The Peanuts cast begins its fourth year as an octet: Charlie Brown, Shermy, Patty, Violet, Schroeder, Lucy and Linus, and Snoopy.
Although Linus doesn't yet speak, he is beginning to emerge as one of the strip's most complex and endearing characters. Meanwhile, Lucy has grown up and elbowed herself to the front of the cast (past Patty, Violet, and Shermy), proudly wearing her banner as a "fuss-budget."
Charlie Brown is in transition. Although his familiar "loser" persona is already in evidence, his brasher, prankish side still bubbles to the surface.
Schroeder settles into his role as the apex of an eternal unrequited love triangle, of which the two other points are Lucy and . . . Beethoven. We also meet the one-joke but hardy Pig-Pen, and the no-joke forgotten Charlotte Braun.
And then there's the beagle. Although he's already thinking to himself and displaying some un-dog-like behavior, Snoopy performs almost no imitations, nor does he sleep atop his doghouse (much less fly a Sopwith Camel)—in fact, he doesn't even walk upright. But just wait. . .
In addition to introducing the beloved character Pig-Pen, The Complete Peanuts: 1953-1954 shows many of the cast of characters beginning to take on their best-known personality traits—from Linus's philosophical thoughtfulness to Lucy's fussiness, as well as Snoopy's emerging eccentricity.
This volume also features an essay on Schulz by the legendary broadcaster Walter Cronkite, a biography of Schulz, and the popular index to characters, objects and themes!
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