The Cartoonist

'I'm a round peg in a round hole': cartoonist Martyn Turner in his studio in Kildare. Photograph: Brenda Fitzsimons

My first 'Irish Times' cartoon

June 12th 1971: "I can't remember how this got commissioned, other than that the then northern editor of 'The Irish Times', Henry Kelly liked the notion of an illustration for his weekly column."

Northern Unemployment

"I always had a soft spot for this cartoon, as having worked as both a journalist and as a cartoonist in Northern Ireland it summed up my attitude to the national question."

Blazing suns

"This was the first cartoon 'The Irish Times' published after they lured me down from the North with the promise of a year's work in 1976. After the year, I just carried on, and so far nobody has said anything."

The ones that got away (part 1)

"There are two cartoons that were not well-received at the time. I was asked to draw a cartoon for Haughey's retirement supplement, which I did. It was not published. 'The Irish Times' lawyers said we couldn't prove that Haughey lived somewhat above his means."

The ones that got away (part 2)

"The Bishop Casey cartoon was kept out of the paper on the question of taste. They did discuss publishing it for a long while, to give my editors their due. And they published it in 'The Irish Times' books."

The right to travel

"This appeared around the time the government thought that maybe not every woman leaving the country had to be scanned for possible pregnancy, lest they were travelling abroad to do something, er, unIrish...I think maybe what they meant was unCatholic."

Yeltsin at Shannon

"This cartoon appeared the day after Boris failed to appear down the steps of his plane to meet Albert Reynolds, who stood on the tarmac at Shannon for, well, it seemed like days."

Bill Clinton

I told you so...(part 1)

"If I might be allowed to indulge in the time-honoured cartoonists' tradition of 'I told you so' here are a couple of examples of me being jaundiced before the event..."

I told you so...(part 2)

"But both the low expectations I had of the banking system in 1998 and of the Catholic Church in 2002 were well surpassed by what they actually did some years later."

Terrorism (part 1)

"I thought of this cartoon while flying back from a political cartoonists' convention in the US. It achieved the united Ireland the terrorists wished for...as it appeared on the front pages of 'The Irish Times' and the 'Belfast Telegraph' on the same day...Thus uniting the press of Ireland against the terrorists."

Terrorism (part 2)

Photo montages

"This cartoon is noteworthy in that it is one in which I plagiarised another artist's work - like an Enda Kenny intro to Obama."

Ray Burke

"A few years before this appeared (which sort of summed up Ray Burke's painstaking disclosure of what he was about), I did a caricature of Burke, who had been an estate agent standing next to a 'For Sale' sign - as estate agents do. 'The Irish Times' lawyers deemed this inappropriate, as it implied he was for sale...heaven forbid."

Politicians