Matt Groening on being approached by large newspaper syndicates

GROTH: At some point you were approached by newspaper strip syndicates who were interested in syndicating Life in Hell but wanted you to tone the material down and possibly even change the name to "Life in Heck."
GROENING: One of the daily newspapers that wanted my comic strip had asked me to change the title. I gleefully agreed because I thought it was such a funny thing to talk about in interviews. Then they realized that they could possibly be the victims of my jesting. Since I have talked about this, the woman who had made the original suggestion said she was only kidding. Newspaper editors -- and syndicate people, I would imagine -- are suspicious of cartoonists. They think we're getting away with something. Which we are. It's very hard to edit hand lettering.