Axed The Age cartoonist slams ‘tacky tabloid’ after abrupt end to 55-year tenure
One of Australia’s most esteemed cartoonists has been dumped from The Age, in a manner he calls a “blunt and unfortunate way to end it”.
Michael Leunig has been filing cartoons for The Age since 1969, but has now been given the axe in what he described to The Australian as “a throat-cutting exercise”.
His anger was further enflamed by an acknowledgement of the end of his 55-year tenure at the paper in editor Patrick Elligett’s subscriber email, which said Leunig had “filed his last editorial illustration for The Age” but didn’t explain this wasn’t Leunig’s choice.
“There was no mention of the fact that he gave me the axe,” Leunig said.
I worked with Michael Leunig on his very first days with Newsday. A sad end to a very illustrious career. All hail the Great Michael Leunig. He will be a legend long after The Age is consigned as yesterday’s wrappings for fish and chips.
Readers will remember The Age because of Leunig’s very clever and memorable cartoons. Very few will remember the rest of the paper.
One could also say that the axing of Leunig was not elegant and more Elligett.
Another wonderful pictorial journo is discarded at the alter of diminishing returns. The general public will end up eating the nonsense fed them by AI & biased media moguls.
way too much kindness for soo many years