I’ve used Lisa Simpson, the TV cartoon character, as my avatar online for years. I love her cocky yellow grin, her pearls and her spiky hair. I thought she was a perfect avatar, symbolizing cartoons and smarts on a gorgeous lime-green background.I paid no attention to those who said they heard my tweets and posts in the youthful, high-pitched voice of actress Yeardley Smith. I ignored those who I assumed most people would know that the person represented by a cartoon was unlikely to be a squeaky yellow girl and more likely to be the woman reflected in the writing on her blog and in her tweets.
But I underestimated the power of a picture. Worth a thousand words you say? A thousand improbable and extremely witless words are apparently conjured up by the image of Lisa Simpson. Which is odd, as she was created by UCLA and Harvard-educated writers who’ve given her a complex and charming character: the talented and smart daughter in a family of dolts.
Being treated like Lisa Simpson would be rather flattering but many readers, including educated people with PhDs, seem to confuse Lisa with her doltish father, Homer. Doh! Or, more likely, they don’t know the TV show and just see any cartoon as puerile and gormless and anyone represented by one as a nitwit.
Worse yet, my book is set in the animation industry (more cartoons!) and I’ve tweeted and blogged quite a bit about animation. So, a double danger of being taken for a feckless freak and a nincompoop, apparently.
None of this would matter but, it suddenly struck me that agents and publishers might also be under the impresion that animation and cartoons are simpleminded silliness and a book about them by someone represented by a childish cartoon would not be worth bothering with. While my writing and I may have our flaws, we are not dolts.So, just in case, goodbye Lisa. I’ll miss you, a much misunderstood avatar.
Yeardley Smith, voice actor, voices Lisa Simpson.
