Hobbes is a character in the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson. He is one of only two characters within Watterson's strip who have multiple identities. Unlike the other character (Calvin), Hobbes only has one alternate identity. Listen to this article (3 parts) (info) Part 1ʉۢ Part 2ʉۢ Part 3 This audio file was created from an article revision dated 2006-01-29, and may not reflect subsequent edits to the article. ... William B. Bill Watterson II (born July 5, 1958) is the author of the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes and a few poems (which are mostly embedded in his works). ... In comic books, first appearance refers to first comic book to feature a character. ... is the 322nd day of the year (323rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... This article is about the year. ... Image File history File links Broom_icon. ... Listen to this article (3 parts) (info) Part 1ʉۢ Part 2ʉۢ Part 3 This audio file was created from an article revision dated 2006-01-29, and may not reflect subsequent edits to the article. ... William B. Bill Watterson II (born July 5, 1958) is the author of the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes and a few poems (which are mostly embedded in his works). ...

Twin identities

From Calvin's perspective he is alive, a real individual with thoughts, feelings and ideas just as every other character. From everyone else's perspective, Hobbes is seen as Calvin's stuffed tiger, given personality and action only by Calvin's active (sometimes overactive) imagination. He is named after 17th century philosopher Thomas Hobbes, who had what Watterson described as "a dim view of human nature."^[1] (Thomas Hobbes is famous for his claim that humans' natural state is a state of war, where "the life of man [is], solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short.") Hobbes is much more rational and aware of consequences than Calvin, but seldom interferes with Calvin's troublemaking beyond a few oblique warnings — after all, Calvin will be the one to get in trouble for it, not Hobbes. To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... A philosopher is a person who thinks deeply regarding people, society, the world, and/or the universe. ... Hobbes redirects here. ...

Relationship with Calvin

For the most part, Calvin and Hobbes converse and play together, revelling in what is ultimately a deep friendship. They also frequently argue or even fight with each other, though their disagreements are generally short-lived. Often Hobbes ambushes Calvin with an energetic pounce-and-tackle attack, which leaves Calvin bruised and scraped up but not seriously harmed. Hobbes takes great pleasure in his demonstrations of feline prowess, while Calvin expresses keen frustration at his inability to stop the attacks or explain his injuries to his skeptical parents. Hobbes is proud to be an animal and seems to think low of humans (when Calvin is wondering why people exist, Hobbes simply responds "Tiger food."), and Calvin had claimed that he once ate a kid in his school; Hobbes is willing to attack Calvin without fear to hurt him, and had once mouthed Calvin's whole head to be left alone.

Hobbes almost never calls Calvin by his name. Instead, he simply uses pronouns when speaking to his human counterpart. This is not easily noticeable since Hobbes rarely speaks in panels including any other characters besides Calvin and himself. In linguistics and grammar, a pronoun is a word that usually takes the place of a noun or noun phrase that was previously mentioned (such as she, it) or that refers to something or someone (I, me, you). Pronouns are often one of the basic parts of speech of the... A panel is a single-drawing cartoon published by a newspaper, by a magazine, or on the Internet. ...

Hobbes is shown to be an enthusiastic, if not particularly talented, artist, a trait which he shares with Calvin, though to a lesser degree, sometimes supplying the (unnecessary) artwork for Calvin's school projects, such as letterhead featuring a "Calvin shield" surrounded by "lance-toting tigers". Despite this, he is shown to be fairly skilled at using clay, creating a realistic-looking sabre-toothed tiger (in contrast to Calvin's clay shrunken-head collection).

Hobbes is almost always willing to submit to finishing Calvin's homework when Calvin gets lazy. Hobbes' motives for doing so is usually only to boast of the academic knowledge and skill of tigers in solving the problems. While he explains the homework to Calvin in a seemingly scientific and advanced method, the answer that comes up is usually completely incorrect, even though most times the problem only involves simple mathematic addition or subtraction. When Hobbes is not trying to explain the homework to him, Calvin is usually reading comics or otherwise doing anything but work.

While Calvin fears girls, particularly their "cooties," Hobbes is susceptible to females, and especially loves "smooches." Cooties is a slang word in American English, used by children, referring to a disease. ...

Origins and development

Watterson based some of Hobbes's characteristics, especially his playfulness and attack instinct, on his own pet cat, Sprite. Hobbes takes great pride in being a feline (his love affair with tuna borders on addiction) and frequently makes wry or even disparaging comments about human nature, declaring his good fortune to lead a tiger's life. Reflecting upon his work in the introduction he wrote to The Complete Calvin and Hobbes, Watterson observed that his two protagonists revealed different facets of his own personality. Calvin generally voices what Watterson considered his immature side, often echoing the sentiments Watterson saw prevalent in modern America. ("The consumer is always right"; "There has to be a way to cram more violence into ninety minutes"; "Hold on, I need to inflate my basketball shoes.") By contrast, Hobbes offers a voice of ironic maturity — though he is himself far from immune to silliness. For other uses, see Tuna (disambiguation). ...

Calvin captures Hobbes in a "tiger trap" during the first strip of the comic. Watterson initially believed that it was important to establish how his two main characters first met, but by the time he wrote the Tenth Anniversary Book, he had changed his opinion, saying it was unnecessary and even detrimental to the feel of the strip. Much later, it is apparent in several strips that Hobbes and Calvin have known each other their whole lives, including when Calvin was an infant. This contradicted the first two strips, which show Calvin and Hobbes' first meeting. One strip especially shows Calvin claiming that he didn't remember much of his infancy. While Calvin starts going on and on about how he suspects he was being brainwashed when he was very, very young, and asking nobody in particular what he remembered that someone wanted him to forget, Hobbes says "I seem to recall that you spent most of the time burping up." Also, in an earlier strip, Hobbes once muses about some advice his father gave him. The reality of this comment is open to debate. Retroactive continuity – commonly contracted to the portmanteau word retcon – refers to the act of changing previously established details of a fictional setting, often without providing an explanation for the changes within the context of that setting. ... A human infant The word Infant derives from the Latin in-fans, meaning unable to speak. ... Brainwashing (also known as thought reform or as re-education) consists of any effort aimed at instilling certain attitudes and beliefs in a person — sometimes unwelcome beliefs in conflict with the persons prior beliefs and knowledge. ...

Hobbes' appearance changed over the strip's run; in the beginning he was slightly shorter, and his tufts of fur less defined and shorter. His eyes also had more of a round shape, as opposed to the oval shape of later years. The most notable change, however, were the pads on Hobbes's hands. In earlier years, Watterson drew the pads on Hobbes' hands as a reminder that they were really paws, but later removed them on the grounds that he found them to be visually distracting.

Hobbes' reality

From Calvin's point of view, Hobbes is a walking, talking, bipedal tiger, much larger than Calvin and full of his own attitudes and ideas. But when the perspective shifts to any other character, readers see merely a stuffed tiger (there is one occasion in which Calvin's perspective of Hobbes is visible in the same panel as a parent, but the parent was not looking at the time). This is, of course, an odd dichotomy, and Watterson explains it thus: A biped is an animal that travels across surfaces supported by two legs. ... For other uses, see Tiger (disambiguation). ... A dichotomy is a division into two non-overlapping or mutually exclusive and jointly exhaustive parts. ...

Many readers assume that Hobbes is either a product of Calvin's imagination, or a stuffed animal that comes to life when Calvin is the only one around, or when nobody else but him is looking. However, Watterson rejects both of these interpretations, saying, "Hobbes is more about the subjective nature of reality than dolls coming to life": thus there is no concrete definition of Hobbes' reality.^[3] Watterson explained: "Calvin sees Hobbes one way, and everyone else sees Hobbes another way." Hobbes' reality is in the eye of the beholder. The so-called 'gimmick' of Hobbes is the juxtaposition of Calvin and Hobbes' reality and everyone else's, with the two rarely agreeing. Imagination is accepted as the innate ability and process to invent partial or complete personal realms within the mind from elements derived from sense perceptions of the shared world. ... For preserved dead animals, see taxidermy. ... This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ... For other uses, see Reality (disambiguation). ... A gimmick is a unique or quirky special feature that makes something stand out from its contemporaries. ...

Despite this, in the world of the comic the other characters often speak of Hobbes as Calvin's "imaginary friend." As well, it is sometimes difficult to imagine how the "stuffed toy" interpretation of Hobbes is consistent with what the characters see. For example, he "assists" Calvin's attempt to become a Houdini-style escape artist by tying Calvin to a chair. Calvin, however, cannot escape, and his irritated father must undo the knots, all the while asking Calvin how he could do this to himself. In a rare interview, Watterson explained his approach to this situation: Harry Houdini (March 24, 1874 – October 31, 1926), born Ehrich Weiss, was a Hungarian/American magician, escapologist, stunt performer, as well as an investigator of spiritualists, and amateur aviator. ...

In response to the journalist's assumption that Hobbes was a figment of Calvin's imagination, Watterson responded,

There are also interesting depth psychological interpretations, since Hobbes' ironic sense of humor, facial expressions, and point of view closely resemble the character of Calvin's father. Hobbes is often the voice of reason, contrasting Calvin's manic impulsiveness. Readers are left to wonder if this rationality is in Hobbes as a distinct personality, or in Calvin as a kind of conscience. In the end, the question becomes less about absolute truth and more about different versions of reality: the nature of Hobbes' existence was never a puzzle to be solved, but rather a subtle comment on the power of imagination, and on the similar power of a lack thereof. For other uses, see Imaginary Friend. ... Depth psychology is a broad term that refers to any psychological approach examining the depth (the hidden or deeper parts) of human experience. ... For other uses, see Reason (disambiguation). ... For the classical mythological figures named Mania, see Mania (mythology). ... For other uses, see Impulse (disambiguation). ... François Chifflart (1825-1901), La Conscience (daprès Victor Hugo) Conscience is an ability or faculty or sense that leads to feelings of remorse when we do things that go against our moral values, or which informs our moral judgment before performing such an action. ... Absolute truth can be interpreted in different ways based on its usage, just like truth. ...

Susie Derkins also comments about Hobbes. She says that, when Calvin refuses to play house with her because she brings home a rabbit from the "Hospital", she calls after him, "I don't see why you'll play with your dumb ol' tiger but not Mr. Bun (her stuffed rabbit)!" For other uses, see Tiger (disambiguation). ... For other uses, see Rabbit (disambiguation). ...

Calvin sometimes threatens to wound Hobbes, like when Hobbes declares that Calvin and Susie are going to be married and says that should he wear spats. Calvin replies "In a minute you'll be wearing a body cast!" Spats are a type of shoe accessory worn in the late 19th and early 20th Century. ... cast A cast is a shell, frequently made from plaster, encasing a limb (or, in some cases, large portions of the body) to hold a broken bone (or bones) in place until it has healed. ...

References

Year 2006 (MMVI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 145th day of the year (146th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... William B. Bill Watterson II (born July 5, 1958) is the author of the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes and a few poems (which are mostly embedded in his works). ...

External links

• The Official site of Calvin and Hobbes
• Official Calvin and Hobbes Publicity site at Andrews McMeel Publishing