I keep forgetting that I want to start ongoing “mail bag” posts but this delightful gem of hatred reminded me that sometimes readers opinions are just too entertaining to keep to myself. Here are some seething words of abhorrence from a very upset young man and cranky old lady:
Dear Julia Wertz,
My mother bought me your comic “Drinking At The Movies” upon my hospitalization. You are not funny. The only reason I got 62 pages into your shit-romp was because I was on morphine and percocet for most of the day. Even then, my anger only dissipated into a dull streak of being unmotivated to express my dissatisfaction for your abomination of a book. I thought your book was so terrible that I would personally slap Fiona Apple in the face for even endorsing it. Your humor just makes you look like a whiny alcoholic whose biggest problem is forgetting her damn keys. Your “edgy” use of turd-humor makes me hope that someone with the smears poop on all your belongings and subsequently burns down all your hopes and dreams. All things considered, the publishing executive must have been giving some jimmies’ under the table, because I am beside myself in the notion someone would want to drop their trousers and knowingly wiz on society; like they did by publishing your book. I mean, the fact that someone actually put effort into, wasted resources on and promoted your work gives me a headache. I would rather pass kidney stones instead of read your comics. Expect a letter of hate as well.
A simple man who actually appreciates comedy,
Charlie.
Hey Chazi,
This is my favorite kind of hate mail: people who are high on government subsidized opiates and irrationally outraged by a comic book. What are you, 10? Don’t worry, sweet, simple Charlie, soon you will discover boobies and masturbation and you will realize that all that unbridled rage once provoked by comic books was simply the bewildering rumblings of oncoming puberty. Hang in there, little guy, before you have a heart attack over a Peanuts strip.
Love Julia
The following (truncated) message appeared on Amazon and was deleted a week later. The passionate writer then went on to review such novelties as women’s razors, dog food and a blender. It’s not a letter to me, but I wanted to respond to it because it’s a summation of many similar reviews and comments about not only my work, but many of my peers as well.
I dont know what it is about [your] generation that thinks its acceptable to publish every detail of your life online but I find it boring and narcissistic. Does anyone actually care besides the writer? I can’t imagine so. This is the work of just another selfish, alcholic writer who thinks their life is more entertaining than it is, I’m glad I got this book for free or else I would have been made (sic) that I wasted my money.
-name withheld but totally a creaky old lady with moth balls up her cooch
Dearest Beldam,
Mom? Mom is that you? OMG you read my diary?!! That’s it! I’m moving in with dad! He has a SWIMMING POOL! But jokes aside, this brings to light something I’ve addressed before regarding unnecessary negative reviews via a program called Amazon Vine in which frequent, registered reviewers can receive free books to review online. This poses a huge problem for comic books subjected to this asinine program because it puts comics in the hands of non-comics readers. This poses more a predicament for comics than regular books, because when someone doesn’t like or understand a normal book, they just shrug it off. But if they don’t understand not only the writing but also the accompanying artwork, they feel doubly confused and rather than just chalk it up to something they’re not into, they go on the defensive and villainize the writer.
Now, I’m not saying that this old hag doesn’t have some valid points, she does. I certainly am selfish and there are a great many people who don’t care, and yes, I am of that “over-sharing/narcissistic” generation because when I was just a twinkle in my parent’s eye up in heaven and God said, “child, when do you want to grace the earth with your presence?” I enthusiastically replied, “oh, 1982 please! I would just love to come of age during an economic crisis, war and world wide disaster! And I want to do it ON THE INTERNET! oh, and pretty please make me a whiny alcoholic just for shits and giggles!” Then God went and gave me everything I asked for and I lived happily ever after.
Love Julia
Disclaimer: I have a (sometimes faulty) policy of answering every email, but as this one arrived via online comments, I decided to make it the first public response to hate mail that I’ve done since Fart Party vol 1. However I’d like to make it clear that I don’t need anyone to jump to my defense nor attempt to reassure me that I’m not as terrible as the letter implies. I get plenty of mail and reviews to the contrary, I just don’t find them as fun to make public. If you have words you’d like to say to me, send em to JuliaJWertz(at)gmail(dot)com
{ 24 comments… read them below or add one }
Well, lucky for you there’s a whole generation of whiny narcissists. You’ve got a built-in audience there. Plus, you know, pictures. Because we’re lazy too.
Moth balls!
I seriously don’t understand why anyone would take the time to write these kind of letters attacking the author. To me it comes off like sour grapes – people incapable of expressing their feelings or translating their life experiences to others – so they try to marginalize anyone else with enough self-awareness to do so.
You should turn your hate mail and replies into comics for your next book. Then you could publish subsequent volumes based on the hate mail you received for the previous volume. It’s like a never ending supply of comedy gold.
“Your humor just makes you look like a whiny alcoholic whose biggest problem is forgetting her damn keys.” …I think this was the exact same thing an ex-boyfriend said to me once lol.
If Charlie ever gets kidney stones, I ask that his mom bring him Fart Party Volumes I and II. To cheer him up.
i look forward to reading your book, which is exactly what i plan to do as soon as i find a hookup for morphine and percocets. (ha)
Give’em hell, Julia!
So, let me get this straight….
“name withheld” states; “I dont know what it is about [your] generation that thinks its acceptable to publish every detail of your life online but I find it boring and narcissistic.”
and then promptly writes a reviews on all the crap they bought on Amazon.
If a cartoonist writes and draws strips based on their life it’s “narcissistic” while this consumer writes lengthy reviews stating their opinions about what they bought and that’s, what? …. altruistic?
Not for nothing, but shouldn’t he really be mad at his mom? She should have brought him some Archie comics.
Jeez, if these blissfully sheltered souls think simply recording a personal memoir makes you a “narcissist” they should encounter some of the pieces of work I’ve had to deal with! Psychologically, narcissism not only involves extreme self-aggrandizement (something I don’t see in your frequently self-effacing form of humor), but another component of it, lesser known, is the need to compete with or put down everyone else around them (not well-given to working in a collective environment a la Pizza Island.) So, inaccurate.
I’m sorry that the guy on percocets didn’t like it though. Usually when I have those I love just about anything I see, or at least giggle at it a lot.
Julia is not narcissistic. Julia is self-deprecating to a fault. Which is what makes it funny. That said, I do hope your next major work shows signs of revelatory maturation in worldviews. That’s not a criticism, but merely hopeful anticipation from a fan. #everyonesacritic
Oh, wait. This isn’t Twitter.
These two pitifully vacuous souls are writing hate mail to leech off of your celebrity and unlikely success. I hope they realize that OUR generation when faced with something as daunting as reading an entire book that very obviously sucked we would likely get through the first page or two then go back to updating our respective Facebooks or Twitters. “Tried to read a book called Fart Party. It was just that.” AND WE’D BE DONE WITH IT. Grandma is one of those people who do not understand the possibilities inherent in the internet and it’s internet generation. The fact that you’re successful at what you’re doing AND you were an alcoholic(because that would obviously preclude anyone from success) confounds the dumb bitch. Moral of her story: Upgrade your software or get left on the curb waiting for Charlie and his Trash Truck to take you to the dump. The amount of courage it takes to not only write, but illustrate how fucked up, infantile, and sad our lives can be is insane. EVERYONE has problems like yours, but you had the balls to put pen to paper and record it, study it, laugh at yourself and in doing so show everyone that they’re not alone.
Morons really piss me off.
Ha! Funny how we only pay attention to the negative stuff.
It’s impossible to make everyone happy. You’ll find people who think Beethoven, Calvin & Hobbes, DaVinci, and the Beatles all suck. If you show me whatever you hold to be top shelf.. your favorite author, musician, cartoonist… I can find a ton of people to hate on them.
People. Fuck em’.
The response to “Why do you always write about yourself?” Should always be: “Well, I would write about YOUR life.. but what a fucking bore-fest travesty that would be!”
Then add a “Zing!” for flavor.
actually, my boyfriend went out the other night and i stayed in reading your comics and eating cheese. and when he came home he asked what i was reading and when i told him it was a comic, his face got all scrunched up and confused when he asked what superhero it involved and i responded “none.” and he playfully (drunkenly) argued with me that well, it wasn’t a comic then if there weren’t any superheroes.
and i think most people also see it similarly, only, if it’s not funny (to them, all the time, but you’re the selfish awful narcissist, of course) then it’s not a comic. and i also think most people are idiots.
That old man’s mom’s got good taste.
I don’t get the whole shit-romp-of-your-generation quip? John Waters had amazing shit-romps in the early 70s…
Now that is hilarious, pissed off at a comic book? Somebody needs to grow up, seriously
homeboy should be angry at mummy for not loving him enough to know he wouldn’t like your book
the kind of guy that would write this letter is probably also the kind that didn’t thanks his mother for the gift, whatever he felt about it. i can kinda picture the scene of some pretentious, snotty fat dude in a hospital bed opening up the bag, or whatever, the comic was in, scrunching his face and saying, “Huh? What is this?” instead of thanking Mom. he probably likes “indie” comics, or whatever, so she tried to do a nice thing…and this is how her little mutant-cancer baby shows his appreciation.
…or or OR!!! she’s a mean redneck lady who smokes too much, got lazy and picked up the first thing she saw to take to her 13 year old, and he wanted one with super heros, so he’s taking his anger at his mother out on Julia!
…either way, he’s kind of pathetic.
Wow, what jerks. Drinking at the movies is the first book of yours I read (I bought it coz jamie attenberg recommended it on her blog) and I thought it was awesome. Loved it. Also love fart party volume 2. Haven’t read volume 1 because they didn’t have it on amazon when I ordered the others.
I love it how people think that there is only 1 kind of funny and that is the funny that they think is funny. How do they not realise that people have different taste? Oh I guess they think that anyone who doesn’t like the stuff that they like has bad taste.
Anyway, I think that first dude was just bitter over whatever misfortune caused him to be hospitalized, and took it out on you. Projecting!
two suggestions -
1. ask that random Mr.bedlam to actually try drawing a comic – which in itself is a commendable task (drawing comics with such attention to details as yours)
2. Just let him (or for that matter, anyone who criticises the content) write out his life and laugh at it! I bet he would suck at it big time.
Dont care em , Julia!
Eh? Do the known side effects of morphine and percocet include a compulsion to read bad books?
I love your pictures with what’s in the background and the expressions on your face. And the conversations.