Charles Schulz struggled with the idea of colorblindness in popular culture, says Marcy Costello. "I give him great credit for the really important and influential and brave stand that he takes with Franklin," she writes. But by making Franklin such a generic personalityless character,Schulz doesn't offer anything to offer,Costello adds.
Cartoonist Charles Schulz wrote and drew Peanuts every day for half a century. In his new book Charlie Brown's America, Historian Blake Scott Ball uses the strip (and the fan mail archive at the Schulz museum) to illuminate the Wishy-Washy politics of Cold War America.