Cartoonist to Share Experiences, Sketches at Library Seminar

Politicians and current events become cartoons with a few strokes of Jimmy Margulies' pencil, but you don't have to be in the news to get The Record's editorial cartoonist to sketch you.

At the end of his workshops, he draws caricatures of audience members to take home with them.  "I've found them to be very popular," he said.

Margulies lives in Bergen County but he'll be visiting the at 7 p.m. on Sept. 21 for a talk entitled, "If You Can't Say Anything Nice...," where he will show some of his cartoons, discuss his job and how he got to The Record and, yes, sketch audience members.

Marcela Dunham, the library's Public Relations & Adult Programming Coordinator, invited Margulies to offer something a little different.

"My philosophy when putting together my adult programs is to combine informational or educational programs with presentations that are just fun and put a smile on people's faces," said Dunham. "I like the idea of people leaving the library with the feeling that they had a good time, and that the library is not just a "repository" of books or a stuffy place." 

Margulies, who certainly isn't stuffy, will also discuss  a typical day at work, which is more than just doodling.

"I actually spend more time reading and thinking than I do drawing," said Margulies, who sketches six cartoons a week for The Record.

What he reads inspires his cartoons which have lampooned politicians or simply found the humor in situations.

"Anything that is current is fair game,"  said Margulies, who usually takes about 90 minutes to finish a cartoon.

Margulies, who grew up in Brooklyn and Long Island in the 1960s, said he was influenced by the Vietnam War protests when he chose his profession.

"It seemed to be the perfect way of combining the things that interested me—politics and satire," said Margulies, who studied art in college. "That was it. I knew what I wanted to do with my career."

Knowing he wanted to be a cartoonist and becoming one full-time were two different things. After graduating from college, some of his work was published and he had some freelance gigs, but it took years to get a full-time job. His first full-time position was for Journal Newspapers, a company that served the Washington, D.C., area. He moved around and then 21 years ago he settled in New Jersey when he became an editorial cartoonist for The Record.

Margulies' cartoons have been published in books, other newspapers and online and some were noted on NBC-TV's "Meet the Press" this year, but he relished the reaction to one of his drawings from 10 years ago.

It pertained to Sen. Robert Torricelli (D-N.J.), acting-Gov. Donald T. DiFrancesco and state Supreme Court Justice Peter G. Verniero who were all facing accusations of various misdeeds.

He recalled that DiFrancesco referred to it as "the worst example of media coverage during his candidacy" which was a compliment to Margulies.

"I was flattered because I never felt that something I did had a direct impact on what goes on in politics," he said.

It seems that cartoons can be serious business.

Registration is required for the program—call the library at 908-754-5554, ext. 64, or register online using the drop-down form that opens when you select the event on the calendar page.