Quotes by Harvey Pekar

About Harvey Pekar:

Harvey Lawrence Pekar was an American underground comic book writer, music critic, and media personality, best known for his autobiographical American Splendor comic series. In 2003, the series inspired a well-received film adaptation of the same name.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

I don't write about certain arguments I have with my wife. I'd get my head torn off if wrote about certain things.

Harvey Pekar

I'm a guy that likes to sit in one place.

Harvey Pekar

I've probably had my day in the sun. I think I've influenced a lot of comic book writers.

Harvey Pekar

I'm always shook up and nervous and I've got the hospital record to prove it.

Harvey Pekar

I've just been writing stuff down as it comes to me. I haven't thought, 'Let me write some major opus here.'

Harvey Pekar

Letterman... he got his problems. We don't get along too well.

Harvey Pekar

People who are readers of fiction aren't particularly interested in comic books.

Harvey Pekar

People writing about me have said that I've influenced a lot of people, and there are some artists who have credited me with influencing them.

Harvey Pekar

Plays have been made of my comics.

Harvey Pekar

Things improved a little bit in the '80s; there was kind of a revival of alternative comics, but then they went downhill in the '90s.

Harvey Pekar

Some of the most valuable stuff I do has to do with my dissenting from the general opinion about people in movements.

Harvey Pekar

A respectable-sized audience hasn't really been able to follow developments in jazz since the free jazz movement in the '60s. Some of them can't even get with John Coltrane. Audiences are diminishing more and more rapidly. Some of the top young music...

Harvey Pekar

I met Robert Crumb in 1962; he lived in Cleveland for a while. I took a look at his stuff. Crumb was doing stuff beyond what other writers and artists were doing. It was a step beyond Mad.

Harvey Pekar

I'm kind of concerned about 'Ego & Hubris' because I'm thinking that people will read it and maybe even be entertained by it, but at the end of it, you know, they'll wonder, 'Why did this guy write this? What was the point of it?'

Harvey Pekar

I don't want to play myself up as a hero, because it would make me unbelievable. I'd rather settle for people thinking that I'm a bum, but digging my stories, than liking me and not being able to believe in my stories. That's one reason I've been har...

Harvey Pekar

I was influenced by autobiographical writers like Henry Miller, and I had actually done some autobiographical prose. But I just thought that comics were like virgin territory. There was so much to be done. It excited me. I couldn't draw very well. I ...

Harvey Pekar

I'm just tired of people saying I'm a self-hating Jew because I'm critical of Israel or make fun of old Jewish ladies. I do not hate myself. And Jews who criticize Israel aren't necessarily mentally ill.

Harvey Pekar

It seemed to me you could do anything in comics. So I started doing my thing, which is mainly influenced by novelists, stand-up comedians, that sort of thing.

Harvey Pekar

Sometimes I want to convey something complex philosophically, and sometimes I just want to portray myself in a situation that I think other people have been in many times, but it hasn't been written about much.

Harvey Pekar

I've gotten more and more cut off from the regular comic-book world, from straight comics and stuff like that. Once in a while, I'll take a look at something.

Harvey Pekar

I guess I wanted to show people, among other things, that you don't have to be a hero to get through cancer. You can be a craven coward and get through. You have to stay on your medication and take your treatments, that's all.

Harvey Pekar

Author Bio

  • NameHarvey Pekar
  • DescriptionWriter
  • BornOctober 8, 1939
  • DiedJuly 12, 2010
  • CountryUnited States Of America
  • ProfessionComics Artist; Autobiographer; Writer