the vynsane asylum

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 WASHINGTON - Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist Berkeley Breathed is retiring, leaving a hole in the Sunday funnies and the hearts of "Opus" fans.

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The last strip featuring the beloved, large-beaked penguin will run in about 200 newspapers nationwide Nov. 2. Breathed announced Monday he's calling it quits after a comics career that has spanned nearly 30 years.

Amy Lago, comics editor of The Washington Post Writers Group, said Breathed will pursue other interests, such as writing books and screenplays.

Starting and stopping popular strips is old hat for Breathed, who lives in Santa Barbara, Calif., and has a children's book, "Pete & Pickles," due out next week.

The writers group unveiled his "Bloom County" strip in 1980; he went on to win the Pulitzer for editorial cartooning in 1987. He ended that strip in 1989 and the same year began the Sunday-only strip "Outland," which he quit in 1995. In 2003, he launched "Opus."

Breathed began his career as a college student with a strip in the University of Texas newspaper.

News of his retirement won't be too shocking for true fans — recent strips have alluded to "Opus" ending. Even so, Lago said, fans are disappointed.

This Sunday's strip will include a contest in which Breathed asks readers to guess the penguin's fate. Details on how to participate are not being released ahead of time. The answer will appear online after the last "Opus" runs next month, Lago said.

So this'll be the third time that Breathed is retiring from comics and ending a successful strip starring Opus? And we're supposed to believe it's permanent this time? Riiiiiight. I've got fifty bucks that says Opus will be back within a year. Hey, Seamus O'Doyle, can you spot me fifty bucks?.