott McCloud

  Space, Doe, Film

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• Form and content must never apologize for each other.

  Scott McCloud

  Book, Apologizing, Comic

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• To kill a man between panels is to condemn him to a thousand deaths.

  Scott McCloud

  Men, Thousand

  Scott McCloud (1993). “Understanding Comics”, William Morrow Paperbacks

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• The ancestors of printed comics drew, painted and carved their time-paths from beginning to end, without interruption, ... the infinite canvas.

  Scott McCloud

  Path, Canvas, Infinite

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• I don't think the potential for comics in nonfiction has been exploited nearly as much as it could be.

  Scott McCloud

  Thinking, Nonfiction, Has Beens

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• There's a very big part of me that just wants to take all of comics history and toss it on the bonfire. I'd sort of like to get on to the future.

  Scott McCloud

  Want, Toss, Bigs

  Interview with Tasha Robinson, www.avclub.com. August 23, 2000.

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• If you just write the kinds of stories you think others will want to read, you'll be competing with cartoonists who are far more enthusiastic for that kind of comic than you are, and they'll kick your ass every time.

  Scott McCloud

  Writing, Thinking, Stories

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• The idea that comics stores, distributors and publishers simply 'give the customers what they want' is nonsense. What the customers wanted they didn't get - and they left.

  Scott McCloud

  Book, Ideas, Giving

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• It wasn't until I discovered comics that I actually began to approach drawing as a possible career.

  Scott McCloud

  Careers, Drawing, Approach

  "Scott McCloud's 'Zot!' is out of this world". Interview with Patrick Montero, www.nydailynews.com. August 24, 2008.

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• Comic book readers are just as abandoned by the corporate system as the creators, despite the importance supposedly given their hard-earned dollars. The average comics shop can offer only a tiny fraction of an industrywide selection that is itself extremely limited in scope. And even when readers know exactly what they want, the search can be maddeningly futile.

  Scott McCloud

  Book, Average, Dollars

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• As I see it, mainstream comics now speak only to the hardcore few who stayed; conversing in a weird, garbled, visual pig latin only they can understand - rendering the term 'mainstream' a hollow joke - while the true mainstream, the other 99.9% of the populace, find enjoyment elsewhere.

  Scott McCloud

  Latin, Book, Pigs

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• When you're free of editorial control, you owe it to yourself to obtain feedback from friends and readers. Some take those criticisms to heart and incorporate it into their work, and some ignore them.

  Scott McCloud

  Heart, Criticism, Feedback

  "Mr. Comics Talks Comics". Wired News Interview, www.wired.com. July 21, 2006.

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• I wouldn't necessarily have been making books about how to make comics if I'd really felt I knew how to make comics.

  Scott McCloud

  Book, Has Beens, Felt

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• My first influences were superhero artists.

  Scott McCloud

  Artist, Superhero, Firsts

  "Scott McCloud's 'Zot!' is out of this world". Interview with Patrick Montero, www.nydailynews.com. August 24, 2008.

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• If a comic comes out on the scene and it's really knock-out brilliant, the community is pretty good about getting the word about good newcomers.

  Scott McCloud

  Community, Brilliant, Scene

  "Mr. Comics Talks Comics". Wired Interview, www.wired.com. July 21, 2006.

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• Webcomics are much bigger than any one scene can circumscribe.

  Scott McCloud

  Scene, Bigger

  "Mr. Comics Talks Comics". Wired interview, www.wired.com. July 21, 2006.

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• The notion of getting under the hood and explaining how something works, that's fairly familiar territory to me.

  Scott McCloud

  Territory, Explaining, Hood

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• All through my comics career, I was always trying to reinvent the form.

  Scott McCloud

  Careers, Always Trying, Trying

  Interview with Tasha Robinson, www.avclub.com. August 23, 2000.

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