Guest Post: Scott Bateman On Faking It
“So, How Did All The Damn Scientists Die?” — by Scott Bateman
Scott Bateman is a cartoonist, animator, and writer based in New York City. Between you, me, and the internet, we hear he likes to fake it. Make stuff up. Tell total lies! And we love it. His hilarious, frankly fictional/historical mini-comics have us in stitches, and are probably making our high school teachers hate us. C’est la vie! For this weeks guest post, he tells us a little bit about himself and the inspiration behind his erroneous epigrams. Make sure to check it out — just don’t believe anything he says!
Most people know me as an animator. In 2005-6, I did the Bateman365 project, where I made an animated film every day for a year. This led to a briefly-lived show on PlumTV, “Scott Bateman Presents Scott Bateman Presents,” which included voice work from Kristen Schaal, Jenny Slate, Reggie Watts and more. PlumTV only airs in places where rich people live, like Martha’s Vineyard and Aspen, so I’ve never seen my own show (though I’d like to think Puffy has seen it at his place in the Hamptons). Then I made an animated feature film, Atom Age Vampire, which played at some film festivals. There were some music videos in there as well, for Thao, Low, Clinic and a few more.
But, eventually, I got really burned out on producing animation. So in 2010, not sure what to do next, I brewed up a 24-page minicomic, Let’s Learn About The Damn Presidents Already, Geez. LLATDPAG features fake facts about all 44 presidents (“John Adams was not only a Founding Father, but also a Founding Uncle, a Founding Brother and a Founding Great Aunt. It was complicated.”). It was fun to combine my artwork with fake facts (which I’m still writing daily on Twitter), and the minicomic sold out wherever I sold it.
So, How Did All The Damn Scientists Die? is another fake fact minicomic, but it’s also an homage to Edward Gorey’s The Gashlycrumb Tinies. Like Gashlycrumb, it explains how several people died, in verse — 22 famous scientists, from Archimedes to Stephen Hawking (not actually dead yet, I know) are featured. Sadly, none of them die of ennui.
Gorey’s always been an inspiration — his line work is amazing. But really, it’s that darkly comic sensibility that I’m drawn to. I’m happy with how the mini has turned out, and I can’t wait for people to see it.
The 22 scientists chosen for the book are among the most famous scientists in history, from ancient Greece to the present. I had to leave a few notables out. And really, Tycho Brahe’s epic death deserves its own book.
Some of the deaths have something to do with what the scientists are most known for—for instance, “Heisenberg’s fate is uncertain.” But many of the deaths are just plain silly — I needed a rhyme for “uncertain,” so the next entry is, “Feynman pissed off Richard Burton.” One should really not use this book to study for the SAT.
And really, the idea of making up deaths for all the famous scientists comes out of my Disalmanac project on Twitter, which involves making up crap about historical events and people. Why settle for the same old, boring facts when you can make up your own?
