The Complete Peanuts Family Album. Andrew Farago

are knocked off by

      line drives, and he even spends an inning upside down

      after a really solid hit. And with the exception of two home

      runs in his entire Little League career, he never comes

      through with a clutch performance when a close game is

      on the line.

      His athletic difficulties aren’t confined to a single

      season, as he’s equally hapless at all sports. Every year,

      Lucy convinces him to attempt a placekick while she

      holds a football for him, and every year, she pulls it away

      and he lands flat on his back. Even the gentle pastime of

      kite flying has proven dangerous for him: He either ends

      up hopelessly tangled up in miles of string or stands by

      helplessly as the Kite-Eating Tree devours his latest flyer.

      Charlie Brown is a thoroughly average student,

      although he could probably be an “A” student if not for his

      insecurities and performance anxiety. Fear of failure, fear of

      success, and, as Lucy once successfully points out, “fear of

      everything” always seems to hold him back. His unrequited

      crush on his classmate known only as the Little Red-Haired

      Girl goes unfulfilled in part because he can never bring

      himself to approach her. As he once observes, “They say

      opposites attract. . . . She’s really something and I’m really

      nothing. . . . How opposite can you get?”

      Despite his anxieties, or possibly because of them, his

      friends appreciate his company and know that they can

      always count on good ol’ Charlie Brown, whether he wins

      or not. As Linus says, “Of all the Charlie Browns in the

      world, you’re the Charlie Browniest!”

      Charles Schulz and his lead character shared many

      similarities, and Schulz projected many of his own

      insecurities onto Charlie Brown. These universal feelings

      of anxiety and melancholy have been embraced by

      generations of readers worldwide. “Charlie Brown is the

      ultimate loser; that is both his magic and his destiny. If he

      weren’t a loser, he’d have no incentive to keep on trying.

      The secret is not necessarily to win over adversity, but

      never to stop trying. That’s the key, perhaps, to the human

      condition. Charlie Brown is the world’s champion tryer. I

      think that’s important.”

      Charlie Brown rarely caught a break under the pen of

      Charles Schulz, and that’s a big part of his universal appeal.

      “I know one thing, humor doesn’t come from a happy

      situation. Happy is not funny. Funny is when something

      happens to someone else and you identify with it and

      laugh at the luckless one at the same time. Disasters afflict

      Charlie Brown that come to all of us sometime; but to

      Charlie, everything bad happens all the time. He never gets

      anything right. But a nice kid. I like Charlie Brown.”

      opposite: Spot art from strip – Charles M. Schulz

      first aPPearanCe

      10/02/1950

      “

      )

      ”

      28 THE COMPLETE PEANUTS FAMILY ALBUM

      “I only dread one

      day at a time.”

      —Charlie Brown

      29CHARLIE BROWN

      opposite, top left: Style Guide art – PW |

      opposite and above: Charlie Brown model sheet

      – CSCA

      | above center: Style Guide art – CSCA

      “

      &

      ”

      30

      above: Style Guide art – CSCA | right: Spot art from strip – Charles M. Schulz | above right:

      Art by Charles M. Schulz – CSCA | opposite: Style Guide art – CSCA | overleaf, left: Style

      guide art – PW |

      right: Comic-Con postcard, 2010 – CSCA

      the Eternal Optimist

      “This year has

      to be the year I

      kick that ol’ ball.”

      —Charlie Brown

      I

      t’s a fall tradition. The football season doesn’t really be-

      gin until Lucy convinces Charlie Brown—again—that

      she’s going to hold a football in place so that he can kick

      it. Each time, he is justifiably skeptical, but she somehow

      convinces him that this is the year that she’ll finally let him

      kick the football. And each and every year, she pulls the

      ball away at the last second, and Charlie Brown flies into

      the air and lands flat on his back. And every year, Lucy ex-

      plains to Charlie Brown that his trust in her was misplaced,

      but both of them know that the cycle will repeat itself the

      following year.

      This tradition was actually started by Violet, who first

      pulled the football away from Charlie Brown before Lucy

      moved into the neighborhood. Lucy soon took over the

      annual ritual, pulling the football on Charlie Brown’s

      second attempt.

      THE COMPLETE PEANUTS FAMILY ALBUM

      “

      &

      ”

      “

      Z

      ”

      34

      THE COMPLETE PEANUTS FAMILY ALBUM

      the baseball manager

      “Just what I’ve always been afraid of . . . my team has built up an immunity to losing.”

      —Charlie Brown

      B

      aseball is Charlie Brown’s favorite sport. As his

      team’s manager and pitcher, he spends each

      off-season analyzing statistics, carefully