Editing Gary Larson (section)

===''The Far Side''===
{{Main|The Far Side}}
Larson decided that he could increase his income from cartooning by selling his ''Nature's Way'' strip to another newspaper. While on vacation in [[San Francisco]], he pitched his work to the ''[[San Francisco Chronicle]]'' and, to his surprise, the ''Chronicle'' bought the strip and promoted it for [[Print syndication|syndication]], renaming it ''The Far Side''.<ref name=Salon99 /> Its first appearance in the ''Chronicle'' was on January 1, 1980.  A week later, ''The Seattle Times'' dropped ''Nature's Way''.<ref name=prehistory /> Unlike [[Charles Schulz]], who resented the name ''[[Peanuts]]'' imposed by his publisher, Larson had no such qualms, saying, "They could have called it ''Revenge of the Zucchini People'', for all I cared."

''The Far Side'' ran for fifteen years, syndicated initially by [[Chronicle Features]] and later by [[Universal Press Syndicate]], until Larson retired with his final strip published on January 1, 1995.

Themes in ''The Far Side'' were often [[Surreal humour|surreal]]. Often, the behavior of supposedly superior humans was compared with animals. For instance, a father explains to his son that a bird song is a territorial marking common to the lower animals, while surrounded by fences and dense housing. Animals and other creatures were frequently presented [[anthropomorphism|anthropomorphically]]. One strip depicts a family of spiders driving in a car with a "Have a Nice Day" bumper sticker, featuring a smiley face with eight eyes.

One of Larson's more famous cartoons shows a [[Common chimpanzee|chimpanzee]] couple grooming. The female finds a blond human hair on the male and inquires, "Conducting a little more 'research' with that [[Jane Goodall]] tramp?" A representative from the [[Jane Goodall Institute]] thought that this was in bad taste and wrote a critical letter to Larson regarding the cartoon. Larson contacted the Goodall Institute to apologize only to find that Jane Goodall, who had been in Africa at the time of the cartoon's publication and only learned of it years after its initial publication, approved of it, stating that she found it amusing. Since then, all profits from sales of a shirt featuring this cartoon go to the Goodall Institute.<ref>{{cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=n5eIBwAAQBAJ | title=Make 'em Laugh! American Humorists of the 20th and 21st Centuries | publisher=ABC-CLIO | author=Jarvis, Zeke | year=2015 | pages=51| isbn=9781440829956 }}</ref> Goodall wrote a preface to ''The Far Side Gallery 5'', detailing her version of the "Jane Goodall Tramp" controversy.<ref>Larson, Gary. ''The Far Side Gallery 5''. Kansas City, Missouri: Andrew and McMeel, 1995. {{ISBN|0-8362-0425-5}}</ref> She praised Larson's creative ideas, which often compare and contrast the behavior of humans and animals.

Larson's ''The Far Side'' cartoons were syndicated worldwide and published in many collections. They were also reproduced extensively on [[greeting cards]] which were very popular, but these were discontinued in March 2009. Two animated versions were produced for television: ''[[Gary Larson's Tales from the Far Side|Tales from the Far Side]]'' (1994) and ''Tales from the Far Side II'' (1997).<ref name=Salon99 /><ref name=IMDB>{{IMDb name|id=488989}}</ref> A 2007 ''The Far Side'' calendar donated all author royalties to [[Conservation International]].<ref name="wild">{{cite news |last=Weise |first=Elizabeth |date=November 22, 2006 |title=Larson drawn to wild side |url=https://www.usatoday.com/life/2006-11-20-larson-cover-usat_x.htm |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230402174742/https://usatoday30.usatoday.com/life/2006-11-20-larson-cover-usat_x.htm |archive-date=2 April 2023 |access-date=May 3, 2010 |work=USA Today}}</ref>

The significance of many of Larson's cartoons resulted in a major display of over 400 of his original works at the [[California Academy of Sciences]] in 1985.<ref>{{cite news |title=The Funny, Intelligent and Bizarre World of "The Far Side"| url=https://apnews.com/article/3e75e179ca20d927443d1d2d9b83479f | date=December 11, 1985 | access-date=February 22, 2023}}</ref>