Frazz by Jef Mallett for October 28, 2013

La peste… it’s a rather nauseating human condition.

Oh good. we get another costume guessing game.

It might metamorphosis into a kafka-esque Halloween:)

payback

Mallet put a clue in there somewhere….Little help?

@rubisco2, that’s what I’m thinking – he’s Gregor.

Like always. This is the third grade. Only they’ve been in the third grade since 2001! And they know that.

Lord of the Flies

Seriously? He’s the Pest, Holden Caufield’s sister in Catcher in the Rye. Perhaps a little remedial American Literature review would help. ;-) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R66eQLLOins&list=PL8dPuuaLjXtOeEc9ME62zTfqc0h6Pe8vb

Another great book, of more recent vintage, is Connie Willis’ “Doomsday Book.” Very emotional and packed with insights into the plague in Europe.

Also thinking Gregor Samsa.

Or it might me a giant cockroach from Metamorphosis (Kafka), as Frazz mentions bugs.

Darn it Raven! I was going with Lord of the Flies, but I scanned the comments to see if I was first, and there you were. And so I claim second.

I’m going with “Archie and Mehitabel”. Okay, it’s not exactly “one of the great books” in the usual sense of the word, but it is a great book.

I’m voting Gregor Samsa, too.

@wdave.

Correct. See Caulfield’s statement in panel four.

Yup. too easy. Jef underestimates his well -read fans……

Next week would be Camus’ 100th birthday. Google ran a doodle about The Metamorphosis a couple of months back, which may have inspired Jef Mallet. There have been some announcements recently about the possible release of previously unpublished works by Sallinger.  So all the guesses so far (except Lord of the Flies) are for works that have probably been in J. Mallet’s mind recently. Pretty good guesses, I would say.

I too thought of Kafka.

I’ve read it. It’s great. Better than The Outsider.

His costume is “Big Nate”?

He’s already named Caulfield. If he were doing another “Catcher in the Rye” reference, he’d send his own little sister (if he has a little sister) to deliver the same lines, claiming to be Caulfield. (Besides, if simply “Pest” were the key, he might as well be Ramona Quimby; perhaps Beverly Clearly’s books aren’t “the great ones” in the same sense Salinger’s are, but they’re damn good in their own right, and at least Ramona’s the title character in her own series.)

From the “bugging” reference, my money’s on Gregor Samsa.