40 years on - it’s still fun

Tim Quinn can’t quite believe it’s now 40 years that he’s been in the business; but he can believe it’s been huge fun.

He will be offering a cartoon workshop for the Petworth Festival on Sunday, July 24 at

2pm (ends 3pm) in Leconfield Hall.

Tim, Guardian newspaper writer, BBC broadcaster and former editor of Marvel Comics Spider-Man and X-Men, will offer a special practical session for children aged seven and upwards.

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The hope is that he will catch young imaginations just as his own was once ensnared.

“It has been fabulous,” Tim says. “Like any old career, there have been ups and downs, especially in the creative world where you might have the odd disagreement with an editor or two, but on the whole it has been even more fun than reading the comics when I was a boy.”

From reading to creating was an inevitable continuation: “I have such very strong memories of picking up my brother’s comics before I could even read. I remember being lost in the pictures. I studied them for hours and hours.

“There were so many comics around at that time with such a variety of content. You just never knew what was coming. On one page you could be deep in outer space, on the next page you could be under the ocean, and then on the next page you could be climbing Mount Everest. It was fantastic.”

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Back then, most national newspapers would have comic strips too: “Some papers like The Daily Mirror would have a whole page of comic strips, and I think they added personality to newspapers. The regional newspapers would have comic strips too, some of them about what was going on in their area.”

Sadly, many have gone: “Sadly, I think a lot of it is down to cost-cutting. But I think you have to be careful when you are getting rid of things, that you are losing the character of the paper as well. I think it is important for newspapers to have that extra quality of personality.”

Tickets £5. More details on www.petworthfestival.org.uk.

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