Reader Question: What’s the story with the little sayings hidden in the strips?

As the story goes, James Kemsley inaugurated the daily version of Ginger Meggs in 1993. Kemsley also started the tradition of lettering some wise or ridiculous quip into one of the strip’s panels every day.

It began quite innocently: once, Kemsley was out-of-town and would miss the practice session of his cricket team (or some such), so he lettered this “news” in code into the strip for that day, expecting his team-mates to see it and act accordingly. 

Thereafter, readers expected (and demanded) these “extras.” And Kemsley complied. He eventually deemed them ‘graffiti’ and Kemsley named a following collection of strips “When You’re Into Graffiti, The Writing’s On The Wall.” (1998)

This was back when the newspapers ran the strip large enough to actually have background details. Alas, these days the strip is printed so small to make room for puzzles and advertisements, it is harder to find space for even the most simple of background details, let alone space to ‘hide’ the graffiti.

Over the decades, the graffiti were a way to connect with readers, who would send in their favourite old quips and witticisms to eagerly see if they’d be included in the strip. At one point, it was thought that 50% of the readers read Meggs for the Graffiti, and the other 50% for the strip itself.

Readers would search for graffiti the way fans of Pat Oliphant would search for the little penguin, or Paul Rigby fans would look for the little urchin boy and his dog. The tradition continues to this day, with readers coming up with their own terms for the graffiti, calling them ‘witticisms’, ‘side comments’, ‘graffito’, ‘hidden gags’ or ‘hidden gems’.

Thank you to Ian Greensmith for the question.