[The following essay first appeared in The Saturday Review, November 11, 1950.]

[Mr. Addams's] hilarious derangements can now be relished in a collection of his cartoons inspirationally entitled Chas Addams's MONSTER RALLY.

Monsters, young or old, four-legged or two-headed, prehistoric or contemporary, simpering or nonchalant, are very much Mr. Addams's affair. His is a hobgoblin world of bats, spiders, broomsticks, snakes, cobwebs, and bloodletting morons in which every day is Hallowe'en. If his creatures hold life lightly and play with death as if it were a toy, it is because they are, each witch's or mother's son or daughter among them, jubilant nihilists.

They are as unburdened with consciences as they are with causes. Murder for them, regardless of their years, is something which exercises their ingenuity as planners without involving their emotions as people. They are Mr. Hydes untroubled by Dr. Jekylls. A teacher is no more appalled by...