Category Archives: Political Comics

Section of my blog devoted to analysis and review of political comics: their origins, significance, and impact as both literary and political tools.

Art Activism, Political Comics

The Dudes Behind the Mask: An Interview with Matt Pizzolo, a Founder of the new Black Mask Studios

March 8, 2013 adastracomix Leave a comment

Nicole: Who is the group behind Black Mask Studios? Did you all know each other before Occupy? Through comics? Through activism? Through the art / music scene?

Matt: Black Mask is founded by Steve Niles, Brett Gurewitz, and me. I’ve known Brett for a pretty long time, but I’d only met Steve shortly before Occupy. We were on a horror comics panel together at San Diego Comic Con, and I accidentally insulted him during the panel… which is always the start of the best friendships. We got along pretty quick though because we both come from the punk scene and bring that sensibility to our work, both in terms of integrating social issues into the content and in terms of producing through the DiY ethic. It was a few months later that Occupy Wall Street began and I had the idea for Occupy Comics–Steve was one of the first people I reached out to about it and he helped me get the whole thing rolling. Brett was quick to help support the Kickstarter and when that was done he asked how he could help with the project as it moved forward beyond the Kickstarter. So we all met up and Black Mask was born.

N: How did Occupy seem like a movement special enough to have a comic book dedicated to it?

M: Occupy is really special because it’s a social justice movement that transcends party politics, which is particularly critical these days when bitter partisanship prevents pretty much anything at all from getting done. What excited me about Occupy is that it quickly spread to all different types of people coming from diverse backgrounds and banding together around an idea rather than an ideology. The very earliest iteration of the Tea Party was similar in that it sprang up from non-partisan populist rage, but it was quickly co-opted. I felt anything we could do in our own small way to help try and prevent Occupy from being co-opted was important because it’s a really unique movement and needs to be protected from entrenched political groups.

N: Conversely, why did comics seem like the art medium to go with for a political art project?

M: … Comics are a very personal, hand-crafted art form (usually created by just one or two people) and the anthology format expands that into a chorus of individual voices… which is precisely what Occupy is: a chorus of individual voices. That’s why the news media didn’t know how to cover it, the news format requires a leader or representative with a list of talking points or demands. A movement like Occupy doesn’t function that way, so comics seemed like the ideal medium to reflect it.

N: Beyond Occupy Comics… what decision brought about the larger vision of creating Black Mask as a publishing body for multiple bodies of work?

M: Well initially I didn’t want to be responsible for distributing Occupy Comics; it was enough of a colossal task to organize and produce it as a volunteer effort. I’d hoped I could then just bring the book to a publisher who would connect the dots getting it to an audience, after all the project was very hot coming off its Kickstarter. And certainly publishers were really aggressive about wanting to take it on, if for no other reason than the amazing roster and tremendous press coverage.
But, nonetheless, the offers from the publishers were all pretty awful… and I realized that if the offers were that bad for a project with people like Alan Moore, David Lloyd, Art Spiegelman, Ben Templesmith, Charlie Adlard and all the other dozens of amazing creators on the roster, then it must be nearly impossible to try and get a decent deal for anything that’s not superheroes or zombies. I’ve always been a fan of the more transgressive, confrontational, socially-conscious comics, and there’s a great history of those themes in comics, but not so much these days. So I decided I’d put the additional work in on building a pipeline for Occupy if we could sustain the pipeline and use it to support other outsider-type comics. Luckily Brett and Steve and all the awesome creators who’ve joined the team agreed with me. It’s unintentional but not by accident that every book on the initial slate [includes at least one person] who contributed to Occupy Comics. Darick Robertson on Ballistic, Matthew Rosenberg and Patrick Kindlon on 12 Reasons To Die, and Matt Miner on Liberator. The people who joined Occupy Comics all share a certain unique sensibility and that’s what holds Black Mask together.

<br.

N: And I’m sorry to be that shitty journalist, but… where are Alan Moore and Art Spiegalman fitting into all of this? I see their names getting mentioned in the press but I don’t see anything on the website…

M: Alan Moore and Art Spiegelman are both contributors to Occupy Comics. They’re both giants, of course, so they get a lot more attention than the rest of the team when headlines are being written.

N: Favourite comic book (preferably political comic book, but I can’t really force that on you) and why?

M: The obvious thing would be to say V For Vendetta or Maus (both of which are favorites), but for a deep cut that blew my mind as a kid I’d say The Realist by Joseph Michael Linsner (an Occupy [Comics] contributor as well) in Cry For Dawn #7 (1992) collected in the Image Comics trade Angry Christ Comix. It’s kind of an inversion of American Psycho, about a guy who kills corporate suits and hangs their ties on his wall. Cry For Dawn was a self-published black & white comic with gorgeous, evocative art and powerful, angry storytelling–so unique to comics. That’s the type of thing that burned a correlation between punk and comics into my young mind. For something more contemporary, I’d say I’m really looking forward to Molly Crabapple’s Shell Game, which I backed on Kickstarter–her work is just incredible.

Thanks so much Matt – looking forward to Occupy Comics and all the rest from Black Mask!

Black Mask and Occupy Comics can be found on Twitter and Facebook:

@BlackMaskStudio
https://www.facebook.com/occupycomics

You can check out their website here:

http://blackmaskstudios.com/

Black History, History, Political Comics, Slavery Comics

Black History: A Comic Book Reading List

March 6, 2013 adastracomix Leave a comment

For the last 10 days of February, I put out a list of Top 10 Comics relating to Black History. I didn’t consider this a quintessential list; moreso, I wanted it to be a startting point for anyone interested in exploring the genre/medium combo.

From the get-go, I knew I could at least name 10 different titles, although I hadn’t read them all. And as research tends to do, I’ve added another few to this list, along with some notes.

Black History Comics – A Reading List

BAYOU – 2010, by Jeremy Love.
It’s the Deep South–in the deep dip of the Depression. Young Lee was already afraid of the Bayou–that was where they dumped the body of Billy Glass–and who knows how many other blacks who “hadn’t known their place”. But when Lee’s white friend goes missing and her father is suspected to be involved, Lee sets out into the Bayou, a dark place of murder and magic, to rescue the girl from whatever has taken her, and in turn rescue her father from the fate of the gallows.
Here in the “new world” we often have a hard time picturing our history as folklore and our folk lore as mythology, but that is what is at work here. Jeremy Love does a great job with this book bringing that mythology to life in the stylization of Uncle Remus and his Br’er Rabbit, Br’er Fox, et al. He even takes it a little further, with pieces of social memory that still seem a little too real, too close, to feel entirely comfortable with: flocks of “Jim Crows” that will eat you alive; monsters with the faces of minstrel characters. There is an anthropomorphic element here–lots of talking animals, stories and song that make the characters really pop. Think “Alice in Dixieland”.
Two Volumes have been released of the story so-far: I do hope that more is on the way…
Published: 2010 by Zuda Comics (online arm of D.C. – now closed.)
Awards: Glyph Comics Awards – Best Writer, Best Artist, Best Female Character, Best Comic Strip, and Story of the Year (2009);
Best Digital Comic for the Eisner Awards – Nominee (2010);
American Library Association – 1 of Top 10 Graphic Novels for Teens (2010);
Further Reading: Nice Analysis over at Web Comic Overlook (although self-admittedly long.)

NAT TURNER – 2006 by Kyle Baker. Four issues bound into two volumes here tell the story of Nathaniel “Nat” Turner, leader of one of the largest slave revolts in American history. The genius of this comic is that it tells a compelling story while allowing the historical value to shine through. It uses all excepts of Nat Turner’s own words, taken from a “confession” he gave to a newspaper while in prison awaiting his execution (the word “confession” of course, is an editorialization from the newspaper of the time–however, one can hardly expect him to be remorseful for killing the men who killed and enslaved his kinfolk). We not only have a primary source, but a first-hand account of what we’re seeing depicted in pictures: the life of a 19th Century slave, the horror of life from capture, transport, sale, work, and punishment. The role of religion and prayer for slaves who survived. As a political and historical comics enthusiast, this is one of the gems. Kyle Baker looks to have taken 19th Century newspaper illustrations and breathed them full of life and human emotion. This and a nail-biting narration have practically gift-wrapped this bloody episode of American history.
Published: 2006 by Kyle Baker Publishing
Awards: Glyph Comics Awards – Best Artist, Best Cover, Story of the Year (2006);
Glyph Comics Awards – Best Artist (2008);
Further Reading: Nice review on Eye on Africa Blog

JACKIE ROBINSON, Issues 0 – 6 – Written by sports-writer Charles Dexter. Now I know nothing about this comic – save that it was published in 1950 and that it’s real. That makes it one of the earliest comic book depictions of a black historical figure (maybe the first?) and impossible to leave off this list, where I try to encourage that there is black representation, but also a note-worthy link to Black History (sorry Black Panther, Storm, Huey Freeman…)
That being said, I know nothing of the quality of this comic – the writing, the artwork. But regardless I like having this comic on my reading this for two reasons. It’s not only that it’s the sole comic that is more than 10 years old… consider the fact that a black baseball player would have difficulty finding lodging or a bar to sit in when this comic was released. Second, it’s written by a sportswriter, and I love sportswriter/political commentator cross-overs (the “Olberman” effect?).
Published: 1950 – 1951 by Fawcett
Further Reading: Good luck getting yourselves a copy of this – some issues retail as high as $75 for their 16 pages. But a decent telling of Jackie’s story (and the story of African Americans in the major leagues) can be found here at Awesome Stories.com

THE SILENCE OF OUR FRIENDS – 2008, Written by Mark Long, Jim Demonakos, and illustrated by Nate Powell. This is a deceptively simple memoir of a man who moved to a small Texas town with his liberal white family in the 1960s. The town was intensely segregated, and the author remembers the stir it caused when his Dad invited a black friend and his family over for dinner. Besides political overtones and largely untold events of recent Texas history, which included protests and a serious accusation of black demonstrators firing on police–which was later determined to be false–Silence of Our Friends is a story of childhood memory that is touching, personal and honest. With a heavy emphasis on Powell’s art, the narrative re-creates the [often quiet] tension of racism, privilege, and friendship.
Published: 2008, by First Second Comics / Macmillan
Awards:
Further Reading: I’m a huge fan of Nate Powell’s artwork, so I will take this time to direct you to his blog over here at See My Brother Dance.

MALCOLM X A GRAPHIC BIOGRAPHY – 2006, by Andrew Helfer, Randy DuBurke.
Published: 2006 by Hill and Wang
I have yet to full read this piece, but have it on my list. There is also another Malcolm X biography – by Jessica Sara Gunderson and Seifu Hayden. Neither Helfer nor Gunderson are names that I’m very familiar with in comics, so I’ve been slow to pick these titles up. However they are available for those interested.

KING: A COMICS BIOGRAPHY OF MARTIN LUTHER KING JR. – 2005, by Ho Che Anderson. Generally considered to be more comics journalism, this volume collects over 10 years of Ho Che Anderson’s work into a biography of the renowned civil rights leader. From a review on Amazing: “KING probes the life story of one of America’s greatest public figures with an unflinchingly critical eye, casting King as an ambitious, dichotomous figure deserving of his place in history but not above moral sacrifice to get there. Anderson’s expressionistic visual style is wrought with dramatic energy; panels evoke a painterly attention to detail but juxtapose with one another in such a way as to propel King’s story with cinematic momentum.”
Published: 2005, by Fantagraphics (the Complete Edition)

BIRTH OF A NATION – 2004, by Aaron McGruder and Reginald Hudlin and Kyle Baker.
McGruder, Hudlin and Baker definitely have satire in their sights for this piece – that being said, it touches on black culture and history more uniquely than other books mentioned here. Aaron has admittedly used some real stories in this work, gathered by himself and friends over the years to make this comedic work ask a darkly humorous question: If East St. Louis seceded from the Union, would anyone really care? East St. Louis (“the inner city without an outer city” it says), is an impoverished town, so poor that Fred Fredericks, its idealistic mayor, starts off Election Day by collecting the city’s trash in his own minivan. (A real story is inserted here, says McGruder – some people kept their trash on their rooftops to discourage the packs of wild dogs from rummaging through it. No joke…well, yeah, I guess he kind of makes it into a joke.) But the mayor believes in the power of democracy and rallies his fellow citizens to the polls for the presidential election, only to find hundreds of them disenfranchised (this was the 2000 election, so that part is also totally believable).
“Birth of a Nation” to me, is what comics have always been about–pointed political commentary that makes you split your stomach laughing at the same time. And in doing so, it raises questions of culture and national identity. A great read.
Published: 2005, by Three Rivers Press

ROSA PARKS & THE MONTGOMERY BUS BOYCOTT – 2007, by Connie Colwell Miller (Author) and Dan Kalal (Illustrator).
Part of the Graphic Library series, this book is an introduction to Rosa Parks and her involvement in the Civil Rights movement. Because the author provides a sequential and clear outline of the historical events of the time, the story of Rosa Parks and the Montgomery bus boycott is told in a meaningful and interesting way. The graphic novel is broken into four chapters, each one telling a specific part of Rosa Parks’ story. Through the content presented, readers are introduced to important figures involved in the civil rights movement, racial segregation laws, significant dates and court decisions, important events in the civil rights movement, and the political and social climate of the time. Furthermore, the author shows the impact the Montgomery Bus Boycott had on the civil rights movement and tells about Rosa s life after the boycott.
Published: 2007 by Capstone Press

“STILL I RISE”: A GRAPHIC HISTORY OF AFRICAN AMERICANS – 2009, by Roland Laird (Author), Taneshia Nash Laird (Author), Elihu “Adofo” Bey (Illustrator), Charles Johnson (Foreword)
Still I Rise is a lot packed into a little book: the entire history of Black America– recently updated in a new edition that includes the election of Barack Obama as the U.S.A.’s first African American president (the first edition, published in 1997, took us up to the Million Man March). I believe this work has excelled in highlighting history left out of a lot of American textbooks, for whatever reasons: including early attempts of slaves and former slaves uniting with white indentured servants, along with the rise of early black entrepreneurs and politicians in the South who were constantly attacked, broken down and weeded out. it it a solid portrayal of a lengthy question, and shows that the notion of American history as “white” history is manufactured, and deliberately dismissive of black culture.
Published: 2009 by Sterling

BLACK IMAGES IN THE COMICS – 2012, Edited by Fredrik Stromberg (Introduction by Charles Johnson).
Endlessly browsable illustrated journey through comics’ history of radical portrayals both good and bad.
This book spotlights over 100 comic strips, comic books, and graphic novels to feature black characters from all over the world over the last century, and the result is a fascinating journey to, if not enlightenment, then at least away from the horrendous caricatures of yore. Fredrik Stromberg, who is from Swede, explains in the introduction that he more of less made the volume because it had not yet been made; he set out to make a comprehensive art history of (mostly) white people’s depictions of blacks: as primitive and savage–even cannibalistic, then as dim-witted clowns. Halfway through the 20th Century, this begins to change, and with the inclusion of more positive representations of blacks (mostly African Americans), we see the emergence of black writers and artists, breaking new ground once again.
What begins as a somewhat depressing window on the small-ness of humanity has something of a happy ending with this evolution. However I’m reminded of the words of Charles Johnson, who in the introduction writes, “I wait for the day when…stories in which a character who just happens to be Black is the emblematic, archetypal figure in which we — all of us — invest our dreams, imaginings, and sense of adventure about the vast possibilities for what humans can be and do– just as we have done, or been culturally indoctrinated to do, with white characters…”
Published: 2012 by Fantagraphics

Some Additions:

My entire reading list is seriously lacking in the realm of arts and culture. I looked far and wide for a Hip Hop Graphic History, but am perhaps a bit early on that one – Ed Piskor’s exciting Hip Hop Family Tree comes out this October. Until then, you can preview some work on Boing Boing – or pre-order it from Fantagraphics!

Black Comix: African American Independent Comics, Art and Culture
Damian Duffy (Author), John Jennings (Author), Keith Knight (Introduction) – 2010, by Mark Batty Publisher

Super Black – 2011, by Adilifu Nama.
Super Black, although not a comic, it the most thorough work yet to break ground on the subject of black people in comics – their representation and significance. This also extends to blaxploitation film and art, where we see a real packaging of the ‘Black Hero’ for the first time in mainstream American culture. Available through Amazon, some university literature courses, and perhaps your more-than-average book store.

ABINA AND THE IMPORTANT MEN – 2011, By Trevor R. Getz. Read more about it on the publisher’s website at Oxford University Press.

BAYOU ARCANA – An anthology of work in a similar vein to Bayou, looking at historical roles of race and gender in the Deep South.

The MARCH TRILOGY – Coming out in August, 2013. A graphic novel memoir of former Civil Rights leader and U.S. Representative John Lewis.

THE CAMPFIRE SERIES – by Steerforth Press includes “Mohammed Ali: King of the Ring” and a “Nelson Mandela” graphic biography.

There is also a “Nelson Mandela: Authorized Comic Book” that was produced by the Nelson Mandela Foundation.

African American Classics

Political Comics, Quotes, Women in ComiXX

Quote #001: Alison Bechdel

February 25, 2013 adastracomix Leave a comment

“That’s one of the things I love about the medium [of comics] — that you can scrutinize one panel for an hour if you want to. You’re not rushed along like you would be in a movie. The reader has a lot of power.”

History, Political Comics, Slavery Comics

Django Unchained Issue #1

January 20, 2013 adastracomix Leave a comment

Tarantino is known by fans and foes alike for essentially making good bad movies. Personally, I find some of them great, and some of them horrible. Django as a film, for me, ranks probably in the top two. But how is a comic book adaptation standing up to that?

First, a side note: I am fascinated by the fact that Tarantino made this movie from a place that is very different from where most people, post-viewing, are coming at it. Tribute to Spaghetti Westerns and Blaxploitation aside, Tarantino also wanted to open discussion about America’s horrible history with slavery, and racism in general–to which he makes several very thoughtful commentaries in the film. Thom Hartman of Common Dreams went so far as to describe the movie as Tarantino telling today’s American South to go fuck itself.

…But a month in to the world of online reviews, and I’m knee-deep in (very) modern-day commentary about the paradigms of white/male privelege, which all ultimately boil down to whether or not Tarantino, as a white man, should have made a movie about slavery at all.

I’m going to do the only reasonable thing I can with regard to these comments, and just ignore them.

Let’s talk comics.

Shortly after the movie’s release, Vertigo released Issue #1 of “Django Unchained,” a 24-page comic book. Categorically, comic books released in conjunction with a film counterpart are exploitative, in that they’re exploiting peaked interest in a particular plot, character, or genre (whether it’s Kung-Fu, Westerns, etc.) It seems ironic to me that this is an exploitation comic about a film that is essentially a tribute to exploitation film. That would explain why I was the third person in line at the comic shop to be buying it. Generally, I’m not down with this kind of comic-book making: they are all designed to be viewed in a different medium (film), and are, more or less, hastily-assembled products solely introduced for the making of money and fan-swag. The artwork is amazing, yes, but stylistically I see nothing special so far, aside from some exceptional cover art and promotion posters.

I am, however, hopeful. The issue opens with a short forward by Tarantino touching on his favorite childhood Western comics, and pointing out that the comic, unlike the movie, is the complete script, unedited and uncut. Things that were cut out of the movie due to lack of time or actors pulling out due to scheduling conflicts remain as scenes in the comic. (Who pulls out of a Tarantino film due to a “scheduling conflict?” apparently half a dozen well-known Hollywood stars…)

More than the film, the comic is a straight-forward look at the barbarity of slavery in the sunset days of the pre-Civil War South (before it transformed itself into the share-cropping/Jim Crow system). Much like any Issue 1, we see a layout of the plot and characters here, and little deviation from the movie.

Some general observations…
I will note that the comic and film DO NOT sing a song of revolution — one in which, say, Django would team up with other slaves, and with their strength in numbers, lead an insurrection. So let’s stop talking about how there isn’t enough of this or that in the film: it’s obviously not meant to be seen that way. The story sings the undeniably individualistic tune of revenge, in which our singular hero and [sometimes] his de-facto side-kick, Dr. King Schultz, go it alone in a hostile environment without anyone’s help.

If you’re looking for a film with strong female roles, you’re barking up the wrong genre tree. The last time someone in Hollywood thought a bunch of strong women belonged in a Western, disaster struck. Someone, someday, will change this–but not here, and not today.

I’m looking forward to the possibilities of this comic series. I’m looking forward to seeing scenes that were cut, and seeing stylistically what it might bring to the table. But so far, nothing remarkable. Stay tuned.

& Resistance, Activism, American Politics, History, Political Comics, Protest, Uncategorized

A People’s History of American Empire: Zinn’s Graphic Adaptation

Image January 6, 2013 adastracomix Leave a comment

It was two years ago this month – on January 27, 2010, that Howard Zinn passed on. He was 87 years old. While he was arguably the most important American historian of the 20th Century and wrote a library of work–including his milestone, A People’s History of the United States–a fun fact is that the last publication he released during his lifetime… was actually a comic book.

Title: A People’s History of American Empire (A Graphic Adaptation) Author: Howard Zinn Artwork: Mike Konopacki Editor: Paul Buhle Published: 2008 through Metropolitan Books

The gravity of Zinn’s legacy tends to make singular reviews of his work impossible. A review of one work necessitates a contextual understanding of his life as a radical historian who in turn, participated in making history during his own time. That being said, I will assume that readers will go elsewhere to get their crash course on Zinn, so my review stays under 10,000 words.

This book is beautifully presented. It is now available in soft- or hard-cover, and at about 12″ x 20″, is a little too big to comfortably sit in my lap as I’m reading it. My assumption is that the creators chose a larger format because the work is so text-heavy.

That text is important, because Zinn is arguing a still-contested notion, and needs as much evidence to back up his arguments as possible. It begins with the annexation of Indigenous lands across what is now North America in the later 1800’s, and takes us to the present post-9/11 era of relative global military hegemony. Zinn’s thesis is relatively clear: all of modern U.S. history is a history of empire; however, there is a parallel history of life and resistance by many. This includes poor and working people, who have played major rolls through unions, churches, and other community groups; women, students, and minorities of many stripes have all had interesting parts to play in a history that is largely told, in Zinn’s words, from the perspective of only “certain white men” (implying the rich and powerful).

Compared to A People’s History of the United States, which first appeared as a piece of academic achievement, American Empire reminds me more of a documentary film. Zinn is shown giving a lecture at an anti-war event, introducing and concluding the book’s chapters, which jump to varying times and places. Major historical figures like Black Elk, Mark Twain, and Eugene Debs are in these chapters, speaking as if to the reader, in scripts pulled largely from their real-life quotations and writings. The creators have chosen to accent this large-scale historical narrative with Zinn’s own personal history, as a young unionist, a WWII Air Force bombardier, and finally, as a young radical professor during the Civil Rights and Vietnam War eras.

What you get here is an interwoven account of his research and his own personal account of the 20th Century. It’s a moving way to look at a history that was told to most of us very differently in school.

Visually, it’s all a lot to take in, especially if you want to appreciate the illustrations as well as the text. I see this book being most appreciated when you can read it in segments. This makes it perfect for classrooms or study group. Each chapter is about 6 pages.

We are looking at a graphic adaptation of Zinn’s work. But we’re also looking at a graphic adaptation of the man as a modern-day intellectual icon. (Ex: These great little “Zinnformation” boxes pop up from time to time in the chapters, depicting a little light bulb with Howard’s tell-tale white hair-‘do.)

But just because I support the work in principle doesn’t mean the review is all roses, right? I have a few critiques of the book, rooted in my perspective as a comics lover + writer, and as a history enthusiast who cannot overestimate the impact Howard Zinn has had on my education.

I’ll get right to the point:

I’m not a fan of comic book adaptations–of books, movies: anything. My experience with them has been largely that they are a lose-lose product: the comic book becomes a simplified medium for what was in its first stage a more complete and highly-developed creative product. (Insert any comic book adaptation of anything here: Game of Thrones, The Last Unicorn, Ender’s Game, etc. etc. etc.) On the other hand, the comic medium is dis-serviced by simply being a highly-saleable vessel by which to re-release something that’s already out on the market. In short, if you’re doing a graphic adaptation, you’d better be bringing something incredibly special to the table.

In this regard, I think this graphic adaptation of Zinn’s past work has both some hits and misses.

First, let’s talk about the hits.

(+) Of course, a comic book makes available a lot of the information that Zinn has, largely, buried in pages upon pages of academic text, filled with all the usual footnotes and supplementary reading. So it’s accessible, and that’s especially important to young adults or classroom settings, as I mentioned before.

(+) The book does in fact compile some new information, largely the primary sources used to assemble its “interview”-styled segments with historical figures like that of Mark Twain shown above. That and the additions of Zinn’s personal experiences make it a more colourful work than any *one* of his texty-texts.

(+) Some of the graphics that have been added to this volume, including the contemporary photographs, political cartoons and other artwork of the time does much to enrich the narrative. It’s always illuminating to have this kind of media–text is, after all, highly prone to editorialization–but a photograph or political cartoon can reveal something of an un-altered reality for the time period. Now, some of the downers.

(-) Personally, I find the cartoon-ish fashioning of the illustrations to be a little out of the mood of the book. This is a serious, often grim, telling of American history–there are many chapters that would have rightly moved me to tears, if not for drawings that look like they came out of a storyboard for Quick-Draw McGraw. I would have gone with a different overall style. Still, even if the manner isn’t to my liking, at least it’s consistent, and professionally rendered.

(-) Many graphics are modified photographs–that’s fine–but what irks me is that whoever photo-shopped them didn’t clean them up. It’s like writing a milestone book and then not bothering to format it properly. I don’t know why political comic books continue to disappoint me in this arena. It’s as if they see the quality of form and content as mutually exclusive. Or they think that readers just won’t care.

Some won’t: that’s true.
But for comic book connoisseurs as well as artistically-minded comic readers, this is what ultimately determines the quality of the work… i.e. the amount of love that went into it.

In my opinion, we’re in the beginning stages of a second golden era for comic books–with political and historical comics, for the first time, being seriously included in the festivities. The last thing you want is to be invited to that party and then let people down. Think I’m making a mountain out of mole hill? Maybe. I’ll come back to this in a moment…

…first I gotta to drill into your heads, again, why Howard Zinn was (and IS) so important. Don’t worry, it won’t take 10,000 words.

As I touched on before, when A People’s History of the United States was published in 1980, the words “People’s History” were neither a mainstream term nor a methodology. Academically speaking, it was a new argument: History didn’t have to be that of kings and “great men”, or, as Henry Kissinger put it, “the memory of states”. It was revolutionary. He introduced the historical equivalent of ‘the 99%”–an overwhelming proportion of human history sits in the stories and memories of common folk–and it was right under everyone’s noses, being largely ignored.

By 2008 when this book came out, Zinn was already an icon. This book has led to countless additional volumes written or based on that first People’s History. Like supplementary reading satellites, they revolve around the foundation of that first work. Here are a few:

Howard Zinn’s (A People’s History of) The Twentieth Century
Voices of a People’s History of the United States
A Young People’s History of the United States, adapted from the original text by Rebecca Stefoff;
A People’s History of the United States: Teaching Edition

Audio renditions of his work are narrated by Matt Damon, Viggo Mortenson, and others moved by his work.

Here are a few books written by other historians, composing a “series” founded on Zinn’s original work:

Chris Harman’s A People’s History of the World
A People’s History of the Supreme Court by Peter Irons with Foreword by Zinn
A People’s History of Sports in the United States by Dave Zirin with an introduction by Howard Zinn
The Darker Nations: A People’s History of the Third World by Vijay Prashad
A People’s History of the American Revolution by Ray Raphael
A People’s History of the Civil War by David Williams
A People’s History of the Vietnam War by Jonathan Neale
The Mexican Revolution: A People’s History by Adolfo Gilly

What we are reviewing here is one of those publications. There is no other historian, mainstream of no, who can claim such a franchise, nor such a significant intellectual imprint.

What I’m trying to say is this: when I see imperfections in comic books, I think of two things:

– Creators/editors who lack experience in comic books (lots of indie/underground comics, as well as quite a few political comics, whose creators are firstly activists or academics; not comic book-makers). This often points to a lack of necessary funds and time.

– A rushed attempt to make money (most often the case in the department of “Comic Book Adaptations’… yet another reason for my distaste of the category…)

With People’s History of American Empire, with all due respect, a little may be true of both.

But it kind of doesn’t matter what I think. At the end of the day, what’s important to me is figuring out what the end user (the reader) is thinking; and that’s what I’ve tried to do here.

Why does it concern me? Because I would never want someone to read this book and find out that their lasting impression of a work was “rushed attempt to make money”–when its origins are so profoundly the opposite in motivation.

Political comics will catch on. As the importance of non-fiction comics grows, more and more investment will be put into making a product with a cause that is indistinguishable from the mainstream players. But for now, the fact that this is one of the most well-circulated political comics of the past few years shows that we’ve got a little ways to go.

NMG

American Politics, History, Political Comics

The First Political Comic in American History

December 22, 2012 adastracomix Leave a comment

Some of you may recognize the logo that I use. Originally, it was depicted over the words, “Join or Die”, with sections of the snake labelled for the early British colonies. It is a woodcut attributed to Benjamin Franklin, circa 1754, and is widely considered to be the first political cartoon in American history.

It was altogether a cry, at least at first, for unity amongst the colonies against their enemies, the French and native nations.
But, as memes do, it was copied and re-used widely in the colonial era. Eventually, it was re-introduced in the context of uniting these ‘states’ against Britain–and became a de-facto logo for the Revolutionary War.

It is important to note that this wasn’t Franklin’s original intent. After all, one isn’t born a revolutionary–and in the days before Pop culture could depict what a revolutionary could look/act like without necessarily providing any political or philosophical substance to their identity, one wasn’t compelled toward that conclusion quickly. No, revolution was for those who had exhausted other avenues–for Ben Franklin, one of those was the Albany Plan.

“Join or Die” was printed and published first in Franklin’s newspaper, the Pennsylvania Gazette, as a push for this Plan. Largely driven by him, it proposed (among other things) a unifying Grand Council and President over the British territories of North America to address new matters of concern–namely, security and defense (including a standing army) in the wake of France’s growing alliances with many North American indigenous groups.

The Crown, sensing that this idea smelled some too much of a push for independence, did not approve. Colony representatives, from New York to Virginia, were too embroiled in their own local squabbles to really care.

With regard to the Albany Plan and its rejection, Benjamin said:

“The Colonies so united would have been sufficiently strong to have defended themselves; there would have been no need of Troops from England; of course the subsequent Pretence for Taxing America, and the bloody Contest it occasioned, would have been avoided. But such Mistakes are not new; History is full of the Errors of States & Princes.”

Despite it coming about as the banner of an essentially failed campaign, it is interesting to see how this image has lived on. One can’t help but note that ‘JOIN OR DIE’, which has survived centuries, was crafted by a man who had a knack for effecting lasting imprints .

The premise of the cartoon, by the way, is somewhat obvious but has some interesting aspects. At the time, it was apparently common superstition that a severed snake could be re-connected (and brought back to life) if the severed pieces were reattached before sunset (… the more you know!). It was a fascinating way to convey that there was precious little time to act on an urgent matter.

The pieces, of course, are the colonies, who were all separate entities. Franklin was among the first to argue that they are recognizable as something of a larger whole, distinct from England and its other world colonies. The era of colonization in America was an era of massive change, and ‘JOIN OR DIE’ was part of a budding outlook… the earliest and most rudimentary depictions of a sense of national identity.

A page from the Penn Gazette- May 9, 1754.

I’ve since seen it used for a lot of references to the Revolutionary War– Paul Giamatti’s “John Adams” series on HBO immediately comes to mind. I’ve even seen [modern day] Tea Partiers use it, somewhat to my confusion and amusement. Fundamentally, its significance isn’t so much about patriotic fervour as harnessing the sentiments of many into an idea–an idea that proposed tremendous action, which was represented with a simple symbol and but a few words.

My interest as a writer and as an activist is in connecting dots. With art as the form and history as the content, I think there are many sentiments in our world today that need harnessing–from depression to hatred, narcissism to nihilism–and media like comics can begin to make sense of it all in a way that is accessible.

Political Comics, War

BLACKSAD clip – “Spit at the Sky”

Image December 7, 2012 adastracomix Leave a comment

Just came across this last night… it’s from one of my favorite–generally non-political–comic books, BlackSad, by Juan Dias Canales and Juanjo Guarnido from Spain. Amazing artwork, great film-noir style plots with all the twists and turns… and all with cats, dogs, foxes, toads, birds, and all other manner of anthropomorphic folk.

This one hit home, and given its angle, I thought I’d share with the folks who follow my Political Comics Review. All work (c) Canales and Guarnido. Enjoy, (and get a copy of the full book here).

Events, Political Comics, Underground Comix

Rock, Roll, Rumbles, Rebels, Revolution: The Life of SPAIN!

December 3, 2012 adastracomix 2 Comments

A couple of weeks ago, some good friends of mine in Toronto, also Americans, invited me to join them in a trip over the border to New York to check out the exhibit of Buffalo native, Spain Rodriguez: “Rock, Roll, Rumbles, Rebels, Revolution”.

On Sept 2012 - January 2013 at the Burchfield Penney Gallery in Buffalo, NY. — The Exhibit contains some 50 hanging pieces, in addition to original comic book copies of Spain’s work, and runs from Sept 2012 – January 2013 at the Burchfield Penney Gallery in Buffalo, NY.

Both my friends Nick and Tanya are themselves bikers, rebels, and surviving witnesses to that mythological time, the 60’s and 70’s (not to mention their occasional run-ins with Spain and folks he knew back in the days he rode with the Road Vultures and drew for now-legendary underground comic publications like Zap!). Going to the exhibit with them was as close as I would get to having Spain there to explain some of the nuances and timely political/cultural references.

Sadly, only a few days before we visited the exhibit, Spain passed away. He was 72, and had been battling prostate cancer for about six years. It became especially poignant to understand the legacy of this artist, who was a pioneer of indie comics, a pioneer of comics journalism before the term was even coined, and a pioneer for political comics and historical comics. What’s more, his career wasn’t 3 or 4 ‘golden years’ nestled in a lifetime of mediocrity. His cutting edge work ranges from the early days in underground comics, unbridled by still-McCarthy-Era censorship rules, to just before he died.

Comic book eccentric, Art school nerd, Tough-ass biker, leftist shit-disturber | Spain was an in-betweener, and these are always the folks who make incredible art. Their creativity isn’t confined to one genre, one subculture, one ideological viewpoint of the world. As a biker, Spain scared his comics compatriots and offended some of his lefty comrades: after all, these were three typically segregated subcultures within a man’s world of the 1960’s (none would even begin to include women as anything more than decoration for a few more years…a sidenote). For this overlap, we have some incredibly enlightening artwork depicting the era’s biker culture, general drug and counter-culture, and, more crucial for me and this blog, political happenings of the day.

Before drawing for Zap! with Crumb in San Francisco, Spain covered the Democratic National Convention in Chicago for the East Village Other (a publication described by the New York Times as being so left-wing it made the Village Voice look like a church circular). This was the home of his other early work, Zodiac Mindwarp.

Above, we see some of the spirit of what went down.

There’s no argument that Spain was an expert brawl-drawer. From his days with the Road Vultures to his activist scuffles, the man had a talent for laying out scenes that generally pass most of us by in blurs if and when we experience them.

These illustrations, when compared to photographs or even video of the protests and police repression, give you more of the feel of the surroundings, and vividly so. I’ve postulated that he had a tendency to compile several visual records in one large frame. Taking these many single instances he saw–he not only depicts what was in front of him, but he describes the scene and tells a story with it.

Spain went on with his occasional comics journalism, and much to my liking, even delved into historical comics. The book “Devil Dog” illustrates the life of one of my favourite American military figures, Smedley Butler. My friend Nick also told me of a piece he did on the Chaco War fought by mercenary pilots in Bolivia in the 1930s that I’ve yet to see, but I can’t wait to inspect. Untold American history is the bloodstream of my own comic series, so, needless to say, this interests me. His most notable political work is probably Che: A Graphic Biography, published in 2009, which he wrote with the editorial assistance of Paul Buhle, a radical history and comic book expert (best combination–ever).

Young comic lovers should appreciate the fact that, in addition to all his other work that had given him a legendary status in indie comics, Spain never stopped paying attention to political causes around him. The exhibit even included some work depicting the Occupy Movement, that he drew mere months ago.

On November 29, comix artist Def Backderf tweeted, “On the day he died, Spain Rodriguez was inking a poster. Died with a pen in his hand. Hell yeah, amigo! You’re a legend.”

Everything else that he so wonderfully was–all aside, this fact alone commands my respect.

Good night, Spain. Your work will forever have a place in my heart.

NMG

Review of Penney Art exhibit:
http://artvoice.com/issues/...

Good informative video about Spain and his political work:
http://www.revelinnewyork.com/videos/spain-rodriguez

Great article from his good friends over at Salon.com:
http://www.salon.com/2012/12/01/death_of...

Pulp History trailer (Devil Dog part of this series)
http://pages.simonandschuster.com/pulp...

Middle East, Political Comics, War

Joe Sacco’s Palestine and Footnotes in Gaza

November 19, 2012 adastracomix 2 Comments

Titles: Palestine and Footnotes in Gaza
Author: Joe Sacco
Published: Palestine was originally published in comic book form in 1993, before being released as a full volume by Fantagraphics in 2001. Footnotes in Gaza was released in 2009 by Metropolitan Books

The downside of attempting to read timely political comics in order to write timely reviews is that you’re often pushing yourself to digest a lot of heavy material in a short period of time. I’ll be honest; it’s really difficult to be going back and forth from Gaza in my newsfeed to Footnotes in Gaza–which largely focuses on events from half a century ago. The idea that this reality is not only constant in that part of the world, but has more or less continued this way for five decades, is mind-boggling.

The first time I read Palestine was back in 2003, and I spent a good 2 months wading through the pages, studying the history and references, appreciating the attention to detail in the art (I had time to admire Joe’s artistic rendition of fabric the most–all of the middle-eastern apparel, I thought, from kufiyehs to shawls, seemed destined to be drawn).

This time around, after going through Palestine again, in addition to Sacco’s relatively new release, Footnotes in Gaza, I feel like I’ve been punched in the gut. Obviously, this isn’t the best thing you want to read in a review… I assure you, there’s a lesson to take in from this. Maybe it’s the combination of the books the real-time video I’m seeing of Gaza on Aljazeera and Russia Today. Maybe it’s the incinerating atmosphere on social media, where people dangle baited commentary like matches over their hot-headed opponents.

I’ll keep what I have to say relatively short. Frankly, this post is more about showing folks looking for political titles that there are comic resources out there for those looking for more information on Israel and Palestine –and as a veteran comics journalist, Joe Sacco is an excellent place to start. From there, I’d just assume that you’d rather spend your time reading those titles than reviews of them, right?

I will say this, with a special focus on those of you reading this who think a “comic interpretation” of Israel and Palestine is tantamount to insulting… quite the contrary. The irony is that Joe does not cynically summarize the arguments of those on the front lines of this conflict, as anyone with more than a mild opinion on the matter is guilty of doing at least once. In the times when the conflict heats up, our detailed portraits whittle away just when readers and viewers need them the most in our media… the Israeli who hates his government but can’t reconcile the ingrained notion that Jews constantly face an impending doom… the Palestinian who, in the words of author Norman Finklestein, must face the challenge of being both “principled and reasonable”, when that is essentially an impossible thing to do. More than anywhere else in the world, and with any other conflict, complexity here dissolves into a simplified belligerence. Israelis become crusaders for the ideals of the western world, or madmen screaming about terrorists. Palestinians become the front-line fighters in a global struggle against the forces of imperialism–or madmen screaming about Zionist snakes.

Of course, I have my opinions… but the irony is that Joe Sacco, a professional cartoonist, does not indulge our cynicism with these caricatures. In fact, as a comic journalist (a profession whose total validity gets challenged on the regular for him 2 decades into his work), he is perhaps more diligent than any other dispatcher in Palestine to portray an unedited picture. You won’t find anything like it in the political cartoons of your newspaper’s opinion section… nor on CNN or BBC, or Aljazeera.

As I finish writing this, the Telegraph reports that Israeli Deputy Defense Minister, Matan Vilnai, has vowed a Palestinian “Holocaust” as a result of the rockets fired by Hamas in Gaza. Yea, he just went there. I imagine that Joe Sacco began this project of documenting the lives of Palestinians because he felt we weren’t getting their story in the West. My response to that now, in 2012, is that we easily hear more about the situation of the Palestinians… and yet it doesn’t matter. Israel acts like a monster that no longer cares to hide it (see, I just KNEW I couldn’t get through this review without making a generalization), and the West supports them while pretending that their hands are tied.

Lastly, I come back to my own mental state right now, after reading these volumes. My lesson is, naturally, to not do what I just did. Take time to digest what you’re reading and looking at… and come to your conclusions in time. No cause is properly furthered by uneducated followers. The last thing the conflict needs are more caricatures.

American Politics, Political Comics

Eric Drooker’s FLOOD!

November 1, 2012 adastracomix Leave a comment

It’s been argued into a cliché that one is the product of their surroundings—and to say as much about Eric Drooker would be an acknowledgement that his artwork is as much about New York City as himself. Maybe more.

Title: FLOOD! A Novel in Pictures
Author: Eric Drooker
Published: 2001, by Dark Horse Comics, Inc.
Bought this Copy: @ Hairy Tarantula Comics
For More Info: Check out Eric Drooker’s Website

The images he depicts in such stark contrast—whether it’s the linocut, scratchboard, or stencil art, all of which he’s known for—all present the same city, seemingly, at war with itself, constantly and eternally.

Eric Drooker was probably one of the first political artists that I discovered. I was 13-ish when Rage Against the Machine put out their single, The Ghost of Tom Joad, and the artwork of that album is Eric Drooker – from the graphic novel, FLOOD!, to be precise.

After that single came out, I looked for more of his stuff. Something in the pictures had a real distinct emotion and humanity behind it–I would say everything in his work had soul. I bought a book of posters and other “street art” by him (this was the late 90’s, back in the days before “guerrilla art/marketing” was a household term, and work by Bank$y wasn’t being bought for $1 million by the world’s rich and famous). Eric Drooker’s art centered around the issues that the people of the city—the city itself—struggled with: police brutality, poverty, affordable housing and tenants’ rights, the freedom to assemble, etc.

In this story, Drooker depicts the epic story of a man struggling for a modest existence with only a handful of text. On most of his journey, he finds little more than bad options after he is laid off. From there, life in the city becomes a downward spiral; he seemingly bounces off of its edges as he falls, the rain pouring harder and harder in the streets. He wants work but can’t find anything that pays enough or is within his skill-set. He wants to feel comfort and love from another human being, but in the night only finds human beings more emotionally starved than himself.

The panel sequence that I find most powerful is when he finds his troubles compounding—bad news over and over and over again. The panels get smaller and smaller, the graphics more and more crude. It’s the perfect depiction of when a bad day just keeps piling up with unfortunate events, until you sit down and try to vent to a friend or in writing… and by then, so much garbage has piled up that it all feels petty.

FLOOD! sharpens the over-arching message that Drooker presents to us in all of his work depicting New York City: It’s not just about one or another character and his or her stories–morality–or soul, as I mentioned earlier. Fundamentally, the “soul” in question appears to be the city itself. By the end of this story, you feel convinced of this idea that New York (and maybe all of our hometowns) have souls, and somewhere in the Heavens of the ether is a grand scale, precariously balancing all of the good (community, humanity, love, compassion, potlucks, free concerts in the park, dogs and cats, children playing in their neighborhood) with the bad (muggings, eviction notices, police violence, drug rings, gangs & crime syndicates, alienation, selfishness, and all that noise, noise, NOISE!). We wait in hoping that, should it ever be finally and resolutely judged, the number of good deeds will outweigh the bad.

… One can’t help but think about these things, especially when the streets of New York City really are a-flood. Even atheists and agnostics can’t avoid the mental exercise of imagining a natural disaster as an ethical and artistic expression of causality–from divine intervention, to karma, to some other simple form of poetic justice.