Pearls Before Swine (comics)
| Pearls Before Swine | |
|---|---|
| Author(s) | Stephan Pastis |
| Current status / schedule | Running |
| Launch date | December 31, 2001 (The Washington Post) January 7, 2002 |
| Syndicate(s) |
United Feature Syndicate (2001–2011) Universal Uclick (2011–present) |
| Publisher(s) | Andrews McMeel Publishing |
| Genre(s) | Black comedy, Gag-a-day |
Pearls Before Swine (More commonly known as Pearls) is an American comic strip written and illustrated by Stephan Pastis, a former San Francisco, California lawyer. It chronicles the daily lives of five anthropomorphic animals: a Pig, a Rat, a Zebra, a Goat, and a fraternity of crocodiles, as well as a number of supporting characters. Pastis has said each character represents an aspect of his own personality and world view. The daily and Sunday comic strip is distributed by Universal Uclick as of 2011; previously, United Media's United Feature Syndicate distributed the strip.
It debuted in 2000, when United Feature Syndicate ran it on its website. Its popularity rose after Dilbert creator Scott Adams, a fan of the strip, showed it to his own fans.
United Feature launched the strip in newspapers beginning December 31, 2001, in The Washington Post. On January 7, 2002, it began running in approximately 150 papers. As of September 2011, the strip was appearing in 750 newspapers worldwide.
The strip is infamous for its use of adult humor, mock profanity, violence, drinking and drug references, and a few references to Middle-Eastern terrorism.
Pearls Before Swine refers to the admonition "Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you." Given by Jesus according to the Gospel of Matthew 7:6.
Prior to creating Pearls Before Swine, Pastis worked as a lawyer in California. In law school, he became so bored during classes, he started to doodle a rat, eventually casting it in a non-syndicated comic strip he called Rat. The title character of Rat would later become one of the main characters in "Pearls Before Swine." The "Pearls" character of Pig also came from a failed strip called The Infirm, about a struggling lawyer.
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