Murray Ball

Murray Ball ONZM
Born	Murray Hone Ball (1939-01-26)26 January 1939 Feilding,New Zealand
Died	12 March 2017(2017-03-12)(aged 78) Gisborne,New Zealand
Nationality	New Zealander
Occupation	Cartoonist
Notable work	Footrot Flats
Father	Nelson Ball

Murray Hone BallONZM(26 January 1939 – 12 March 2017)was a New Zealandcartoonistwho became known for hisStanley the Palaeolithic Hero(the longest running cartoon inPunchmagazine),Bruce the Barbarian,All the King's Comrades(also inPunch) and the long-runningFootrot Flatscomicseries. In the2002 Queen's Birthday and Golden Jubilee Honours,Ball was appointed anOfficer of the New Zealand Order of Merit,for services as a cartoonist.

Life and work

Ball was born inFeildingin 1939; his father wasAll Blackrugby playerNelson Ball.He grew up in New Zealand before spending some years in Australia and South Africa, where he attendedParktown Boys' High Schooland finished his education. He played for the Junior All Blacks in 1959 as a "first five-eighth" (number 10). As a young man he worked for theDominionnewspaper inWellingtonand theManawatu Timesbefore becoming a freelance cartoonist and moving to Scotland, where he found work with publishers DC Thomson, ofDundee.

He developed his characterStanleyand had it published in the influential English humour-magazinePunch.Stanley the Palaeolithic Herofeatured a caveman who wore glasses and struggled with theNeolithicenvironment. It became the longest-running strip inPunch's history, and other English and non-English speaking countries syndicated it. Ball continued to contribute toPunchafter returning with his family to New Zealand.

Ball's early cartoons often had political overtones; his mid-70s UK strips includedAll the King's Comrades,Stanleyoften expresses left-wing attitudes, and he described himself in the introduction toThe Sisterhood(1993) as asocialist,and he was avidly anti-apartheid while in South Africa. Despite this, he has also been accused of racism, and often found himself at odds with contemporary leftists, especially on issues regardinggender identity,feminism,transgenderism,andabortion.

In 2002 Ball was awarded theNew Zealand Order of Merit.

Tributes paid to him included these:

Murray was a great influence to many Australian cartoonists and will be long remembered by his friends across the sea here in Australia.

— President of theAustralian Cartoonists AssociationJules Faber

Ball was funny and goofy and generous, and incredibly serious about inequality

— Tom Scott

Sheer brilliance

— Charles M. Schulz,talking of Dog

Footrot Flats

Main article:Footrot Flats

After 1975 Ball wrote several comics in New Zealand (for instance 'Nature Calls'), but it was in 1976 that he first published the stripFootrot Flatsin Wellington's afternoon newspaper,The Evening Post.It rapidly led to the demise of his other strips includingStanley,which he was still writing forPunch.

The strip follows the adventures of a working sheep-dog called (if anything) "Dog" or "The Dog" or "@*&#!", his owner Wal Footrot and the other characters, human and animal, that they encounter or associate with. Ball expresses Dog's thoughts inthought-bubbles,though he clearly remains "just a dog" (rather than the heavily anthropomorphised creatures sometimes found in other comics or animation). Dog also has alter-egos including "The Grey Ghost" and "The Iron Paw".

Ball'sFootrot Flatshas appeared in syndication in international newspapers, and in over 40 published books.Footrot Flatsinspired a stage musical, atheme-park and New Zealand's firstfeature-lengthanimated film,Footrot Flats: The Dog's Tale(1986).Footrot Flatscharacters include Wal, Dog, Cooch, Cheeky Hobson, Aunt Dolly, Horse, Pongo, Rangi, Charlie, Major, Jess and the Murphy family of Irish and Hunk and Spit.

Footrot Flatsfeatures several remarkable traits: its expansive created-universe, complete with ancillary characters, things and places; the fact that the characters slowly but perceptibly age and mature throughout the twenty-year run of the comic; and the gradual encroachment of political themes over the years (particularly environmentalism and gentle parodies offeminism).

Ball said he wanted his cartoons to have an impact. "The heart of a cartoon is the idea, an artist can create a painting, hang it on the wall and be satisfied with what he has achieved even if no-one else sees it. In cartooning, you must get a human reaction to the idea. The task of the cartoonist is to translate his idea into a drawing that will have impact".

Death

Ball lived with his wife Pam on a rural property inGisborne, New Zealand.In an interview onRadio New Zealand Nationalon 27 January 2016, Pam said that Murray's health had been poor for the last six years and that he was suffering from dementia. Longtime friend and collaboratorTom Scottsaid that on Sunday, 12 March 2017, he had been advised that Ball had died. He is survived by his wife and children.

Bibliography

In addition to his cartoon collections, Ball wrote and illustrated eight books:

• Fifteen Men on a Dead Man's Chest,a satirical look atNew Zealand rugby.
• Migod! It's Bruce the Barbarian,which pitted Bruce, a socialist warrior from Footrot Flats, New Zealand, against the wealthy and malevolent upper classes of the ancient Roman Empire.
• The People Makers(1970), a humorous account of Ball's time as a teacher.
• Quentin Hankey: Traitor(1986), political satire revolving around a Clinton Hankey, nationalist and born antihero "crusading for a brave new world"
• The Sisterhood(1993), a controversial political work highly critical of contemporary feminism.
• The Flowering of Adam Budd(1998), a coming-of-age story.
• Tarzan, Gene Kelly And Me(2001), approximately, an autobiography.
• Fred the (Quite) Brave Mouse,a children's book about a mouse in love.

Ball also wrote a large-formatillustrated novelwhose verse parodied the Australianbush-balladas popularised byBanjo PatersonandHenry Lawson.TitledThe Ballad of Footrot Flats,it was published in 1996. Originally intended as a second film script, this work was the first newFootrotmaterial which Ball had published since 1994. It was the last of theFootrotseries.

Interests

Murray Ball andCharles M. Schulzeach admired the other's work. OneFootrot Flatsstrip shows Dog laughing at aSnoopycartoon. Schulz wrote the introduction to the onlyFootrot Flatspublished in the United States (it appeared asFootrot Flatsthere, but asFootrot Flats 4in Australasia.)

See also

• New Zealand literature
• Footrot Flats,comic strip written by Murray Ball
• Footrot Flats: The Dog's Tale,1986, animated film

External links

• Murray Ball: The man behind Footrot Flatsbiography
• Footrot Flats by Murray Ball,a Facebook fan-site with a huge photographic catalogue of many Footrot Flats or Murray Ball items/merchandise
• Murray BallatIMDb
• Tim Shoebridge.'Ball, Murray Hone',Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, first published in 2022. Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand,