In 1993, when Dusan Petricic came to Toronto from Belgrade in what is now always called "the former Yugoslavia," he was generally seen as its leading political cartoonist.
That is a charged and prestigious category in Europe, particularly eastern Europe, where political discussions during most of the 20th century were coded rather than straightforward. This was especially true during the Soviet era when cartoonists, like playwrights, were significant figures; they had a limited licence to express dangerous thoughts. They were expected to both represent and defuse political passions.
