(Note: This was a final assignment in a graduate course on comics and graphic novels. We were tasked with creating a candidacy reading list for the field of comics and graphic novels, and rationales for our choices. It was one of the more difficult things I've had to do in grad school, but ultimately very rewarding.)
The construction of a canonical
reading list is, of course, a challenge fraught with uncertainty. I have been reading comics, in pamphlet or
graphic novel format, for over 30 years now, and have barely scratched the
surface of what the medium offers. I
privilege the superhero as my favourite of the genres of the comic book, but to
have spent the last 30 years reading only one genre in any medium would point,
perhaps, to pathology in the reader, and certainly to an ignorance of the
potential of the medium as a whole.
Regardless, this attempt at a canonical field reading list is in many
ways a purely subjective exercise, based on my experience of the medium and its
stories. A true canon (whatever that
might be) would require a longer list, a longer conversation, and certainly
more than one person’s opinion. But this
is my opinion, for what it is worth, on how one might experience some of the
breadth of the medium of the comic. In
preparing the list and the rationale, I keep in mind Thierry Groensteen’s
assertion about his system of comics, that “[a]ll theoretical generalizations
[have to be] cognizant of the trap of dogmatism” (Groensteen 20). I strive not to be dogmatic, but suggestive.
The list is arranged in broad
categories, and then roughly chronologically within those categories.
This is not in an attempt to direct the order
of reading, simply a tool for my own organizational purposes.
There is a mix of theory and primary texts,
with primary texts in bold in the list.
The earliest text is Stephen Bateman’s
A Christall Glass of Christian Reformation, from 1569, and the
latest China Mi
éville
and Alberto Ponticelli’s 2013 superhero series
Dial H.
Laying aside
subjectivity for a moment, this span of time demonstrates the other fundamental
problem in constructing a canonical list.
Even by my conservative estimate, the history
of comics covers over 400 years.
Add to
this the debate over exactly what constitutes a comic, and canonical
delineation becomes near impossible
.
These debates acknowledged, I will proceed. Entries preceded by an asterisk in the
present list are pieces that I believe are fundamental to an understanding of
the medium in some way, and are hence unnegotiable in the reading list. Some cases provide the option of a
choice. In these cases, the text I have
provided is simply representative of a larger body of work that I feel is
important (for example, Manara’s presence on the list is representative of the
influence of Heavy Metal Magazine on
North American comics creators and readers).
Other cases (such as Jeff Smith’s Bone:
Out From Boneville) are placed in one category, but obviously have
ramifications outside of this category.
I will elucidate such ramifications in the rationale that follows each
section of the list. Overall, then, I
will offer commentary on each broad category, with brief notes on why I would argue
that each work belongs on the reading list, with emphasis on the asterisked
works that I believe are vital components in a comics studies candidacy reading
list.
Theory
1. *“Essay on
Physiognomy” – Rodolphe Töpffer
2. *Comics and Sequential Art – Will Eisner
3. “Writing for
Comics” – Alan Moore
4. *Understanding Comics – Scott McCloud
5. *The System of Comics – Thierry
Groensteen
We must begin with theory. One of the major concerns of comics studies
scholars is the theoretical definition of the medium. In this section I have included a small range
of critical discourse about the nature and processes of comics. Töpffer’s
essay should certainly be included, not solely for its historical significance,
but also for his foundational thinking on how the medium differs from other
literary media. His claim that “the
picture-story, which critics disregard and scholars scarcely notice, has great
influence at all times, perhaps even more than written literature” (Töpffer 3) is still
relevant enough that it might have been drawn from a text in 2013 rather than
1845.
The inclusion of both the McCloud
and Eisner texts also serve a somewhat historical function, as they are amongst
the earliest critical texts on comics to have gained significant academic
traction. In a discipline such as comics
studies, I think it is important that we listen to the considered opinions of
practitioners of the art, even if they are not scholars themselves, and their
works not considered scholarly. McCloud’s
Understanding Comics in particular
has exerted a significant influence on academic thought in comics studies,
drawing both praise and disagreement, but, most importantly, provoking
discussion. Eisner’s work “diagnose[s]
the form itself...dismantl[ing] the complex components of the medium” (Eisner
xii) from the distinct point of view of an acknowledged master of the
form. From these two lay-scholars, I
move to the work of Thierry Groensteen, whose semiologically-inflected vision
of how comics work brings the theoretical discussion into a dialogue with
traditional critical theory. This
juxtaposition of scholarly and non-scholarly writings provides a good basis for
understanding the form from multiple perspectives, as well as acknowledging the
historical lineage of critical comics studies thought.
The one optional text in this
section is Alan Moore’s 1985 essay “Writing for Comics.” The other writers in this section focus, for
the most part, on the combination of words and pictures, privileging, in some
cases, the image over the word. The
inclusion of Moore reminds us that many stories begin with a script, or at
least an idea, and even if an artist simply begins to draw with a story in
mind, it is still a form of writing.
Moore’s essay also addresses the collaborative nature of the medium in a
way that the prior theoretical pieces do not.
History
6. “Definitions
and Descriptions of Emblem-Books” – Peter Daly and Elizabeth Morelli
7. *The Origins of Comics – Thierry
Smolderen
8. “The
American Comic Book: 1883 - 1938” – Robert Beerbohm and Richard Olson
9. “The
American Comic Book: 1929 – Present” – Robert Beerbohm and Richard Olson
10. A
Christall Glass of Christian Reformation, selections – Stephen Bateman
and various artists (or one other representative pictorial emblem book)
11. *“A Harlot’s Progress” – William Hogarth
12. “Marriage à-la-mode”
– William Hogarth
13. *Songs
of Innocence and of Experience – William Blake
14. *“Histoire de M. Crèpin” –
Rodolphe Töpffer
15. “Die Passion Eines Manschen” (The
Passion of a Man) – Frans Masereel
16. Promethea
#12: “Metaphore” – Alan Moore
and J.H. Williams III
The history of the comics form is
almost as varied as its theoretical conceptions.
Thierry Smolderen’s forthcoming (in translation)
The Origin of Comics is indispensable in
this section, outlining from Hogarth to McKay the technical and cultural
evolution of the form.
I would add to
this history Daly and Morelli’s work on emblem books, and an example of one in
Stephen Bateman’s 1569
A Christall Glass
of Christian Reformation. The two Beerbohm texts, often reprinted in
the Overstreet guides, provide a brief overview of the twentieth century state
of North American comics.
It is of
course possible that a more academically rigorous analysis of the twentieth and
twenty-first century history of comic books is available, and as such these two
articles are not required, only suggested.
The remaining primary texts cover a range of historical periods,
presenting sequential art and picture/word combinations that are traditionally considered
as forerunners to the contemporary comic book.
The inclusion here of Moore and Williams’ “Metaphore” from
Promethea is in conjunction with the
inclusion of the emblem book.
I have
argued elsewhere that this particular issue of the series is in fact an emblem
book itself, and so I think it should be read here, in conjunction with Daly
and Morelli, and with Bateman, so that the lineage to this sixteenth century
art form is made explicit.
It is important here to include at
least one of Töpffer’s
works, and I have listed it by its French title, as opposed to its English
translation. Not only is Töpffer’s critical thought
on the medium vital to our theoretical and historical understandings, but his artistic
contributions in his picture stories are also important. Either translated or untranslated is
acceptable, as the problems of translated texts are dealt with further down the
list in the “International” section.
Masereel’s “Die Passion Eines Manschen” is included, as are Hogarth’s
and Blake’s works, all of these as examples of early sequential art stories and
word-picture combinations. The
descendants of such works might be seen in Vaughn-James’ The Cage and Niffenegger’s The
Three Incestuous Sisters. It is
important the we note from these historical works and the contemporary works
that follow them that a comic isn’t always the nine-panel grid of Watchmen. The telling of stories with sequential
pictures, with or without words, broadly fits this medium. We should not limit that which we acknowledge
in comics studies.
Comic Strips
17. *“Caricature”
– David Carrier
18. Men,
Women and Dogs – James Thurber (or any collection of single-panel
comics, e.g. The Far Side)
19. *Krazy
Kat (1 year worth of strips) – George Herriman
20. *Peanuts
(1 year worth of strips) – Charles Schultz
21. My
Crowd – Charles Addams (or any collection of single-panel comics, e.g. The Far Side)
22. Bloom
County (1 year worth of strips) – Berke Breathed
23. Calvin
and Hobbes (1 year worth of strips) – Bill Watterson
24. The
Boondocks: Because I Know You Don’t Read the Newspaper – Aaron McGruder
Before the pamphlet periodical, the
comic strip “shape[d] the future of the form for more than a century”
(Smolderen 75). The comic strip
provided, and continues to provide, an important stepping stone between the
early days of the medium and the graphic novels we now attempt to canonize in
our institutions. This section of the
list includes strips both historical and contemporary, though only Krazy Kat and Peanuts are required primary texts, having the weight of both
critical and popular opinion in their support.
Carrier’s article speaks to the single panel comic and points to ways
that we might incorporate these comics into the theory that often more closely
scrutinizes strip or periodical comics.
I include Thurber’s and Addams’ works on this list as examples of the
single panel comic, and also to highlight the literary pedigree that
single-panel comics achieved very early in the history of the medium (having
been culled from that most “literary” of magazines, The New Yorker). These
single-panel collections could be easily replaced by others (collections from Playboy, or treasury editions of The Far Side, for example), the
important point being to recognize this less-prominent branch of the medium.
The balance of the strips are culled
from those that have achieved contemporary popular success. Comic strips, at least before the advent of
the internet, enjoyed a far wider readership than periodical comics as a result
of their inclusion in major newspapers.
Thus, such works as Calvin and
Hobbes or Bloom County drew far
more popular praise than contemporaneous comic books. Though the comics pages of newspapers continue
to attest to the strip as a venue of choice for some comics artists, it is
quickly being supplanted by the web comic.
Regardless, strips mark a vital part of the medium, and though we may
not see the likes of Peanuts again in
newspapers, the constant collection and redistribution of such strips speaks to
their importance to the medium.
These collections of strips highlight differences of narratology and
composition for this particular branch of the medium, as we see the necessity
of daily or weekly punch lines, and, in the single-panel comic, the
relationship between picture and caption.
Groensteen’s spatio-topia of the comic album, the “invent[ion of] a
scenario that can be incarnated in this medium” (Groensteen 22) is very
different for the comic strip. Like the
proto-comics of the “History” section, and the comics included below in the
“Experimental” section, the strips demonstrate the versatility of the medium,
and the vastness of its boundaries.
Webcomics
In Reinventing Comics, published in 2000, Scott McCloud offers that
once the “bandwidth barrier falls...comics will have found its native soil at
last” (McCloud, Reinventing 231), a
native soil that is no longer constrained to pages, panels, linearity, or
corporate distribution. His assertion is
in the process of being proven or disproven, and though many web comics still adhere
to the panel-based format, what internet publishing has changed is the
distribution model, another of the comics revolutions that McCloud foresees in Reinventing. A huge amount of material, some good and some
bad, is now available to readers willing to put in the time to find it (which
really is not so different from the experience of a comic book store). Such works as Andrew Hussie’s voluminous and
increasingly mutlimedia Homestuck, or
the ever-popular and subversive Cyanide
and Happiness demonstrate the virtues and advantages of web
publishing.
Webcomics also owe a great deal to
the comic strip, having in many ways supplanted it, and as such I include on
this list web comics that grow directly from prior comic strips. Dan Walsh’s Garfield Without Garfield offers a look at how digital technology
and notions of remixing have appropriated Jim Davis’ beloved strip and made it
new. The same holds true for the
Heyermans’ Hobbes and Bacon, a
continuation of Bill Watterson’s Calvin
and Hobbes. It is hard to imagine
either of these comics existing in a pre-digital era, and even if they did it
would be in much cruder, and much less-accessible forms. The web has allowed these kinds of pastiches
and remixes to achieve a much broader recognition and acceptance than would be
possible pre-Internet. Yungbluth’s Clarissa also owes a debt to comic
strips, borrowing a Calvin and Hobbes-ian
art style, though Clarissa
demonstrates the extremely dark uses to which comic strip-style art can be
put. It shares with Walsh’s and the
Heyermans’ strips the advantage of its web-related availability. The content of the comic is so dark that it
is hard to imagine it being presented in a print form for as wide an audience
as it currently commands.
The single required text in this
section, Comeau and Horne’s A Softer
World, offers one of the few entries (Vaughn-James’ The Cage being the other possible candidate) of what I would term
“comics poetry.” The strip offers no
real narrative or characterization, simply a combination of words and visual
images that produces emotional response.
The visual imagery is most often photography, but manipulated in such a
way that it evokes rather than depicts. This
manipulation is reminiscent of something Douglas Wolk points out in Reading Comics:
The most significant fact about comics is so obvious it’s
easy to overlook: they are drawn. That means that what they show are things and
people, real or imagined, moving in space and changing over time, as
transformed through somebody’s eye or hand. (Wolk, emphasis in original 118)
He
goes on to note that the “chief tools” of cartooning “are distortion and
symbolic abstraction” (120), which seems an apt description of the photography
of A Softer World. So the tools for both digital manipulation
and digital distribution open up a wider range of modes of expression that we
can characterize as comics. In a print
culture, A Softer World might be a
book of photography, albeit manipulated photography. In a web culture, it is a comic.
Canadian Content
30. *Invaders from the North – John Bell
31. *Cerebus:
High Society – Dave Sim
32. Scott
Pilgrim’s Precious Little Life – Bryan Lee O’Malley
33. Northwest
Passage – Scott Chantler
34. *Wimbledon
Green - Seth
35. Skim
– Mariko Tamaki and Jillian Tamaki
Canadian cartoonist Seth opens his
foreword to John Bell’s Invaders from the
North with the statement “Canada, as a nation, doesn’t seem very interested
in its popular culture” (Seth 9). While
it may be a sad but true statement, Bell goes on to tell us that “English
Canadian comic books first appeared in 1941” (Bell 16), so though we may not
pay much attention to our popular culture, it does not mean we don’t have
one. The separation of Canadian comics
from the rest of the list is based solely on the fact that the list is being
prepared in Canada. Were this a
candidacy list for an institution in the United States, or Great Britain,
Canadian comics would be included in the following section on “International
Comics.” I feel, however, it is
incumbent upon me to distinguish some of the great Canadian works in order that
we might combat Seth’s assertion.
Dave Sim is ostensibly one of the
best-known, and one of the most highly-regarded, Canadian cartoonists, despite
his legendary slide into misogyny and religious fundamentalism. The High
Society volume of Cerebus
represents a high point in a series full of high points. It showcases Sim’s artistic and narrative
abilities, and offers some particularly biting criticism of the democratic
electoral process. It is also one of the
last times in the series that Cerebus
embraces its humorous side before becoming a dark and philosophically ponderous
work. On the other hand, O’Malley’s Scott Pilgrim embraces its comedy
throughout, as the first volume in the series attests. The videogame-inspired work also points
toward an interesting convergence of comic and videogame tropes, and the
potential for storytelling that emerges from the confluence of the two. A similar convergence of tropes is seen in
Hussie’s web comic Homestuck.
Northwest
Passage and Skim dip into
historic and social tensions evident in Canadian culture. Chandler’s work looks at early settlement in
Canada from the point of view of a rollicking adventure story, injecting some
excitement into a subject that, if my own experience is any attestation, was
dry and dull when taught in public school.
Jillian and Mariko Tamaki’s Skim
hits the same kinds of notes as Gene Yang’s American
Born Chinese, but with a decidedly darker vision. Issues of both gender and ethnic prejudice
play out against the backdrop of nineties Toronto, and shows that the Breakfast Club-like angst of teenagers
is not solely relegated to our neighbours to the south.
In the following section on comics
from around the world, I bring up problems of translation, and specifically
whether or not we need to somehow translate images from other countries and
cultures in order that we properly understand a text. This small selection of Canadian comics
offers a group of texts that we, as Canadians, are in a unique position to
appreciate. Not only are the texts set
in, or call attention to, our country and our cities, but they were produced
within the culture that we call our own.
As members of that culture, these works speak to us in ways that they
would speak to no one else, even other English-speaking readers. One glaring omission from this section of the
list, however, is the lack of any bandes
dessinees from Quebec. I have not
encountered any works in this tradition personally, which speaks in some ways
to Seth’s earlier assertion, but also to the problems of translation that I
will outline below.
International Comics
36. “The Task
of the Translator” – Walter Benjamin
37. *“Theorizing
Translation” – Thomas Jackson
38. “Manga
Translation and Interculture” – Cathy Sell
39. Le
avventure africaine di Guiseppe Bergman (An Author in Search of Six
Characters and Dies
Irae) – Milo Manara (or two other stories by artists popularized in Heavy
Metal Magazine) (Italy)
40. *Any 1 Asterix
– Goscinny and Uderzo (France)
41. *Any 1 Tintin
– Hergé (Belgium)
42. *From
Hell – Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell (United Kingdom)
43. *Any 1 year
of The
Beano Book or The Dandy Book – Various (United
Kingdom)
44. The
Book of Leviathan – Peter Blegvad (United Kingdom ?)
45. *Akira
v.1 – Katsushiro Otomo (Japan)
46. “Gon Eats and Sleeps” – Masashi Tanaka
(Japan)
47. Mushishi v.1 – Yuki Urushibara (Japan)
48. Zen
Speaks: Shouts of Nothingness – Tsai Chih Chung (China)
Though there are numerous problems
with studying translated works, I believe it to be important in a comics
reading list to acknowledge the international scope of the medium. Publications such as Heavy Metal magazine, and the proliferation of Japanese manga in
North America, have exerted a profound influence on English-language comics,
and so must be read in conjunction with them.
I have included some general criticism on the process of translation to
highlight the problems endemic in that process.
Benjamin’s essay notes that “instead of resembling the meaning of the
original, [the translation] must lovingly and in detail incorporate the original’s
mode of signification, thus making both the original and the translation
recognizable as fragments of a greater language” (Benjamin 78). Regarded this way, the translated works need
not be looked upon as inferior copies, but as re-iterations of the originals
that we can parse in an English-language setting. Translation also raises an interesting
question with regard to Thierry Groensteen’s assertion that comics are “a predominantly visual narrative form”
(Groensteen 12, emphasis in original).
Is there a need to translate visual codes, or are they somehow
universal? Within the pages of a work
like Akira, or Tintin, are there visual codes that require translation, and how
does one go about this project?
A further issue raised by the
inclusion of international comics is the question of the nationality of
works. Where does one locate the
nationality of a work such as The Book of
Leviathan? It is a comic strip from
the U.K., written by an American by birth who seems to have chosen Britain as
his home, but it is published in graphic novel form by a publishing house in
the U.S. Similar questions can be asked
of numerous comics, especially since the much-lauded British Invasion of the
late Eighties. DC’s All-Star Superman features a quintessentially American hero,
published by an American company, but written and drawn by two Scotsmen. Is this a work of British or American
literature? Such determined categories
are not so well-defined for comics, though are often definitional ones in
academic structures. Comics such as Leviathan ask us to rethink our
nationally-divided syllabi, and perhaps point to a more holistic approach to
literature.
Experimental
51. *The
Cage – Martin Vaughn-James
52. *The
Invisibles – Grant Morrison and Various
53. Quantum
and Woody – Christopher Priest and M.D. Bright
54. Meanwhile
– Jason Shiga
In this category, I have included
two works that are formally experimental, and two that are narratively
experimental, though as Groensteen points out, such a delineation in comics is
not always a productive distinction (Groensteen 22). Comics are as much able to produce
experimental works as any other medium, and it is important on a reading list
such as this one to acknowledge this fact.
Both The Invisibles and Quantum and Woody present adventure
narratives non-chronologically, and work against the idea that comics, and
especially popular superhero comics, are easier to read than “proper”
books. Though Quantum and Woody’s storyline is ultimately incomplete, Priest and
Bright’s technique in the narrative offers what Shklovsky might describe as “perception
[that] is impeded [so that] the greatest possible effect is produced through
the slowness of the perception” (Shklovsky ).
Quantum and Woody forces a
reader to pay closer attention than the traditional chronological superhero
comic book might, and offers great reward for such attention through the
estrangement championed by the Russian Formalists. Morrison’s The Invisibles plays similar games with the chronological ordering
of the story, but also, through both the story and visual markers in the text,
asks questions about the very existence of the text, and the role of the reader
in its creation. Over the course of its
three volumes, the work comes back time and again to the same scenes, but from
differing perceptions, offering not simply critique on how we perceive reality,
but also on the medium, and on literature, itself. Each time we approach a work, we are seeing
it in many ways for the first time. We
bring different subjectivities to a work by virtue of our being creatures in a
constant state of flux. Morrison’s work
asks us to question these subjective perspectives even as the text itself moves
through numerous different focal perspectives.
Vaughn-James’ and Shiga’s works are
fine examples of the formal experiments that can be carried out with the
medium. The Cage’s lack of character and narrative (the lack of which, of
course, could be argued) offers a glimpse at the edges of what we might call
the comic book, verging into territory similar to that of Audrey Niffenegger’s The Three Incestuous Sisters. Like the narrative experiments of Morrison,
Priest, and Bright, The Cage
demonstrates what the medium is capable of in the hands of an artist who does
not consider comics a juvenile form.
Shiga’s Meanwhile reads much
like a graphic novel correlative of Danielewski’s House
of Leaves, the plot weaving backwards and forwards through the physical
body of the text. This work points to
ways that the physical graphic novel can re-appropriate tropes of the web comic
and of hypertextual composition, and adds to these tropes the weight of
physicality. There is something very
different in flipping a page to follow a story than in clicking a hyperlink,
but narratively Shiga’s book resembles such a hyperlinking story.
Experimentation, and
experimentability, is important in any medium.
An artistic form that either denies, or is incapable of, experimentation
is ultimately a dead end. Indeed, we
might make the argument that if a form of expression, artistic or otherwise, is
incapable of experimentation, then it is no longer a form of expression. A further argument might be that there is no
form of expression that is incapable of experimentation, but this veers off
into philosophy, and probably into a very different paper than this one.
Adaptation
*“Not Just
Condensation: How Comic Books Interpret Shakespeare” – Marion Perret (or one
other theoretical work on comic book adaptation)
55. “Shakespeare for Americans” – Howard
Chaykin and Walt Simonson
56. King
Lear – William Shakespeare and Gareth Hinds
57. *Masterpiece
Comics – R. Sikoryak
58. Manga
Shakespeare: Hamlet – William Shakespeare and Emma Vieceli
The comic book has a long history of
adapting works from other media, many times in an effort to gain some kind of
legitimacy as a literary form (the various Classics
Illustrated series, for example). Arguing
from a perspective of the medium already being legitimate, I would argue that adaptations
can instead serve to demonstrate the similarities comics have with other media,
perhaps most notably film and drama. The
scripts that exist for these works make them prime candidates for adaptation
into comics, and their nascence as scripts and execution as visual media gives
them a great deal in common with the comics.
Perret’s article, though focussing on Shakespearean texts, is useful in considering all adaptations in
comics. She notes that “comic book
versions of Shakespeare’s plays are not just illustrated digests of plots and
sketches of character; inescapably, they interpret as well as inform” (Perret
73). This echoes Benjamin’s claim for
translation that it “mak[es] both the original and the translation recognizable
as fragments of a greater language,” and also John Sena’s assertion that the
pictorial representations of Gulliver’s
Travels “have a more significant function than merely supplying
decorative ornamentation to a narrative” (Sena 50). In all adaptations, we can see interpretive
practices at work that (hopefully) both showcase and enhance the original
narratives.
Hinds’
King Lear is the most faithful of the adaptations in question, and
serves the function of demonstrating what I would term a “traditional”
adaptation, placing the action in a period similar to that of the original, and
retaining vast amounts of the original dialogue and staging of the play.
The manga version of
Hamlet too retains some of the original dialogue
,
but places the action in a science fiction setting.
As with dramatic re-interpretations, be they
film or theatre, of existing dramatic literary works, this demonstrates the
comics’ ability to bring something new to potentially very old texts.
Further, the visual aspect of the comic is
not bound by the limits of technology or, to be blunt, reality, and can place
these stories into realms that other media cannot.
Both “Shakespeare for Americans” and Masterpiece
Comics bring an additional level of satire to the works they appropriate,
and demonstrate the ability of the comic medium to critique, both playfully and
soberly, the canonical works of literature.
Masterpiece Comics in
particular offers a critical view of not only the adapted literary works, but
also “canonical” works of the comics medium.
In short, it adapts both famous comics and famous literary texts to
point out the similarities between the two, and the problems with our
canonization of said texts.
Adaptation and translation serve
similar functions on this list. In that
the list is being prepared for a post-secondary North American institute, it is
important to direct our attention both inward, toward the medium, and outward,
toward the influences upon the medium that already exist canonically within a
literature department. International
comics and their translation remind us that comics are not a fundamentally
North American medium, and adaptation reminds us that no literary form grows in
a vacuum. Literary media can
cross-pollinate, often to the benefit of both media involved. We will see examples of the reverse
pollination, from comics to other media, in the section dealing with
superheroes.
The Superhero
59. *“On the
Place of Superhero Studies within Comics Studies” – Ben Saunders
60. *“Superman” (Action Comics #1) – Jerry
Siegel and Joe Shuster
61. “The Sub-Mariner” (Marvel Comics #1) – Bill Everett
62. *“The Fantastic Four” (Fantastic
Four #1) – Stan Lee and Jack
Kirby
63. *“Spider-Man!” (Amazing Fantasy #15) – Stan Lee and Steve Ditko
64. The
Essential Howard the Duck – Steve Gerber and Various
65. *Superfolks
– Robert Mayer
66. “Franz Kafka, Superhero” – David Gerrold
67. Crisis
on Infinite Earths – Marv Wolfman and George Perez
68. *Watchmen
– Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons
69. *Batman:
The Dark Knight Returns – Frank Miller
70. *“The Coyote Gospel” (Animal
Man v.1 #1) – Grant Morrison
and Chas Truog
71. Batman:
Arkham Asylum – Grant Morrison and Dave McKean
72. “Nowhere Man,” “The Painting That Ate Paris,” “Labyrinths,”
“The Kingdom of No,” “Going
Underground” (from Doom Patrol v.2) – Grant Morrison and Richard Case
73. “Crossing Over” (Spawn #10) – Dave Sim and
Todd McFarlane
74. *Flex
Mentallo – Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely
75. *The
Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay – Michael Chabon
76. “The Amazing Life of Onion Jack” – Joel
Priddy
77. *All-Star
Superman – Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely
78. “Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?”
(Detective
Comics#853 & Batman #686) – Neil Gaiman and Andy Kubert
79. Dial
H – China Miéville
and Alberto Ponticelli
As noted in my brief introduction,
the superhero genre is the one I privilege in my own reading habits with
comics, and as such is the one in which I would claim the greatest breadth of
knowledge. What we must also
acknowledge, however, is that, at least in North America, the superhero genre
has been fundamental to the continuation and popularization of the medium. Though their popularity has waxed and waned
over the decades, the superhero has never fully vanished, and probably never
will. The ubiquity of this genre has
also resulted in many (but not all) of the more talented writers and artists in
the comics industry producing at least one or two superhero tales. Many lauded writers, both within and outside
of the industry, actively seek out superhero storytelling opportunities, which
speaks to the great creative allure of the genre. It is for this reason that I include so much
of Grant Morrison’s work on this portion of the list, as I consider him to be
one of the best living writers of our time.
His Flex Mentallo and “The
Coyote Gospel” are prime examples of how the genre of the superhero has passed
on from McCloud’s oft-quoted “crude, poorly-drawn, semiliterate, cheap,
disposable kiddie fare” (McCloud, Understanding
3) to a space capable of telling thought-provoking stories of a literary
quality. Other “great writers” are
included here, names such as Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Dave Sim, and Frank
Miller. As with The Book of Leviathan in the translation section, some of these
writers, and the artists that work with them, question the national boundaries
of the medium. Of the five names I have
mentioned so far, only one is American, one Canadian, and three British. Within those three, two are English and one
Scottish. How then do we categorize by
nation?
For a theoretical piece, I have
included Ben Saunders’ short appendix from Do
the Gods Wear Capes?. Saunders is a
major proponent of the superhero genre in comics studies. His essay outlines both the ways in which
superhero studies must emulate the wider field of comics studies and also what
that wider field can learn and take from the superhero genre. A large amount of the critical writing on
superheroes focusses on the problematic aspects of the characters, whether
these be ideological, gender-biased, or any number of other critical
lenses. Saunders acknowledges these
problems, but also asks us to look to the potential for good that the superhero
represents. All literatures, all stories
in fact, have problematic aspects. I can
think of few that have been criticized for these aspects as soundly as has the
superhero genre. It is my hope that the
stories I have included in this section of the list point to not simply
problems, but perhaps solutions that superheroes can offer.
Following Saunders, the first four
texts on this list represent watershed moments in the genre. Both Action
Comics #1 and Marvel Comics #1
are definitional pieces in the genre, as are the later tales of Spider-Man and
the Fantastic Four. Depending on the
predilection of the person reading the list, more of the earlier work might be
preferable, but I offer my opinion that the superhero story is only now coming
into its own in the last 10 – 20 years, and that the stories from the late Eighties
to present time have produced some of the most literate superhero tales in the
genre.
The balance of the texts offer an
overview, though, as with the rest of this list, a brief one. Crisis
on Infinite Earths and Spawn #10
– “Crossing Over” – offer examples of the inter-continuity and inter-company
crossovers that are in some ways unique to the superhero comic book (though the
practice has been taken up by television and film in the last decade or so). Steve Gerber’s collected Howard the Duck performs a satire of late twentieth century America
as cutting as any piece of “literature” of the same era. Also included on the list are three prose
pieces: Robert Mayer’s Superfolks,
David Gerrold’s “Franz Kafka, Superhero,” and Michael Chabon’s The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier &
Clay. These works represent a
crossover of another kind, back into the more legitimated realm of the novel
and short story. Gerrold’s piece
intersects with an acknowledged, and critically popular, literary author, and
Chabon’s novel is already hailed as a modern masterpiece, having won the
Pulitzer Prize and having been nominated for numerous other prestigious
awards. As Bart Beaty points out in Comics Versus Art, there is a “narrow
definition of comics as a cultural form offered by theorists...from Bill
Blackbeard to Scott McCloud” (Beaty 150), so as with the “Experimental” section
of the list, I offer these prose writings as yet another avenue down which
comics has progressed. The novels and
short story still offer tales firmly rooted in the medium, both by dint of the
characters and subject matter, and also the fact that the words upon the page
are sequentially arranged images, albeit images from the far end of McCloud’s
graph of iconic abstraction (McCloud, Understanding
52-3).
Wolk says it well: “if you are going
to look honestly at American comics, you are going to encounter superheroes”
(Wolk 89), this in a section of his book subtitled “Why Superheroes? Why??” But,
in the same vein as Saunders, he goes on to assert that “every major superhero
franchise...can be looked at in terms of a particular metaphor that underscores
all of its best stories” (95), and this is the perspective from which the
superhero genre, pervasive, and to some invasive, as it may seem, must be
approached. There are easy answers to
the question of why the superhero has dominated American comic books for so
long. The more difficult answers are certainly
more interesting.
Other Genre
Children
80. American
Born Chinese – Gene Luen Yang
81. Tommysaurus
Rex – Doug TenNapel
82. *The
Best of Archie Comics v.1 – Various (or other representative collection
of Archie comics)
Comedy
83. *Bone:
Out from Boneville – Jeff Smith
Drama
84. *A
Contract with God – Will Eisner
85. Brooklyn
Dreams – J.M DeMatteis and Glenn Barr
86. The
Three Incestuous Sisters – Audrey Niffenegger
87. “The Revival” – James Sturm
Erotica
88. The
Spider Garden – Michael Manning
89. Lost
Girls – Alan Moore and Melinda Gebbie
Horror
90. *Sandman:
Season of Mists – Neil Gaiman and Various
91. Preacher:
Gone to Texas – Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon
92. Hellboy:
The Chained Coffin and Other Stories – Mike Mignola
Mystery
93. The
Mystery Play – Grant Morrison and John J. Muth
94. *Like
a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron – Daniel Clowes
Non-Fiction
95. *Maus
I & II – Art Spiegelman
96. A
Treasury of Victorian Murder – Rick Geary
Underground
97. *“Fritz the Cat” – R. Crumb
98. Alias
the Cat – Kim Dietch
The “Other Genres” section of the
list is easily the most difficult for me to comment upon. It might have been easier to break this large
topic down into its constitutive parts, but as Wolk notes, while “mainstream
comics about anything other than superheroes aren’t entirely
obsolete,...they’re definitely anomalies” (Wolk 90). Again, as the list is potentially fluid, a
reader with an avid interest in the Underground Comix of the sixties and
seventies would be able to replace large swaths of the over-arching superhero
genre titles with works more to his or her taste. I will comment more fully, and perhaps
sheepishly make excuses, on the prevalence of the superhero genre in my
conclusion.
In this section of the list are
works that have to be on any comics
studies list. Spiegelman’s Maus is represented, as is Gaiman and
company’s Sandman. Jeff Smith’s Bone makes an appearance, as does Ennis and Dillon’s Preacher and a selection of the best of Archie comics. Will Eisner’s graphic novel work is
represented here too, a companion to his earlier inclusion in the “Theory”
section of the list. R. Crumb’s Fritz is
also included here, so what the “Other Genre” section of the list accomplishes
is to include works that are vital to our understanding of comics that don’t
fit easily into any other categories.
Clowes’ Like a Velvet Glove Cast
In Iron and Morrison and Muth’s The
Mystery Play are included under the heading of Mystery, but they are not
solely that. They merely pull their
primary tropes from that genre. Smith’s Bone is not solely comedy, being also an
all-ages work, a fantasy work, and drawing on a lineage of comic strips such as
Kelly’s Pogo and Alfred or Barks’
Duck comics. “Other Genre” could easily
have been “Miscellaneous,” but that term seems to denote afterthought, which
these inclusions to the list are definitely not.
What this final section of the list
does accomplish is something similar to the “Experimental” section of the list;
it showcases the diversity of stories that can be, and have been, told in the
comics medium, and the quality this diversity of stories represents. It is not to say that these are the only
examples of each genre (where, for example, are the EC horror comics of the
fifties, or Harvey Pekar’s American
Splendour?), only that each of these genres exists and is a vibrant part of
the medium. The works included in this
section are simply individual pinnacles amongst many.
As a way of concluding this paper, I
must make plain that even over the course of writing and editing the paper, my
list has undergone change. Each time I
read a fine example of what the comics medium can achieve (Marc-Antoine
Mathieu’s 3 Secondes and Gene Yang’s American Born Chinese, which supplanted
the Spiegelman and Mouly-edited Little Lit,
being the latest), I struggle as to whether or not it is a viable contender for
the list, and what it should replace in keeping with the limit of 100
individual titles. This list bears
little resemblance to that of The Comics
Journal, and that list was compiled by individuals whose cachet within
comics studies is far greater than mine.
The most honest justification I can offer for the titles included , and
for the generic choices and distinctions, on this list is that they have all
played some fundamental role in my own appreciation and education in comics and
comics studies. As we leave 15-20
percent of such reading lists open to the tastes of the student, there is
certainly space to tailor the list, perhaps adding more horror and removing
some superheroes, for example. This
list, then, is what I would recommend as having taught me the most about the
medium, its history and theory, and the potential for its use as a vehicle of
good, and sometimes great, stories.
Works Cited
Beaty, Bart. Comics Versus Art. Toronto: University
of Toronto Press, 2012. Print.
Benjamin,
Walter. Illuminations. Ed. Hannah Arendt. New York: Schocken Books, 1969.
Print.
Eisner, Will. Comics and Sequential Art. New York:
Norton & Co., 2008. Print.
Groensteen, Thierry.
The System of Comics. Trans. Bart
Beaty and Nick Nguyen. Jackson: University
of Mississippi Press, 2007. Print.
McCloud, Scott. Reinventing Comics. New York: Paradox
Press, 2000. Print.
---. Understanding Comics. New York: Paradox
Press, 2000. Print.
Perret, Marion.
“Not Just Condensation: How Comic Books Interpret Shakespeare.” College Literature
31.4 (2004): 72-93. JSTOR. Web. 21
Sept. 2012.
Sena, John F. “Teaching Gulliver's Travels.” Approaches to Teaching Swift's Gulliver's
Travels. Ed. Edward J. Reilly. New
York: Modern Language Association of America, 1988. 44- 51. Print.
Shklovsky, Victor.
“Art as Technique.” www.vahidnab.com. N.p. n.d. Web. 12 Dec. 2013.
Smolderen, Thierry.
The Origins of Comics. Trans. Bart
Beaty and Nick Nguyen. 2014. TS.
Töpffer, Rodolphe. Enter: The Comics. Lincoln: University
of Nebraska Press, 1965. Print.
Wolk, Douglas. Reading Comics: How Graphic Novels Work and
What They Mean. Philadelphia:
Da Capo Press, 2007. Print.
