'Trudeau' has rare cultural depth

be "highly verbal," suggesting that the message is more important than the cartoon figures he draws. Soper quotes Trudeau saying, "I have always felt that I'm not much of a writer and I'm not much of an artist but I reside at the intersection of those two disciplines and that's where I make my contribution, such as it is."

What Trudeau refers to is the use of "exaggeration, irony, caricature, wordplay and understatement."

Soper discusses at some length the main characters in "Doonesbury" — Mike, Mark Slackmeyer, Zonker, B.D., Joanie, etc. They each have "a heavy-lidded eye, with a dark shadow beneath," which symbolizes to Soper a "range of attitudes with which many educated, adult readers can identify: a knowing irony, a world-weariness, skepticism, middle-aged fatigue."

Soper further thinks that Trudeau intends to picture "an entire generation of baby boomers." This is a book of unusual cultural depth. Besides, anyone who likes "Doonesbury" will eat it up.

---

E-mail: dennis@desnews.com