Still more about Peanuts: What did it mean to you?

[thatcrazycajun]

Just a friendly reminder that PBS stations are still airing the "Good Ol' Charles Schulz" episode of American Masters this week (check your local listings for day/time). Since we here in Atlanta are actually blessed with not one, but two PBS TV stations (one, PBA 30, run by the city's public school system, and the other part of the statewide Georgia Public Broadcasting network), we get no less than five, count 'em, five shots at seeing this excellent cinéma-vérite documentary on the man and his world-famous comic strip, Peanuts. (And thanks, filkferengi, for tipping me to the times.)

The GPB station ran it late at night a couple evenings ago, paired with a New Jersey Network show featuring classical composer Ellen Zwilich and the suite of pieces for orchestra she wrote in collaboration with Schulz before his death, Peanuts Gallery. The show includes a live performance of the composition at NYC's famed Carnegie Hall. Each song in the suite—"Lullaby for Linus," "Charlie Brown's Lament," "Snoopy Does the Samba" and more—shows that she gets these characters, as truly and richly as anyone other than Schulz himself could. I can't find it online for download or streaming, alas, but I did get most of it on tape.

So once again, I got to thinking about why in the world this man I never even met and his silly little newspaper comic strip should make me so obsessive, and have made me so literally from when I was barely out of training pants. I guess it all came down to identifying with the characters, as I suspect it did for a lot of us, and learning from them as one could not learn from any other strip out there: the eternal loser Charlie Brown; the insecure, bookish, thoughtful Linus; and the dog Snoopy, always off in his own little Walter Mitty world of fantasy. I learned about perseverance and decency from Charlie Brown, insight from Linus, imagination and having fun from Snoopy, a little too much about self-love from Linus' big sister Lucy, the perils of vanity from Frieda (she of the naturally curly hair), the pursuit of excellence from Schroeder and his amazing toy piano, dignity despite externals from Pig-Pen...and on and on.

What struck me most, and still does, about the strip is poor old Charlie's determination even in the face of repeated failure, his ability to cling to the belief that he could one day succeed if he didn't quit trying. If he could get back up, again and again and again, and try one more time to win that baseball game, fly that kite, kick that bloody-be-damned football...then what excuse on God's green Earth do any of us have for not doing the same with the daily struggles each of us face?

What did, or does, Peanuts mean to you? I'd be interested to hear what others in my LJ circle have taken away from reading and watching the gang's adventures over the years.

Comments

[not-the-pope.livejournal.com]

I read Peanuts faithfully all through my childhood and right up until there wasn't any more. My favorite philosopher has always been Linus VanPelt. Between them, the Peanuts gang has always given us the tools to cope with life. Or at least shown us what not to do, in the case of Lucy occasionally.