Bugs Bunny was born in the early 1940s in a tin and tarpaper hut on a prop-cluttered back lot of Warner Brothers Studios. The ramshackle setting befit his bastard parentage: an amalgam of rough and tumble, quick thinking, and street-wise survival artists of early 20th century popular culture. His features suggest possible descendence from Jimmy Cagney, Humphrey Bogart, Edward G. Robinson, or some other lead male "tough" under Warner contract. Bugs’ lineage on his mother’s side is less clear, since his only shows of feminine tenderness were in moments of ridicule or farce. It is equally possible that he inherited his worldliness from an Ida Lupino or a Barbara Stanwyk. In any case, his ancestry is one of voices and characters, not blood. His very name, Bugs, may derive from a slang derivation of vox, used in the ancient vulgate as a nickname for the biggest talker on the street.

Physically, Bugs got his start under the pencil of a animated cartoonist in the team led by Tex Avery, an untutored genius who practiced cartooning during math class in a cow town high school, then roamed west to California where he left a Lone Star sized bootprint on the emerging field of cartoon animation. Avery’s team set out to desentimentalize cartoons and create characters and stories to entertain or humor both kids and adults. Even the earliest works distinguish themselves in their emphasis on verbal humor and the rough adventures of characters who are anything but idealized. Avery’s cartoon characters immediately seized their own niche: tough, real-world characters whose situations, adventures, and slapstick humor played upon ambitions and flaws witnessed among people in everyday life. Violence was pronounced and yet so fantastic as to be benign, since no one every really got hurt. Avery’s work may be contrasted to that of Disney, whose Mickey Mouse started in the semi-silent era, and whose work relied primarily on visual splendor and promoted innocent, uplifting sentiments. It also differs from the jazz music driven cartoons of Max Fleischer or the zany reductivist slam-bash slapstick of Walter Lanz’s Woody Woodpecker.

Bugs is a distinct American type. He minds his own business, but is totally unsentimental and will do anything to take care of himself when threatened. As an anthropomorphized rabbit, he embodies certain qualities of working class Americans. While outwardly unpretentious or ostensibly easy to capture and dominate, he is in fact very individualistic, self-assertive, and--if need be--aggressive. Bugs has no boss, no family, and no particular buddies. He does not function in groups or leagues. If ever in a team role, it is incidental. Most of the time he is on his own, defending himself single-handed. There is no hoidy toidy. Everything is worth a laugh. Only his indepdendence is sacred.

Bugs’s nemeses fall into two categories: Elmer Fudd, the white collar Nebbish, who compensates for a deep-based inferiority by constantly lugging and discharging a double-barreled shotgun; and Yosemite Sam, a pistol-packing renegade who probably shares Bugs’s street corner origins, yet turned a bad leaf and lives by theft, intimidation, and exploitation. Elmer and Yosemite pursue the rabbit protagonist in the mistaken belief that he is a demure Thumper Rabbit. He is not. Bugs can answer their abuse threefold. However, this is never with a vengeance. He is always prepared to let people go their way, provided the others leave him be. Bugs’s enemies may require a lot of reminders not to cross him. Even if they don’t formally endorse his rights, they must recognize his indomitable nature, as ceded by Fudd’s eternal closing sigh, "Cwazy Wabbit."

Bugs’s first screen role was as a nuisance creature in a World War II era cartoon with an air base setting. There was nothing at all distinctive or likable about this first persona, except as an entertaining contrast to the sentimental bunnies of Disney. However, Bugs then evolved significantly.

The typical Bugs Bunny story can occur in any place or at any point in history, but usually follows the same plot line. As the story opens, Bugs is leading a simple life, bothering no one. Trouble comes and finds him. It deals him setbacks. But Bugs fights and wins back his rights. A quick wit is his principal deterrent. He is more agile in body and mind than any of the brutes who assail him. Yet he can also respond eye for eye and tooth for tooth. This may entail ruthless action and violence. Yet, when all is said and done, he lets bygones be bygones. He asks little of life, other than be allowed to hang about his simple but cozy rabbit hole and munch on huge carrots--which he flaunts and to which he seems hooked like the cigarettes which were a staple prop in non-cartoon movies of the epoch. People might also have imagined other things about Bugs’s carrot fixation in that heyday of Freudian psychology, but the truth is much more innocent. Avery’s animationists had no hesitation about much more literal innuendoes or outright libidinal representations in a series of girlie cartoons generated in the 1940s.

Bugs’s maturation came, literally, with a voice change. Mel Blanc, the legendary mime and impersonator, became the voice of Bugs Bunny in the late 1940s. The fit was perfect, and Blanc remained in this role through the mid-1960s. This was the period when Bugs had his classic adventures and achieved his fullest development.

Blanc’s voice gave Bugs the aura and demeanor of the second generation immigrant denizen of the big city. Bugs’ accent is a play on vintage early 20th century Brookynese, a derivative of cockney English and Irish slang. Curiously, there are few East European Jewish idioms, despite Blanc’s own heritage. The Italian element is also mute, except when parodied in one story in which Bugs appears as a contemporary of Christopher Colombus. Second generation immigrants often suppressed or ridiculed their immediate ethnic roots and imbued themselves with the language and manenr of the prior waves of immigrants whose social advance they strove to emulate. However, the Blanc voice added an urban an East Coast city street air to Bugs’s otherwise Great Plains pioneer spirit, expressed in his rural rabbit hole homestead and his cowboy-like antics derived from Tex Avery. This makes Bugs a natural American type in almost any setting. He is a vigorous blend of East and Middle Border--in other words, a Bedford-Sty Californian.

Most of Bugs’s consonants are diminished and the vowels dominate. His t’s become d’s, his terminal r’s get slurred almost to the point of inaudibility, but are not outright w’s. The vowels get stretched and twanged in true Flatbush / Brooklyn fashion. This is especially true of long o's and short a's. The s’s are modestly accentuated, but there is no isp. Among consonants, only the b’s are strident. As in Bugs’s own name, they are explosive and staccato.

Bug’s vocabulary is earthy, but never profane. He uses many street expressions and slang, but no four-letter words. Of course, until late, swear words were taboo on screen. But, perhaps owing precisely to that restriction, Bugs’s oaths are far richer. Each retort or insult is unique and original. Bug’s greatest eloquence is in his derision. However, he emits his put downs only in defense. He never gratuitously sets out to offend people.

Bugs’s grammar is loose, but only modestly flawed. There are steady contractions (always "gonna getcha" and never "going to get you"). He is also a steadfast user of "ain’t" as opposed to isn’t. However, he never uses double negatives. His syntax, though simple, is not corrupt or affected by errors in tense or number. For instance, although one of his antagonists, Yosemite, will repeatedly say "You was," Bugs will always say "You were," in line with the more educated but speech impaired Elmer.

Bugs’s musicality is limited, since he seldom sings. Most of his songs are parodies of popular melodies and ballads of the 1910s and 1920s--usually hollered out whimsically during an opening seen to help set place and mood. Many are Ragtime or Irving Berlin ditties, well-worn but familiar and cheery. The songs are almost always spunky and happy-go-lucky. They help convey Bugs’ natural disposition. They also set up the audience to sense the sharp contrast of the challenges which arrive at Step 2 in each story. Often this comes with a gun blast from his original adversary, Elmer Fudd, or an encounter with some swindler (Yosemite) or a fearsome rabbit-eating monster driven by the savage id (the Tasmanian Devil).

Bugs’s most memorable song is the "On with the Show" overture to the Warner cartoon series broadcast on the American Broadcasting Network prime time during the 1963-4 season. Anyone who was a TV viewing child in that age or shortly after probably remembers every line. Warner Brothers presumably holds the copyright. Unfortunately, there is no outside reference to help verify the song’s source. The lyrics are loaded with expressions which suggest an earlier vaudevillian origin. Its peppy, let’s go ahead, now or never message, is spirited and motivational. "On with the show, this is it," stands with "What’s up, Doc?" as two of Bugs Bunny’s most immortal contributions to the language.

Virtually everything in this essay is based on loose recollections of hundred cartoons viewed on television between pre-school age in the late 1950s and the occasional encounter to this very day. Unfortunately, the scripts and story lines have not been published as transcripts for me to cite specific stories or specific publication dates. The vintage Bugs Bunny shorts appeared on big movie screens in the 1950s as fillers between feature motion pictures. They later acquired their own status on television, where they became a standard among after-school and Saturday morning juvenile audiences. The 1963-4 season series resulted in a bevy of stories which received repeat broadcasts at off-hours through the next two decades. Bugs has now virtually vanished from broadcast television, but enjoys a certain immortality on cable TV stations dedicated exclusively to cartoons or children’s programming. Unfortunately, my family had to cancel our cable subscription, so I have been unable to refresh my recollection of Bugs’s classic adventures through any recent viewing. I presume Bugs Bunny anthologies are available on video cassette, but I borrowed none, since I don’t want any rental clerks, librarians, or my own children to think I am CWAZY.

Doubtlessly, many sophisticated Web pages are dedicated to Bugs Bunny. Some probably include animated GIFs, WAV files of Bugs’s famous quips, or even digital AVI extracts from historic episode. However, I specifically avoided these sources. Many include pirated materials in violations of copyright. Most probably include errors every bit as egregious as those which may be blamed on my memory. However, since placing a document in HTML can help you use Web engines to verify the presence or absence of plagiarism, I have published this document itself at the following Web address: http://homepages.go.com/~jmkoch/bugs.htm. This will help you verify that it is original and borrows nothing from anyone, anywhere.