My Dirty Dumb Eyes

By Lisa Hanawalt. Published by Drawn & Quarterly.

Hardcover, 120 pages, Color, 2013. 

SHARPLY OBSERVANT, LAUGH-OUT-LOUD FUNNY COMICS FROM THE BELIEVER CARTOONIST AND NEW YORK TIMES ILLUSTRATOR

My Dirty Dumb Eyes is the highly anticipated debut collection from award-winning cartoonist Lisa Hanawalt. In a few short years, Hanawalt has made a name for herself: her intricately detailed, absurdly funny comics have appeared in venues as wide and varied as The Hairpin, VanityFair.com, Lucky Peach, Saveur, The New York Times, and The Believer.

My Dirty Dumb Eyes intermingles drawings, paintings, single-panel gag jokes, funny lists, and anthropomorphized animals, all in the service of satirical, startlingly observant commentary on pop culture, contemporary society, and human idiosyncrasies. Her wild sense of humor contrasts strikingly with the carefully rendered lines and flawless draftsmanship that are Hanawalt trademarks. Whether she’s revealing the secret lives of celebrity chefs or explaining that what dogs really want is a tennis-ball bride, My Dirty Dumb Eyes will have readers rolling in the aisles, as Hanawalt’s insights into human (and animal) behavior startle and delight time and again.

Praise for My Dirty Dumb Eyes

With its leitmotif blend of whimsy, wistfulness, and a touch of scatology, [My Dirty Dumb Eyes] is funny and life-of-the-party loud.

The Paris Review

Marrying an inspired sense of crude absurdity with an uncommonly lush and colourful drawing style, Lisa Hanawalt’s comics fall somewhere between the marginal doodles that have you suppressing laughter in the back of chemistry and drawing farting butts on Impressionist canvases.

The National Post

My Dirty Dumb Eyes... is exactly as weird, obscene, hilarious, and gross as you might expect... It is also absurdly smart and sharp.

Slate

Imagine a grown-up Richard Scarry turned absurdist social commentator, and a world where dogs sit in houses made of fish....irresistible.

Publishers Weekly, starred review

Hanawalt's work is hilarious and sexual and weird and dark, yet always kind of cheerful and friendly, too.

Portland Mercury

For years I've encountered Lisa Hanawalt's comics and illustrations piecemeal — in various magazines and periodicals. They're always a pleasant jolt. Now, they've been assembled into one thick, blazing bludgeon. I envy you getting walloped by them all for the first time. This is a Hanawalt assault. Succumb.

Patton Oswalt

Something kind of awesome.

Paste

Read this book because it's funny, because it's beautiful, and because it will nourish the inner weirdo you've been keeping under wraps for too long.

NPR

My Dirty Dumb Eyes is a zero-attention-span assemblage of surreal one-page drawings, clusters of gag cartoons (“How We Can Tell Martha Stewart’s Drunk”), short comics stories, illustrated movie reviews and garish stoner tableaus. They add up to a wildly entertaining portfolio from an artist with a masterly painting and drawing hand, obsessions with animals and genitals, and a very weird, intentionally dopey sense of humor.

New York Times

If you’re not yet familiar with Hanawalt’s work, the book is a great window into her wildly colorful, off-kilter worldview; if you are, you’ll probably just be happy to be able to read the book while eating.

LA Review of Books

Hanawalt's My Dirty Dumb Eyes is a fantastically vivid and whimsical playground, offering page after page of absurdity, humor, and charm. The artwork is stunning and the jokes are surprising and fresh. This book is a rare and wonderful invitation inside the surreal world of Hanawalt.

Kristen Schaal

Lisa Hanawalt is as gifted of an artist as she is a hilarious writer, which is completely upsetting and unfair considering how untalented most people in this stupid world are. Her comics are brilliantly funny, gloriously weird, and visually stunning. I worship the chair she farts on.

Julie Klausner

Lisa Hanawalt is the shit.

Cult MTL

I totally hate Lisa Hanawalt. I hate anyone who's funnier than I am… People are always saying that something made them LOL, but did it really? "My Dirty Dumb Eyes" did.

Chicago Tribune