‘Doonesbury’ Under Fire--Again

“Doonesbury” goes exotic Sunday with guest Persian Gulf War offerings from a cartoonist who strip creator Garry Trudeau says shipped him the drawings from his military post in Saudi Arabia.

At least one newspaper yanked the “Living in Purgatory” comic, which features a strong dose of dark humor, and another would have pulled it if editors had reviewed the strip before its Sunday comics went to print.

“I saw it and was offended,” said Alan Horton, editor of the Naples (Fla.) Daily News, which replaced the strip with a drawing of an American flag. “It shows a series of cartoons about American troops in the Middle East. One shows a soldier committing suicide. Another one shows a soldier being roasted on a spit. Another one shows a soldier being hit by a missile and converted into an angel.”

Except for the opening panel, the cartoons were drawn by an American airman in the Persian Gulf, with whom Trudeau has corresponded, said Alan McDermott, managing editor of Universal Press Syndicate, which distributes “Doonesbury.”

“Garry was kind of intrigued by this guy,” McDermott said. The airman signed his “Life in Purgatory” comics with the pen name “Zorro.”

The Los Angeles Times will run the strip.

William Johnston, circulation director at the Cincinnati Enquirer, wrote in a memorandum that four clerks will be added Sunday and Monday to field anticipated complaints.

McDermott said the cartoon reflects a certain “macabre quality of concerns from the front--the sort of concerns that are present in any war, at any front.” He said the cartoon strip was filed to the Kansas City-based syndicate in December before the war began.

“Doonesbury” has been pulled from newspapers several times in recent years when editors thought its political criticisms went too far.