Back Issues

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BACK ISSUES: A HISTORY AND STUDY OF THE COMICS FORM BY IAN JAMES GRAY A Thesis Submitted to the Division of Humanities New College of Florida in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Bachelor of Arts Under the sponsorship of Cris Hassold Sarasota, Florida January, 2010

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ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank my parents and my sister, Jen, for all of their love and encouragement throughout my life, and during my time at New College and the duration of this project in part icular. Special thanks also go to my friends and roommates, John F, John C, Brian, Lauren, Caleb, and Aaron for all their support, as well as their inspiration for my art. No names have been changed because no one was innocent. I also thank William Hog arth, Rodolphe Tpffer and/or Richard F. Outcault for inventing comics... maybe. Likewise, I thank the creators of the myriad comics I have known and loved and that have shaped the artist that I am today. Finally, I would like to thank Cris Hassold, Nova Myhill, and Miriam Wallace for their guidance on this project and for all their help as teachers during my stay at this outpatient mental hospital for the gifted and eccentric we call New College of Florida. I love you, New College.

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iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ii TABLE OF CONTENTS iii LIST OF FIGURES iv ABSTRACT vi BACKWARDS/FORWARDS: SEQUENTIAL ART AND THE HISTORY 1 OF THE MODERN COMICS FORM SIDEWAYS: PARALLEL TRADITIONS IN JAPAN AND AMERICA 20 AND MY OWN COMICS WORK FIGURES 41 APPENDIX I: BOY' S NIGHT 64 APPENDIX II : TALES FROM THE DRIVE IN 74 APPENDIX III: FLIGHT 84 BIBLIOGRAPHY 94

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iv LIST OF FIGURES Fig. 1 Hiroshige and Kunisada, from Famous Restaurants from the Eastern Capital 1852 3. Fig. 2 Hiroshige and Kunisada, from Famous Restaurants from the Easte rn Capital 1852 3. Fig. 3 Claude Monet, La Cathdrale de Rouen. Le portail et la tour Saint Romain, plein soleil; harmonie bleue et or 1892 1893 Fig. 4 Claude Monet, La Cathdrale de Rouen. Le portail, soleil matinal; harmonie bleue 1892 1893. Fig. 5 Barron Storey, from Fifteen Portraits of Despair in The Sandman: Endless Nights 2003. Fig. 6 William Hogarth, Plate 2 from A Harlot' s Progress 1732. Fig. 7 William Hogarth, Plate 3 from A Harlot' s Progress 1732. Fig. 8 Rodolphe Tpffer, Plate 32 fr om Monsieur Vieux Bois 1827. Fig. 9 Thomas Rowlandson, Dr. Syntax Stopt by Highwaymen from The Tours of Dr. Synt a x 1809. Fig. 10 Thomas Rowlandson, Dr. Syntax Bound to a Tree by Highwaymen" from The Tours of Dr. Synt a x 1809. Fig 11. Marie Duval and Charles H. Ross, from Some of the Mysteries of Loan and Discount 1867 Fig. 12 Richard F. Outcault, The Yellow Kid and His New Phonograph 1896. Fig. 13 Toba, from the Animal Scrolls(Ch j giga) early 12th Century. Fig. 14 Katsushika Hokusai, from Hokusai M anga c. 1815.

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v Fig. 15 Rakuten Kitazawa, Tagosaku to Mokub # no T ky Kembutsu ("Tagosako and Mokub # Sightseeing in Tokyo") 1902. Fig. 16 Osamu Tezuka, from Astro Boy Vol. 1 1951. Fig. 17 Chris Bachalo with Marvel Bullpen, Generation X #3 Page 19, 1995. Fig. 18 Terry Dodson and Rachel Dodson with Marvel Bullpen, from Generation X #53 Page 14, 1999. Fig. 19 Ryan Sook with Wade von Grawbadger, X Factor #1 Page 10, 2005. Fig. 20 Al Feldstein, cover from Tales from the Crypt No. 24 1951. Fig. 21 Artist unknown, film poster for Attack of the 50 Foot Woman 1958. Fig. 22 Artist unknown, ancient Greek vase, c. 525 BC. Fig. 24 Antonio del Pollaiuolo, Battle of the Nudes c. 1470.

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vi BACK ISSUES: A HISTORY AND STUDY OF THE COMICS FORM Ian James Gray New College of Florida, 2010 ABSTRACT This thesis begins with an analysis of the history of sequential art as it pertains to the evolution of the mode rn comics form. This study follows the development of comics as a mass art form from the eighteenth and early nineteenth century cartoonists who pioneered the early comics form to later artists of the nineteenth century who refined comics into their recog nizable modern incarnation. What follows is a treatment of other sequential art traditions specifically the woodblock prints of Edo period Japan and other native Japanese sequential art forms, as well as their subsequent influence upon the modern Japanese manga tradition and, though manga, western comics in the late twentieth and twenty first centuries. From there I describe my own woodcut sequential art narratives, taking the form of three short comics stories stylistically informed by historical eastern and western woodcut ( and sequential art) traditions. Cris Hassold Division of Humanities

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1 BACKWARDS/FORWARDS: SEQUENTIAL ART AND THE HISTORY OF THE MODERN COMICS FORM Before one delves too deeply into the history of comics or the development of the m odern comics form, it seems important to define just what exactly are comics. In Comics and Sequential Art Will Eisner defines "sequential art," a term he is credited with coining that refers to a medium that includes comics as well as book illustrations and other forms of graphic narratives, as an art and literary form that deals with the arrangement of pictures or images and words to narrate a story or dramatize an idea." 1 Some of the phrasing here is interesting, as "arrangement of pictures or images and words" seems to suggest that sequential art might consist of any collection of images that articulates a shared narrative or idea, including many historical forms such as medieval religious friezes or ancient frescos, as well as forms that use images i n conjunction with text, such as comics and illustrated books. It also seems noteworthy that this definition allows for sequences or arrangements of images "that narrate a story or dramatize an idea." This makes the category of sequential art even more in clusive, as it consists not merely of art that relates a particular progression of narrative as in the examples above, but also any collection of images that share concept or subject matter and are set in communication with one another. This implicitly inc ludes everything from traditional Japanese woodblock prints such as those of Hiroshige and Kunisada, thematically linked by their portrayal of multiple views of the same region or visual accounts of popular Edo area attractions, or modern painting series d ating back to and including Monet' s Haystacks and Rouen Cathedral s as well as 1 E i s n e r W i l l C o m i c s a n d S e q u e n t i a l A r t W W N o r t o n a n d C o m p a n y 2 0 0 8 x i

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2 contemporary experimental comics, such as the Barron Storey illustrations in Neil Gaiman' s Sandman s tory Fifteen Portraits of Despair In the Hiroshige/Kunisada series Famou s Restaurants from the Eastern Capital (Figs. 1 and 2), individual prints are linked by their similar compositions and shared themes: a kabuki actor rendered by Kunisada stands in front of a number of background frames by Hiroshige depicting a landscape ne ar each restaurant and perhaps a signature dish or two. The result is something akin to a late Edo period series of celebrity endorsed advertisements, and is clearly representative of a series in a unified format communicating a shared idea. Monet' s Cathed ral s (Figs. 3 and 4) function as sequential art for the same reasons, only more so. A near narrative dimension enters the series of canvases as they depict an identical view of Rouen Cathedral as it appears at different hours of the day and seasons of the year. The many panels that make up Storrey' s twenty first century comic book page (Fig. 5) function very differently from the historical forms of sequential art discussed above, and are equally distinct from conventional graphic narrative, but nonetheless demonstrate a readily apparent intercommunication that marks them as sequential art. Captioned images of the personification of Despair engaged in various activities, such as "fishing in a church," "driving a cab," or "sitting in a grave reading a newspape r," are arrayed around a central panel containing a word salad of cryptic and foreboding sentence fragments, creating a general portrait of a day in the life of Despair. Each of these examples represent a form of Eisner' s concept of sequential art. While t his gives us a remarkably comprehensive definition of the varied art forms that constitute sequential art, it isn' t a very useful or specific definition of comics. In his later book, Graphic Storytelling and Visual Narrative Eisner revisits his definition and

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3 offers two related subcategories in "graphic narrative" and, more specifically, "comics." "Sequential art" is here even more loosely defined as "images deployed in a specific order." This definition seems perhaps misleading compared to the first, in t hat the words "specific order," suggest a chronological or narrative progression between images that his earlier definition does not necessitate. This seems to be more properly the purview of what he defines as "graphic narrative": "any story that employs image to transmit an idea." This includes, while not all representatives of either medium, the overwhelming majority of comics and, according to Eisner, film as well. This definition almost certainly also covers the ancient and medieval frescoes and frieze s described above, but is so problematically broad that it could apply to the performing arts and solitary graphic images as well. The definition he provides for comics as a further specialization of sequential or graphic narrative, however, is: "a form of sequential art, often in the form of a strip or books, in which images and text are arranged to tell a story." This definition seems perfectly serviceable, although it might seem pertinent to replace "images and text" with "images frequently accompanied b y text," as Eisner, himself a cartoonist active since the 1930s, was well aware of and occasionally employed conventional comics narratives without text. 2 Scott McCloud adopts and refines Eisner' s definition of comics as sequential art in h is own treatmen ts of the comics form. He swiftly append s a number of additional adje ctives and clarifications upon Eisner' s definition, describing comics as a purposeful sequence of visual images exist ing in juxtaposition to one another in space ( as opposed to merely bei ng sequential to one another in time, as in animation and film ) In this way he 2 E i s n e r W i l l G r a p h i c S t o r y t e l l i n g a n d V i s u a l N a r r a t i v e N e w Y o r k N Y : W W N o r t o n a n d C o m p a n y 2 0 0 8 x v i i E i s n e r C o m i c s 1 0

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4 arrives at the fairly thorough if nonetheless mouth filling definition of comics as juxtaposed pictorial and other images in deliberate sequence, intended to convey informatio n and/or to produce an aesthetic response in the viewer 3 McCloud allows that this broad definition would still include a surprising number of forms of visual communication under the category of sequential art, or even comics, including sequential photogr aphy, directional diagrams, medieval stained glass narratives and the aforementioned painting s of Monet. 4 While I personally find McCloud' s definition useful for considering both comics' potential as a form of creative expression and their place in a wide r historical tradition of graphic narratives, he creates some confusion in his seeming conflation of comics with the broader category of sequential art, treating the term "sequential art m uch in the way that Eisner initially does, as a euphemism for comi cs This kind of thinking, as Thierry Groensteen complains, "dissolves the specifics of the comic strip in the general history of representation; it confuses the modern medium with the thousand year old tradition of visual expression." 5 So what are comics, and what is their relation to anything called sequential art? It all seems to come down to keeping in mind the specifics of comics as a modern art form, a type of sequential art most typically taking the form of graphic narrative, but each of these terms needs to be understood as a distinct category that relates to the others as both steps in a historical evolution and different forms of a shared medium of expression. For my purposes, they might each be conceived of as follows: "sequential art" refers more 3 M c C l o u d S c o t t U n d e r s t a n d i n g C o m i c s N e w Y o r k N Y : H a r p e r P e r e n n i a l 1 9 9 4 7 9 4 M c C l o u d U n d e r s t a n d i n g 2 0 5 G r o e n s t e e n T h i e r r y T p f f e r t h e O r i g i n a t o r o f t h e M o d e r n C o m i c S t r i p D i e r i c k C h a r l e s a n d P a s c a l L e f v r e e d s F o r g i n g a N e w M e d i u m : T h e C o m i c S t r i p i n t h e N i n e t e e n t h C e n t u r y B r u s s e l s : V U B U n i v e r s i t y P r e s s 1 9 9 8 1 0 8

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5 generally to any series of images in communication and/or juxtaposition, and may include anything and everything from comics and book illustrations to cave paintings and 19th century print and painting series. Intentionality becomes an important concern i n this definition, because without an explicitly known, or at least implicit and appreciated, intention on the part of the artist, editor, or other arranger, any random assortment of images and/or objects could be argued as "sequential art," which, for the purposes of my own interests and those of this discussion, it will be held that they are not. "Graphic narrative," meanwhile, is a form of sequential art that consists of more or less exactly what it sounds like: a visually rendered selection of images th at articulates a shared narrative, with a progression of time, space, and plot. The overwhelming majority of comics, a great many book illustrations, and many ancient and medieval forms of graphic art and sculpture, among others, would thus all fall within the category of graphic narrative. Working under this understanding, all comics are sequential art, and most comics are graphic narratives, but not all sequential art nor all graphic narratives would be considered comics. "Comics," then, might thus be def ined as a specifically modern form of sequential art intrinsically tied to the development of mass culture in the early modern period, and one that first takes its current recognizable form in the first half of the nineteenth century, although direct antec edents are visible in preceding centuries. Comics are not an art form with a discrete date of invention, but rather the specialized form of a historical illustration tradition of sequential art and graphic narrative that attains its current recognizable in carnation over the course of decades if not centuries, coinciding with the development of modern mass culture. Given this, a discussion of comics' history and development as an art form will not be one that places

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6 emphasis on firsts or discoveries (such an approach being not only misguided but next to impossible), but one that speaks of transformation, innovation, and -perhaps most importantly of all -popularization. As Charles Dierick and Pascal Lefvre put it: the history of the comic strip is not one of genuine invention, but, rather, of genuine creative artists who accelerated the development of graphic storytelling. Rather than debating dates, we ... see more value in establishing the relations between different artists and how they fit into the whole ongoing history of comics." 6 The origins of the modern comics form are thus not defined by discoveries or inventions, but the continuing evolution of the art form conducted through the experimentation of artists like William Hogarth, Rodolphe Tpffer, Th omas Rowlandson, Emilie de Tessier, and Richard F. Outcault. The purpose of this chapter is to track the evolution and transformation of what, over the course of the nineteenth century and through the innovative use and proliferation of devices and techniq ues that have come to characterize the modern comics form, ultimately takes the shape of comics as we recognize them today. But where to start? To find the origins of many of these iconic structures, Historian Danile Alexandre Bredon would have us look ba ck as far as the thirteenth century. In the illuminated manuscripts of the Middle Ages, any one of which might contain thousands of individual images, medieval illustrators already conceive of frames and panel transitions, speech bubbles and thought balloo ns, sound effects, and the use of lines to indicate motion. As Alexandre Bredon asserts, "there are few so called modern 6 D i e r i c k C h a r l e s a n d P a s c a l L e f v r e I n t r o d u c t i o n F o r g i n g a N e w M e d i u m : T h e C o m i c S t r i p i n t h e N i n e t e e n t h C e n t u r y B r u s s e l s : V U B U n i v e r s i t y P r e s s 1 9 9 8 1 8

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7 techniques which medieval artists did not discover earlier." 7 But these are not comics, for one important reason if no other: as hand i llustrated tomes that were available only to a select few of the upper classes, these were not available for the consumption of the general populace as a form of mass art, a facet that seems as important to the definition of the modern comics form as anyth ing else. Nol Carroll defines mass art as "forms of art that have emerged recently in urban, industrial, capitalistic society... reproduced and distributed by mechanical and digital reproduction technologies... intentionally designed to attract a mass au dience." 8 For the first precursors of modern comics that reflect this concept of the form as the intersection of sequential art and the mass media, one should look forward to the eighteenth century and the narrative works of painter, printmaker and satiris t William Hogarth (1697 1764). Hogarth' s early contributions to the variety of sequential art that would eventually evolve into comics include the development of narrative structures and techniques that would influence the formation of the art form, and we re made possible by his drive to publish and distribute his works, making them both widely consumed and widely influential. Hogarth seems to have believed that through his graphic narratives he was expressing a new art form, or, in his own words, "a field unbroke [sic] up in any country or any age." 9 Still, his graphic narratives, however innovative (and imitated), were not born from a vacuum. Coming of age as he did in the heart of London in the early eighteenth 7 D i e r i c k 1 3 8 M a c W i l l i a m s M a r k W e d J a p a n e s e V i s u a l C u l t u r e : E x p l o r a t i o n s i n t h e W o r l d o f M a n g a a n d A n i m e A r m o n k N Y : M E S h a r p e 2 0 0 8 6 9 G r a v e t t P a u l T h e C a r t o o n i s t s P r o g r e s s : T h e I n v e n t o r s o f C o m i c s i n G r e a t B r i t a i n D i e r i c k C h a r l e s a n d P a s c a l L e f v r e e d s F o r g i n g a N e w M e d i u m : T h e C o m i c S t r i p i n t h e N i n e t e e n t h C e n t u r y B r u s s e l s : V U B U n i v e r s i t y P r e s s 1 9 9 8 8 1

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8 century, Hogarth almost surely had access to and was influenced by earlier forms of sequential art and graphic narrative such as contemporary broadsheets, narrative prints, printed playing cards, woodcuts, and chapbooks. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the popular broadsheets contained depictions of everyday life and religious proverbs, as well as social satire and farce, all themes upon which Hogarth himself would ultimately capitalize. 1 0 He may even have run across imported Italian forms of these media, including morality tales of rakes and harlots such as Giuseppe Mitelli' s Unhappy L ife of a Prostitute that closely mirror his own later subject matter. 1 1 Whatever his inspirations, Hogarth came to recognize the economic reality that his paintings alone could not support the upper class l ifestyle to which he aspired, and so, drawing upon the example of these earlier forms of mass art produced for popular consumption, he invented an alternative in the form of mass marketed narrative prints. While even the intaglio reproductions of his large r painting series were not inexpensive, they reached a much broader audience, in both numbers and class, than his original oil works could ever hope to. Their popularity was no doubt in part due to their risqu and sensational subject matter, with series l ike A Harlot' s Progress being highly subjective in their interpretation and act ing at once as a condemnation and celebration of lascivious activity In the second plate of A Harlot' s Progress (Fig. 6 ), the meretricious protagonist and her mackerel faced patron are illustrated as figures of profound moral turpitude from the expressions on their faces (a voluptuous leer and a saucer eyed gape, respectively) alone. The comic effect of their vulgar exchange is heightened by the state of chaos that 1 0 D i e r i c k 1 4 1 1 G r a v e t t 8 1

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9 surrounds t hem, a monkey wearing a bonnet skittering under an overturned table while a second gentleman' attempts to discreetly escape the chamber unnoticed, phallically pointing sword and cane under arm, in the background. Despite its finery, this is clearly a dis orderly house.' In the third plate (Fig. 7 ), a diseased and disheveled looking protagonist now flashes her finery (as well as a glimpse of her breast) toward the viewer from the bed of her hovel as a magistrate bursts in, puzzled by the lurid scene before him. Amongst other macabre knick knacks, a pointed hat, a broom, and a cat can be found, creating an atmosphere of witchcraft. While the protagonist is by no means presented as an attractive figure to be imitated, and comes to a bad end, the farcically co mic bent of the images seems to clearly illustrate entertainment (and even titillation) as a primary goal of Hogarth' s work over moral edification. Hogarth' s eye for marketing and flair for the sensational were not the only contributions he left to later g enerations of comics pioneers. His works are those of a master craftsman of graphic narrative, containing a literary appreciation for conflict, drama and storytelling. As Charles Lamb said "His graphic representations are indeed books; they have the teemin g fruitful suggestive meaning of words. Other pictures we look at, his pictures we read." 1 2 Pictures were not all he provided his audience to read, as he occasionally employed text in his narratives and even used word balloons in some earlier works In the captions or gutters outside of the printed images, he would frequently provide his plates with explicative titles or short narrative synopses, sometimes in the form of rhymes or Biblical quotations (but never in the form of third person speech). He would frequently offer considerable textual commentary in the intaglio reproductions of his work that were not available in the paintings upon which 1 2 G r a v e t t 8 5

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10 they were based, owing in part to the fact that engraving is a much easier medium (in both dissemination and exec ution) for the articulation of textual information than oil painting. And yet, in many ways Hogarth' s narratives might seem very odd to the modern comics' reader in their condensation of information. First of course is the simple fact that the handling of time and the relations between images (transitions from panel to panel) function very differently from those of modern comics. In Making Comics Scott McCloud identifies six possible transitions between comics panels or sequential art images to describe t he apparent relation between them: moment to moment, action to action, subject to subject, scene to scene, aspect to aspect, and non sequitur 1 3 While modern comics overwhelmingly favor the first three transitions, which are designed to create dynamic, cine matically paced stories and short, easily digestible jumps from the events and content of one panel to the next, the movement from image to image in Hogarth' s narrative series seems to consist exclusively of scene to scene transitions, leaping across huge gulfs in time and space from one print to the next. In addition, any given image was overflowing with baroquely expressive figures and symbolic allusions, as if trying to condense several pages worth of information in a modern comic book or graphic novel (or an entire scene of a movie or play) into the space of a single tableau. Paul Gravett makes the interesting claim that with far fewer images and items of information vying for their time and attention than the modern viewer, Hogarth' s contemporary audie nce would have approached and appreciated the nuances of his work much differently than we do now, presented with the opportunity and even the expectation to "decipher and reflect on every element and interpret them in 1 3 M c C l o u d S c o t t M a k i n g C o m i c s N e w Y o r k N Y : H a r p e r 2 0 0 6 1 5

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11 their own way, imagining their own di alogue and scenario." 1 4 However his works may have actually been consumed, Hogarth' s entrepreneurial mass art gambit seems to have been an unprecedented success, definitively illustrating the potential of and public appetite for visual narratives and storie s that combined images with the subordinate use of text, and serving as an inescapable influence and inspiration for the next generation of early comics pioneers. Rodolphe Tpffer (1799 1846) in particular is regarded by modern comics historians as a semi nal figure in the formation of the modern comics form, and he is credited with the first consistent use of the action to action panel transitions that have come to be the standard of the modern comics form. 1 5 Groensteen goes so far as to claim for Tpffer t he distinction of author and publisher of the first comic book, but while neither Dierick and Lefvre nor I are completely comfortable with that assertion, he is nonetheless a significant and interesting figure in the early development of the comics form f or his innovative use of cinematic breakdowns and devices such as montage, dynamic choices of viewpoint, and alternating scenes that some have described as being prescient of film. In a four panel excerpt from Monsieur Vieux Bois (Fig. 8) there is an obvi ous sense of a moment to moment, action and consequence progression of events not found in Hogarth' s work. Here, the eponymous protagonist attempts to kill himself (for the fourth time) by leaping from a window, is saved by snagging himself on a sundial, l ater resolves to abandon such foolishness, but is immediately struck by illness. 1 4 G r a v e t t 8 5 6 1 5 G r a v e t t 9 0 S c o t t M c C l o u d d e f i n e s a c t i o n t o a c t i o n t r a n s i t i o n s a s p a n e l s t h a t d e p i c t a s i n g l e s u b j e c t ( p e r s o n o b j e c t e t c ) i n a s e r i e s o f a c t i o n s ( M c C l o u d M a k i n g 1 5 ) A c t i o n t o a c t i o n t r a n s i t i o n s a r e p e r h a p s t h e m o s t c o m m o n p a n e l t o p a n e l t r a n s i t i o n t o b e f o u n d i n c o m i c s a s t h e y c a p t u r e a s u b j e c t o r s u b j e c t s p e r f o r m i n g a s e r i e s o f s e p a r a t e c o n s e c u t i v e a c t i o n s o v e r t h e c o u r s e o f s e v e r a l p a n e l s w i t h t h e a v e r a g e n e w s p a p e r o r w e b c o m i c s t r i p c o n s i s t i n g o f t h r e e t o s i x p a n e l s o f s i m p l e a c t i o n t o a c t i o n t r a n s i t i o n s

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12 Tpffer' s works are instantly recognizable as modern comic strips. He did not develop his craft in a void, however, and while he does not appear to have been aware of his medi eval precursors in sequential art and graphic narrative, it is clear he credits Hogarth as an antecedent and inspiration, and, like Hogarth, he also drew from popular broadsheets and folks prints. 1 6 Additionally, Tpffer shared with Hogarth an emphasis on t he telling of original, fictional stories (as opposed to the religious or journalistic content of medieval proto comics) and an awareness of the importance of the printing and dissemination of his work. Likewise, he aspired toward (and appeared to believe in his invention of) a new medium of artistic expression, although his direct impact upon other artists and the general public at large in his own century might have been far more limited that some comics scholars seem to think. 1 7 This is not a matter of a ny contemporary obscurity, either: texts exist on Tpffer and his works written in his century, of which there are seemingly two book length volumes, Auguste Blondel' s Rodolphe Tpffer: L' Ecrivain, l' artiste et l' homme (1886) and l' Abb Pierre Maxime Relav e' s Rodolphe Tpffer: Biographie et extraits (1899). Strangely, while he seems widely recognized and acknowledged in these texts as an artist, teacher, and writer, the actual nature of his artwork and any significant novelty it may have possessed goes undi scussed. Tpffer even makes an appearance in the Grand Dictionaire universel du X1X sicle (1876), in which he receives three columns, and yet there is no information present alluding to any use of text/image interaction or experimentation with picture nar ratives. In these sources, where his works are mentioned, 1 6 D i e r i c k 1 5 G r a v e t t 9 0 a n d G r o e n s t e e n 1 0 9 1 7 G r o e n s t e e n 1 0 9

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13 these histoires comiques' are described merely in terms of their narrative content, the humorous personalities and actions of their comic protagonists, with no attention paid to the originality or peculiarity of their graphic form. 1 8 Suffice it to say that however well regarded Tpffer may now be by modern scholars, even hailed by some as the inventor of the modern comics form, this seems a difficult claim to substantiate given that his role as a pi oneering cartoonist, however legitimate, was not very well recognized by his contemporaries in the nineteenth century, if it was recognized at all. Moving forward from Dierick and Lefvre s provocative conception of the history of comics as a history of in fluences and innovations rather than inventions, it seems important to call attention to not just who was the first to do a thing, but who was the most successful at putting what they were doing out into the world to impact the doings of others. Another d isciple of Hogarth and inspiration of Tpffer' s was the English cartoonist Thomas Rowlandson (1756 1827 ). Rowlandson was also a pioneer of the early comics form, experimenting with many structures and devices that that have now become commonplace in newspa per strips, comic books and graphic novels alike. He also beats Tpffer to the distinction of being the creator of arguably the first recurring character in comics, the mishap prone schoolmaster Dr. Syntax. Appearing in a series of isolated panels that pro gress from one to the next in scene to scene transitions similar to those in Hogarth' s work, the Dr. Syntax series detailed the character' s comedic misadventures in the form of disjointed but narratively linked highlights, much like, to use Paul Gravett' s 1 8 G r o v e L a u r e n c e B D T h e o r y B e f o r e t h e T e r m B D E x i s t e d F o r s d i c k C h a r l e s L a u r e n c e G r o v e a n d L i b b i e M c Q u i l l a n e d s T h e F r a n c o p h o n e B a n d e D e s s i n e F a u x T i t r e 2 6 5 F a u x T i t r e S R o d o p o i 2 0 0 5 3 9 4 0

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14 words, a set of holiday snapshots." 1 9 Each of these bear highly elucidating title captions, such as the consecutive Dr. Syntax Stopt by Highwaymen (Fig. 9 ) and Dr. Syntax Bound to a Tree by Highwaymen" (Fig. 10). Not only is Rowlandson' s Syntax one of the very first comics stars in what was to become a teeming galaxy, he was a highly commercially successful one at that, spawning an early merchandizing craze and being translated into Danish, German, and French to be enjoyed and appreciated abroad, the b etter to serve as inspiration for continental cartoonists such as Tpffer. As Dierick and Lefvre point out, firsts don' t necessarily count for everything, and Rowlandson' s Syntax might seem a relatively minor figure compared to later characters like Ally Sloper or the Yellow Kid. Still, the claim that Dr. Syntax is the first recurring comics hero of the mass art era seems notable and well founded, and Rowlandson' s experimental and consistent use of techniques such as word balloons and framed panels with di rect narrative communication between them, along with his fame and commercial success, mark the artist as a noteworthy and influential figure in the continuing evolution of comics. 2 0 The mid nineteenth century saw the rise of cartoon and caricature magazine s in Britain. Of their bustling multitude, a handful stand out, chief amongst them Punch which, starting on July 17th, 1841 and running into the late twentieth century, easily bears the title of the longest running comic magazine of all time. Punch is als o credited with the introduction of the word "cartoon" in its modern, comics related meaning to the English language with its July 1st, 1843 issue and the editor' s pronouncement of "several 1 9 G r a v e t t 9 0 2 0 G e i p e l J o h n T h e C a r t o o n : A S h o r t H i s t o r y o f G r a p h i c C o m e d y a n d S a t i r e S o u t h B r u n s w i c k a n d N e w Y o r k : A S B a r n e s a n d C o m p a n y 1 9 7 2 6 4 a n d G r a v e t t 9 0

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15 exquisite designs to be called Punch' s Cartoons." 2 1 The anecdote th at inspired this coinage is almost too convoluted to relate here, but suffice it to say that it originated in a satirical take on the earlier meaning of the term pertaining to the preparatory sketch for a painting. 2 2 With its broad class appeal and eye to comedic political and social commentary, Punch as its longevity attests, was a runaway success, and inevitably spawned imitators in the form of other weekly comic papers, many of them containing fledgling comic strips. Among the most significant of these derivative papers is the appropriately named Judy launched on May Day of 1867. 2 3 It was in the pages of Judy that the first true superstar comic s character, Ally Sloper, was born, written by Charles H. Ross and illustrated by his wife, Emilie de Tessier drawing under the pseudonym of Marie Duval. De Tessier/Duval is perhaps deserving of consideration as one of the first woman comic artists in the nineteenth century, but merits even greater recognition as the artist of one of the first inarguably modern c omic strips, and an exceedingly popular, lucrative, and influential one at that, Paul Gravett calling her, "the first cartoonist in Britain to make consistent, and highly experimental, use of sequential cartooning." 2 4 A testament to her popularity and recog nition even in her own time is found in Judy' s publication in 1873 of a 210 page album collecting her work, its cover touting, "750 comic sketches by Marie Duval." 2 1 G i f f o r d D e n i s T h e I n t e r n a t i o n a l B o o k o f C o m i c s N e w Y o r k : C r e s c e n t B o o k s 1 9 8 4 8 2 2 G e i p e l 1 4 : A t t h a t t i m e t h e p r e s e n t H o u s e s o f P a r l i a m e n t w e r e n e a r i n g c o m p l e t i o n a n d P r i n c e A l b e r t a n d h i s t e a m o f a r t i s t i c a d v i s e r s w i s h i n g t o r e v i v e t h e a r t o f f r e s c o p a i n t i n g a s a m e a n s o f d e c o r a t i n g t h e v a s t w a l l s p a c e s o f t h e n e w b u i l d i n g h e l d a c o m p e t i t i o n t o w h i c h a r t i s t s w e r e i n v i t e d t o s u b m i t t h e i r c a r t o o n s t h e t e r m b e i n g u s e d i n i t s o r i g i n a l s e n s e W h e n a s e l e c t i o n o f t h e c o m p o s i t i o n s w a s e x h i b i t e d i t w a s a p p a r e n t t h a t m a n y o f t h e a r t i s t s w e r e q u i t e u n u s e d t o p r o d u c i n g w o r k o n s o h e r o i c a s c a l e T h e n e w l y f o u n d e d s a t i r i c a l w e e k l y P u n c h s e i z e d t h e o p p o r t u n i t y t o r i d i c u l e t h e i n c o m p e t e n t d e s i g n s b y c o m m i s s i o n i n g J o h n L e e c h t o d r a w a s e l e c t i o n o f M r P u n c h s c a r t o o n s 2 3 G i f f o r d D e n i s V i c t o r i a n C o m i c s L o n d o n : G e o r g e A l l e n & U n w i n L t d 1 9 7 6 6 2 4 G r a v e t t 9 6

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16 In addition to her strip' s celebrated popularity, she was also a dynamic innovator of the c omics form, David Kunzle crediting her with the development of graphic technique and devices "which do not become standard in the cartoon until the late 1880s: vibrating contours to express fear; multiplication of limbs to suggest oscillation of parts; eff ects of shriveling up, exploding, discombobulation, twisting, unraveling, and melting of form." 2 5 In other words, "Marie Duval' s" work represents some of the first and most consistent use of stylistic devices that would become staples of both comics and, l ater, animation as well. An early Ally Sloper strip ( Fig. 1 1 ) most likely broken down and sketched by Ross and finished by de Tessier, demonstrates the type of slap stick action typical of the series, with much pratfalling, bum kicking, and legs flailing in the air above a chimney. While, again, when working within Dierick and Lefvre s framework of the history of comics, it isn' t very useful to speak in terms of firsts or invention when discussing the development of the modern comics form, de Tessier none theless is an artist of distinction in the evolution and popularization of the structures and techniques now iconic of European, American, and global comics traditions. The development of the comic strip in the United States was surprisingly slow at first, initially found in weekly humor magazines equivalent to their cousins across the pond, Punch and Judy These magazines included titles like Puck Judge and the first American magazine to bear the title Life The beginning of the modern American comics in dustry, and the start of a comics tradition that would influence all others, is found in a format of product that was given away: the comic supplement of the Sunday newspaper. A marketing ploy credited to Joseph Pulitzer and James Gordon Bennett, the rival publishers of the New York World and Herald respectively, the newspaper comic strip 2 5 G r a v e t t 1 0 1

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17 was born in 1894, and while it wasn' t instantly the globally influential force it would become, it already had something that the British comic papers wouldn' t have until September of 1896: color. 2 6 This technical innovation would soon be complemented by the invention of the first American comics star, a character that would ultimately become the most popular of the nineteenth century -so popular, in fact, he is frequently mistaken for the first: Richard F. Outcault' s ( 1863 1928) The Yellow Kid First published in 1895 in the pages of Pulitzer' s New York World in a series of large cartoon illustrations fairly different from what we' ve come to accept as the modern comic stri p, Outcault' s strip was originally called At the Circus in Hogan' s Alley By the end of the following year, however, Outcault left the World and took the Yellow Kid with him (although not without some legal difficulty) to William Randolph Hearst' s New York Journal Here, The Yellow Kid would evolve in to a recognizable modern comic strip with frame based narratives and text delivered through word balloons 2 7 In The Yellow Kid and His New Phonograph (Fig. 1 2 ) the format of a proper American comic strip can be immediately recognized, with the action progressing across five borderless panels over the course of the Yellow Kid' s dialogue with the reader and then his phonogragh. Text is handled through word balloons and, uniquely, through the colloquially misspelle d captions written on the Kid' s nightshirt. The silly exchange ends with an appropriately whimsical denouement. Early, America centric comics historians casually made the claim that The Yellow Kid was the first true modern comic strip, but in truth, Outcau lt wasn' t really doing anything new technically (and much of The Yellow Kid s run wasn' t even 2 6 G i f f o r d V i c t o r i a n 1 5 2 7 D i e r i c k 1 7

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18 recognizable as a comic strip). Nonetheless, the strip was widely influential, and should be considered significant if for no other reason than that it is conside red significant. As I have expressed before, it seems a vitally important aspect of the definition of comics that they are an art form that has been designed from the beginning to be printed, published, and distributed for mass consumption. Herein seems to lie the catalyst of The Yellow Kid s success and lasting influence: it is better remembered than its predecessors and contemporaries due to its better dissemination in the pages of a major New York newspaper and was thus more influential because it was su periorly placed to influence. The success of The Yellow Kid and other turn of the century American newspaper comic strips, both in the United States and abroad, would prove a powerful influence upon global comics traditions during the twentieth century. As Dierick and Lefvre put it: "As the century went on, growing numbers of comic artists all over the world adopted and developed the form and techniques the American cartoonists used. The American model' became largely dominant, although other models survi ved and were modernized (e.g. [the European convention of] texts under panels)." 2 8 As the twentieth century continued, the America centrism of the development of the comics form would only intensify, especially after the introduction of a new format of comic s that would become synonymous to many with the art form as a whole: the comic book. Denis Gifford would give Outcault' s The Yellow Kid a pioneering position in the development of this format as well, with a five cent album of previously published The Yel low Kid cartoons and strips being published in 1897. By 1902 the New York Journal and other newspapers belonging to Hearst were marketing albums collecting previously published material of other popular newspaper strips at the then whopping price of fifty 2 8 D i e r i c k 1 7

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19 cents, potentially coining the term "comic book" in the process. If this is the case, these collections mark a humble origin indeed, not an exciting, new specialized format for the publication of a unique art form, but a cheap and haphazardly produced comm ercial grab. Their contents were chaotically arranged, with the constitutive strips un resized and scarcely formatted for their new oblong, cardboard bound homes, with only half of a strip able to fit onto a given page, such that a book of thirty pages wou ld contain only fifteen newspaper strips. The comic book had not yet realized its potential as a comparatively sizable yet easily serialized format for sequential art and graphic narrative. 2 9 In the 1930s, Max Charles Gaines would make over the comic book c oncept, still using it as a vehicle for the reprinting of popular newspaper strips, but properly rescaled to fit the magazine style format and more aesthetically aware in their visual and material presentation. 3 0 Here we have the origin of the comic book in its recognizable modern form, a format that is largely unchanged, as of the time of this writing, after seventy six years. 2 9 G i f f o r d I n t e r n a t i o n a l 3 0 3 1 3 0 G i f f o r d I n t e r n a t i o n a l 4 2

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20 SIDEWAYS: PARALLEL TRADITIONS IN JAPAN AND AMERICA AND MY OWN COMICS WORK My own creative work, like that of all modern ca rtoonists, is inevitably indebted to the technical and stylistic contributions of the pioneering artists described in my first chapter, who are grandparents and godparents of the modern comics form and the Anglophone comics tradition in particular. While I feel it is important to acknowledge the innovations that led to the creation of the artistic discipline that I here attempt to follow, and place my work within its proper context in the yet continuing evolution of comics as an art form, it is likewise imp ortant to acknowledge that my own artistic project draws from expressions of the sequential art medium both later and more recent than those of the eighteenth and nineteenth century western cartoon model, as well as some entirely alien to them. The more m odern influence is fairly obvious: the form and format of my project is heavily indebted to the modern American comic book. Identifiably emerging circa 1940 -the famous Action Comics No. 1 (1938) is an easy milestone to point to -and continuing to the pre sent day, the modern comic book might be defined as a short print magazine consisting of original comics material, frequently serialized and often in fantasy adventure genres such as super hero, science fiction, or horror. Comic books have been a profound influence upon my art and imagination since early childhood. However, while my own graphic narratives borrow considerably from the technical and stylistic devices of comic books (panel breakdowns, page compositions, panel transitions,

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21 inter communication be tween pages...), even in some cases borrowing individual genre conventions, their technical execution is very different from modern comic books in at least one significant respect. While comic books typically rely upon twentieth and twenty first century m ethods of printing and publication, my own project is executed instead in what is likely the oldest medium for the production and popular dissemination of mass and sequential art: the woodcut. The woodcut fell into disfavor as a medium for fine art in West ern Europe in the fifteenth century with the invention and proliferation of intaglio printing, and further lost its primacy as a means of image reproduction following the European discovery of the movable type press. Nonetheless, it continued in the West i n book illustrations and the folk art of the lower classes even into the nineteenth century, where it appeared in such incarnations as the covers of penny part novels (' penny dreadfuls' ). 3 1 In pre Meiji Japan, however, woodcut printing never became obsolete due to advances in printing technology, and even served the function of the moveable type press, as that form of printing was not introduced there until well into the modern era. Instead, a sophisticated tradition of sequential art and graphic narratives based in the printed woodblock image developed that is in many ways comparable to modern comics. This indigenous graphic narrative tradition easily transferred to a native comics tradition through cultural exchange with the West during the late nineteenth and twentieth centur ies and these manga would in turn make a powerful impact on the western comic s traditions and artists that I have found myself influenced by in turn. 3 1 C a r p e n t e r K e v i n P e n n y D r e a d f u l s a n d C o m i c s : E n g l i s h P i c t o r i a l s f o r C h i l d r e n f r o m V i c t o r i a n T i m e s t o t h e P r e s e n t V i c t o r i a a n d A l b e r t M u s e u m 1 9 8 3 5

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22 In the beginning, however, Japan' s native graphic narrative tradition was very simila r to its medieval contemporary, the illuminated manuscript in Europe. These picture scrolls, or emakimono, could be up to eighty feet in length, and featured hand drawn brush and ink illustrations that, rather than being divided between individual panels o r frames, literally unfolded in a narrative progression through a continuous landscape, moving from right to left, with significant shifts in time, space, or the tone of the story demarcated by symbolic devices such as a swirl of mist or a line of drifting leaves, devices that would continue into later forms of graphic narrative, in cluding manga, and through manga into modern western comics. The most famous extant examples of these emakimono are the Animal Scrolls(Ch j giga) of Toba (1053 1140) (Fig. 13 ) an artist whose name would become synonymous with Japanese cartoon images (Toba e). Toba' s emakimono show anthropomorphized animals parodying the leisurely lifest yles of priests and aristocracy. L ike the medieval European illuminated manuscript, it was precisely the leisurely tastes and hobbies of the upper classes that made picture scrolls such as the Ch j giga possible. Such a rare and prestigious work of art was not available for the perusal of the general populace, and might have been intended for the enjoyment of a few dozen members of the privileged upper echelons of society, at most. 3 2 During the Edo Period (1603 1868), however, the popularization of woodblock printing as a means of visual reprod uction brought not only art but an emergent tradition of sequential art and graphic narratives to the masses. One of the earliest forms w as akahon (literally "red books"), popular picture books of hand drawn or woodblock 3 2 I t o K i n k o M a n g a i n J a p a n e s e H i s t o r y M a c W i l l i a m s M a r k W e d J a p a n e s e V i s u a l C u l t u r e : E x p l o r a t i o n s i n t h e W o r l d o f M a n g a a n d A n i m e A r m o n k N Y : M E S h a r p e 2 0 0 8 2 6 8 a n d S c h o d t F r e d e r i k L M a n g a M a n g a T h e W o r l d o f J a p a n e s e C o m i c s T o k y o N e w Y o r k a n d S a n F r a n c i s c o : K o d a n s h a I n t e r n a t i o n a l 1 9 8 3 2 8 2 9

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23 printed illustrations containing fa mous fairy stories and folk tales initially accompanied by text but eventually consisting entirely of images. Frederik Schodt argues that a related form, the kiby shi (by contrast, "yellow covered book"), which consisted of frequently hand painted, text ac companied social satire similar to contemporary Western cartoons, represent a form of early comic book and direct antecedent to modern manga. Together with the ukiyo e genre of paintings and woodblock prints, often sophisticated series of images (in the ma nner of sequential art) depicting wandering landscapes, dramatic scenes from history or literature, or the exploits and misadventures of famous actors, athletes, and courtesans, these picture books could be seen as part of a parallel evolution of comics, a t once mirroring and in some respects far in advance of contemporary Western forms of graphic narrative. It is something similar to these Edo period picture books, combined with the modern American comic magazine, that I have sought to create in my own art istic project. 3 3 Arguably the first manga, and seemingly the origin of the word (which could be roughly translated as "crazy doodles") is the fifteen volume Manga of Katsushika Hokusai (1760 1849). Consisting of literally thousands of woodcut images, the H okusai Manga contains no text and little in the way of overarching narrative, but is nonetheless a seminal and vastly influential work of sequential art that has had an inestimable impact upon the national tradition of comics that shares its name, and othe rs as well. Hokusai' s Manga imagines an entire fantastic world, containing, as Ary Renan listed at the end of the nineteenth century, "dragons, reptiles, recluses working miracles, wrestling contests, semi human monsters... chaotic landscapes and hideous c ombinations of the elements evolved in a delirium unknown to us, theatrical scenes, romantic pictures, wondrous 3 3 I t o 2 8 a n d S c h o d t 3 6

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24 studies of movement... mythological figures that make the flesh creep 3 4 Although Renan could hardly have imagined it his description is like wise applicable to numerous modern Japanese manga today, and is very similar to how one might describe the contents of a great many American comic books in their multiplying fantastic genres. In a typically fantastical scene (Fig. 14 ) a number of men acro ss two plates explore an underwater world by means alternately mundane and unlikely -swimming, diving, being lowered in jars, and in one instance attempting to ride a horse Clearly the Japanese did not need the model provided by contact with American fan tasy adventure comics after the war in order to inspire the fantastic stories that are iconic of their national comics tradition, having a long established predisposition toward graphic narratives depicting fantasy and adventure. The Edo period, characteri zed in the arts by this flourishing of uniquely Japanese sequential art forms, was also characterized by political isolation, but by the second half of the nineteenth century, Japan' s native artistic traditions were no longer untouched by western influence s. In 1853, American Commodore Matthew C. Perry ended more than two centuries of Japanese seclusion from the outside world and in so doing brought an end to a long chapter in Japan' s art and culture, opening a wider world of artistic possibilities in both Japan and the West. By the dawn of the Meiji Period (1868 1912), the common consensus was that the prints and other traditional art forms of Japan, sequential and otherwise, had entered a period of stasis and decadence, and the artworks displayed at the Ex positition Universelle in Paris in 1867, images that would fire Western imaginations and revolutionize the arts of the late nineteenth century, were considered 3 4 N a p i e r S u s a n J o l l i f f e F r o m I m p r e s s i o n i s m t o a n i m e : J a p a n a s f a n t a s y a n d f a n c u l t i n t h e m i n d o f t h e W e s t N e w Y o r k : P a l g r a v e M a c m i l l a n 2 0 0 7 3 7

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25 pale imitations of the ukiyo e pictures of a century before. This new era of cultural exchange w ould see dynamic transformations and new forms of expression in the arts of both Japan and the West, sequential art forms (and, indeed, comics) among them. 3 5 European technologies of printing came to replace the traditional woodblock method even for native artists as part of a sweeping wave of Westernization intended to create an internationally competitive, modern' Japan. Perhaps the most significant figure in this new era of Japanese sequential art (and the first true indigenous Japanese comics, as an ina rguable extension of the modern Western comics model) is Rakuten Kitazawa (1876 1955) Inspired by Outcault' s work and other American newspaper cartoons, Rakuten created what Schodt credits as the first serialized Japanese comic strip with regular characte rs Tag osaku to Mokub # no T ky Kembutsu ("Tagosako and Mokub # Sightseeing in Tokyo") in 1902 in the Sunday comics s upplement of Jiji shimp (Fig 15 ). He is also credited as the first to popularize the word manga as a name for comics. Rakuten' s early manga lacked many of the technical devices that we typically associate with Western comics and modern Japanese manga, such as word balloons (perhaps ironically, as an independently evolved equivalent of word balloons does appear with some frequency in the ukiyo e prin ts of the Edo period), and their style seems a curious blend of the traditional Japanese brush and ink drawing style and that of contemporary western cartoons and newspaper strips. 3 6 What we now recognize as the characteristic stylistic traits of modern ma nga and the national style' of Japan, as well as manga' s characteristic modern form and content, 3 5 I t o 2 9 3 6 I t o 3 2 M a c W i l l i a m s M a r k W e d J a p a n e s e V i s u a l C u l t u r e : E x p l o r a t i o n s i n t h e W o r l d o f M a n g a a n d A n i m e A r m o n k N Y : M E S h a r p e 2 0 0 8 1 1 M i k h a i l o v a Y u l i a I n t e l l e c t u a l s C a r t o o n s a n d N a t i o n a l i s m d u r i n g t h e R u s s o J a p a n e s e W a r M a c W i l l i a m s M a r k W e d J a p a n e s e V i s u a l C u l t u r e : E x p l o r a t i o n s i n t h e W o r l d o f M a n g a a n d A n i m e A r m o n k N Y : M E S h a r p e 2 0 0 8 1 6 4 1 6 5 a n d S c h o d t 4 2

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26 would be produced during a second period of even more extensive contact with the West, the American occupation following World War II. Here, a combination of the bold and dynamic four color adventure genres of contemporary American comic books and the preexisting Japanese taste for the fantastic stories occurred Likewise the stylized cartoon aesthetics of these comics and American animation were combined with the expressively schematized aesthetics of tradi tional Japanese artistic styles. T he modern manga emerged, as typified by the pioneering work of Osamu Tezuka (1928 1989), "god of manga 3 7 An excerpt from the first volume of Tezuka' s Astro Boy (Fig 16 ) is representative of characteristics that remain iconic of the manga tradition, containing a light, plush schematization reminiscent of Walt Disney and a sensitivity to detail and nuance in the same vein as the Ukiyo e artists of the Edo period. M anga feature d (and continue to feature) many of the same genres of contemporary, mid twentieth century American comic books: comedy, fantasy, horror, romance, science fiction, and historical adventures, be these starring cowboys or samurai. Curiously, the only major g enre of American comic book to have never gained popularity in Japan and spawned a proper indigenous equivalent is that of the super hero figure, the genre that has come to dominate American comic books in the past forty years, almost to the exclusion of a ll others. While the modern Japanese manga may owe much of its form and many of the themes of its content to Western and particularly American models (if not without considerable influence from preexisting native traditions), this cultural exchange of seq uential art form s and comic styles has not been entirely one sided. Certainly since the 1990s, as manga has become an increasingly visible presence in comic shops and, in 3 7 M c C l o u d S c o t t M a k i n g C o m i c s N e w Y o r k N Y : H a r p e r 2 0 0 6 2 1 8

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27 recent years, major chain bookstores on American shores, its influence has become inc reasingly visible as well in the artistic styles and compositions of American graphic novels, mainstream comic books and especially webcomics. Scott McCloud defines the salient features that characterize manga as a unique national tradition of the comics form as: the use of iconic characters, genre maturity, a strong sense of place, a broad variety of character designs, a frequent use of wordless panels and aspect to aspect panel transitions, the use of small real world details, subjective motion, and emot ionally expressive effects. While many of these traits have been present in varying degrees in Western comics from almost the beginning, they are far more prevalent and near universal in Japanese manga since at least the time of Tezuka, and many of these f eatures seem older. Also, McCloud claims that when manga first started appearing in noteworthy numbers in the United States in the 1980s, these features were largely absent from the contemporary super hero comic books that dominated the comics industry at the time. Looking at American comics, even mainstream super hero comics, in the mid to late 1990s and 2000s, this is clearly no longer the case. The level to which Japanese technical devices and stylistic preferences have come to inspire and inform Americ an comics is immediately visible in the work of comics artists like Chris Bachalo, Terry and Rachel Dodson, and Ryan Sook whose works have in turn inspired and informed my own. 3 8 In Bachalo' s work (Fig. 17), there is a stylization and sensitivity to detail suggestive at once of popular manga and traditional Japanese art, while its harsh lines and frenetic breakdowns remain definitively representative of a 90s American style. In the Dodsons' work by contrast (Fig. 18), it is the clean lines and use of devic es such as subjective motion, described below, that illustrate a familiarity with and influence by the 3 8 M c C l o u d M a k i n g 2 1 6

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28 Japanese comics tradition. Sook' s work (Fig. 19 ) contains aspects of both, with stylized figures rendered in clean lines with nuanced backgrounds and amp le use of aspect to aspect and moment to moment transitions. Perhaps to get a better sense of the specifics of the individual traits I am alluding to, we might look one by one at the defining features of the manga tradition on McCloud' s list. By iconic ch aracters McCloud means simply rendered and stylized figures with pleasing and emotive but schematized and, ultimately, nondescript features that act as veritable icons of person.' This makes them exceedingly easy for a reader to identify with and project onto. McCloud seems to credit this doe eyed and mouse mouthed style of schematization that has come to be recognized as the Japanese national style for comics and animation to Osamu Tezuka, who was drawing in turn from the comics and animation of early tw entieth century America. However, one could also interpret a similar iconic effect in the expressionistically rendered figures depicted in the ukiyo e prints of artists such as Hiroshige, Kunisada, or Utagawa Kuniyoshi, where individual figures are stylize d in such a way as to render them similarly nondescript and ambiguous, with very few unique identifying features, suggesting that manga' s quality of iconic stylization might be at least as much domestic as imported. By genre maturity McCloud means merely t hat manga offers works in a much wider range of genres, each with its own meticulously developed themes and conventions, than American comic books and strips in the latter half of the twentieth century. This period also saw a disappearance of the wild and cartoonish diversity of body types and archetypal forms of character designs in American comic books. Both were ubiquitous in the first half of the twentieth century and during the so called Golden

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29 and Silver Ages of American comic books (between the begin ning of World War II and the end of the Vietnam War). By the 1970s, however, more realistic,' draftsmanly styles came be preferred in the (comparatively) serious and dominant super hero genre in a misjudged effort to pander to what would ultimately prove to be a progressively narrowing demographic. Both of these changes have been reversed to a considerable degree in American comics in recent years, largely due to the super hero comic book' s oversaturation of an economically burdened market coupled with th e new technologies available allowing for the publication of webcomics on the internet and graphic novels through small presses. Many of the other stylistic features McCloud describes have also become increasingly prevalent in the past two decades. The s ense of place provided by highly detailed and atmospherically rendered backgrounds, the use of wordless and aspect panels to create nuanced and enveloping settings, and small real world details that connect with a reader' s real life lived experiences all c ontribute to both the reader' s suspension of disbelief and investment in the story, as well as a story' s verisimilitude and realism -traits to be desired in any form of fiction or artistic expression. Subjective motion a term McCloud uses to refer to the stylistic device of imposing movement lines on backgrounds instead of or in addition to on the figure itself, and the innumerable emotionally expressive effects that illustrate various moods and states of mind in manga and Japanese animation, both further cultivate this sense of connection and investment between the reader and the work. This is a value that American comics artists have found increasingly difficult to ignore in an age where their craft must compete with myriad electronic distractions.

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30 Each of these features can be found, to varying degrees, in my own comics works. My own inspiration is drawn primarily from American comic books, particularly those of the fantasy, horror, and super hero genres, and especially those of the past twenty years tha t show the clear stylistic influence of the sensual, expressionistic forms and textured, atmospheric compositions of Japanese comics, comic books with which I share far more affinity than with manga itself. In particular, I can say that my single greatest influence as a comics artist has been the work of Chris Bachalo on Marvel super hero comics like Generation X in the mid 1990s. His character designs vary from the schematized and iconic features of the series' protagonists to the wildly cartoonish and fre quently grotesque visages of villains and background characters. His lavishly depicted backgrounds, whether interiors populated by the clutter and debris of lived in spaces, or outdoor environments replete with odd toads, turtles, rabbits, and blowing autu mn leaves, invite readers to connect with their people and places and escape to them. Even as an artist breaking into the American comics industry in a decade where comic books were characterized by a conscious excess of spectacle, the dynamism and express ive quality of Bachalo' s pencilwork is still dizzying in its depth of detail and blending of the delicately beautiful with the bizarre and monstrous, and represents a clear marriage of the Silver Age, Marvel Comics style of Jack Kirby or Steve Ditko with t he shapes and styles of Japanese comics and animation. This is a style that I would follow in my own works. My personal style borrows less liberally from Bachalo than it might once have as I was learning to draw from X Men comics in the mid ninetie s, but like the work of Bachalo and his contemporaries, and in some ways differently given my harkening back to traditional Japanese materials,

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31 my project is stylistically informed by and seeks to combine aspects of both Japanese and American comics tradit ions. My artistic project consists of three of my own short comics stories, eight pages each plus front and back covers. The subject matter is largely autobiographical, drawn from anecdotal experiences that have occurred over the past two years, but each w as conceptualized and framed as thematically linked to a specific twentieth century comic book genre and borrowing from that genre' s particular conventions and stylistic devices. The images are 10"x15", a 2x3 ratio being typical for American comic book pag e sizes, and also the size of the historical ban format of ukiyo e print. The prints themselves are printed in black and white, an aesthetic they share with both modern manga and the earliest of Edo woodblock prints, on okawara, a traditional printmaking paper. They have then been hand bound in a variant of the fukuro toji tradition of Japanese bookmaking as I have gleaned the process from Kosanjin Ikegami s book on the subject, Japanese Bookbinding: Instructions from a Master Craftsman to create a stylis tic synthesis of the Edo period picture book and other traditional Japanese sequential art forms with twentieth/twenty first century American comic books and the Western comics form. 3 9 The first story, Boys' Night (Appendix I), borrows heavily from, and in part becomes, a pseudo medieval fantasy tale of sword and sorcery adventure, but this fantasy world' s status as fantasy is made at once clear and complicated by its relation and contrast to the mundane, real life' world to which is anchored: a group of co llege friends, based on myself and my former roommates, engaging in a tabletop fantasy role playing game. A male bonding dynamic is depicted, explored, and parodied as the characters imagine a fantastic world where hyper masculine traits of aggression and bravado can achieve 3 9 K o s a n j i n I k e g a m i J a p a n e s e B o o k b i n d i n g : I n s t r u c t i o n s f r o m a M a s t e r C r a f t s m a n W e a t h e r h i l l 1 9 8 6

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32 anything, but they fail in the real world' in overcoming the mundane intrusion of females into their male exclusive space. The style was largely patterned off of that of crude medieval European woodcuts, and it was this initial inspira tion that led me to pursue this project in the woodcut medium. The choice of panel breakdowns was straightforward and fairly conventional. With roughly half of the panels depicting a fairly typical fantasy adventure story, or at least a farcical exaggerati on of one, I wanted it to possess qualities of the sword and sorcery fantasy comic, and it seems especially fitting perhaps, for this story more than the others, that a story about escapism and men' s fantasy adventures should take the form of a comic book. The origins of the sword and sorcery fantasy genre can be found in the 1930s pulp magazine tales of the likes of Robert E. Howard, creator of Conan and the term was coined in 1960 by fantasy novelist Fritz Leiber to name the genre that Dennis Gifford de scribes as one where "near naked mortals wield their blood stained weapons against the forces of evil, set in a misty, distant land in a distant, misty age." However, Gifford also credits the first appearance of the genre in comics form to the first advent ure of the Mighty Thor i n Journey into Mystery No. 83, August 1962, scripted by Stan Lee and drawn by Jack Kirby, the two creators of The Fantastic Four The Incredible Hulk and The X Men among others. Given that this first fantasy adventure story was se t in a contemporary setting and featured the protagonist repelling Stone Men from Saturn, the early conventions of sword and sorcery as a comics genre were closely tied to those of the more established super hero genre, sharing its ripplingly muscled, gari shly clad heroes fighting inhuman and fantastically powered foes. One might argue that the distinction between the two genres is one of settings and terminology rather than their

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33 core themes or types of characters, and the frequent description of super her oes as modern mythology seems an appropriate one. 4 0 My own story is strangely similar to the early adventures of Thor in some respects, given its alternation between a more realistic, contemporary setting and an ahistorical, fantastic one. The difference I suppose is that my story might be read as making explicit that which is implicit in Journey into Mystery : the sword and sorcery fantasy world as an escape from mundane reality, even more so than the other pulp associated speculative fiction genres. What b etter way to depict this than by making this a story about a story being told in a tabletop role playing game? It likewise seems significant that the heroes' adventures are not brought to an end by the hands of any demonic creature or undead horde, but t hrough the intervention of nonparticipants of their fantasy in the real world' disrupting the players' fantasy space. Scripting this first story, more than the others, was a difficult balancing act. As Gifford says, "The many comic books in the S and S ge nre that have followed the bloodstains down the years have all been distinguished by their high quality artwork and low quality dialogue." 4 1 This is a problem of comics that extends beyond the sword and sorcery fantasy genre, but the distance of such a sett ing from experienced reality creates a fertile breeding ground for particularly egregious examples. Nonetheless, I can' t help but forward the hypothesis that this is the true obstacle between American comic books (and their fantasy adventure stories) and m ainstream credibility. It is not the outrageous images with their wild perspectives or exaggerated motions and expressions, but the dialogue, the inane, insipid dialogue -dialogue that must have seemed cheesy to third 4 0 G i f f o r d I n t e r n a t i o n a l 2 4 0 4 1 G i f f o r d I n t e r n a t i o n a l 2 4 1

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34 graders in the 1950s and, in many cas es, hasn' t improved considerably since. This is an obstacle I ran into in writing the dialog for Boys' Night : how does one make clear the difference between a pastiche of bad writing and what to all appearances just seems to be bad writing? This is one rea son why it seems an attractive alternative to leave the pages unlettered and let the visuals of the narrative speak for themselves. I worry, though, that much of the story where images are interdependent with written words for part of their meaning would b e rendered unclear and cryptic, which for me seems a more detrimental outcome than potentially confusing the boundary between looking stupid and being stupid. The second story, Tales from the Drive In (Appendix II), is a visual reimagining of the anecdotal experience of my friends' and my encounter with a strange woman late at night at a fast food restaurant styled after the established tradition of the horror comic book and, in particular, those of EC Comics from the 1950s, such as Tales from the Crypt P aul Buhle said that, "The chief contribution of American literature is horror," and taking a look at our popular culture, it is easy to find evidence of terror and the macabre as national preoccupations. 4 2 From the dark romantic authors of the nineteenth ce ntury, as typified by Poe, to the post gothic American writers of the early twentieth century, among whom H.P. Lovecraft seems to hold a particular place of modern eminence, to the films of Universal Studios starring Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff, the U.S. has a prominent and varied history of spinning horror tales. In 1949, the horror genre entered the American comic book in full force when Al Feldstein wrote and drew the first Crypt Keeper and Vault Keeper hosted strips in the pages of two of EC' s crime genre comic books. Within six months, Crime Patrol and War 4 2 G i f f o r d I n t e r n a t i o n a l 1 8 4

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35 Against Crime were gone, replaced by The Crypt of Terror (later Tales from the Crypt ) and The Vault of Horror and EC' s only western genre title, Gunslinger became The Haunt of Fear hosted by th e Old Witch. These twisted morality tales became outrageously popular overnight, and in the early 1950s, the American comic book market became dominated by lurid tales of thrills, chills, and disembodied heads. While it seems clear in retrospect that EC' s horror tales were intended for a slightly more mature audience, most of their readers were nonetheless schoolchildren, who constituted the predominant demographic of comic books at this time. Parents and teachers were considerably less entertained, and ult imately, neither was the Senate subcommittee that EC publisher William Gaines found himself dragged before in 1954. Following what became a congressional attack on the comic book industry as a whole, the industry swiftly formed the Comics Code Authority as a self censoring agency to defend itself, and in a similarly swift effort at self defense, set to driving EC out of business. The formation of the CCA would have far greater ramifications than the end of EC Comics, and in more ways than one, one of the mo st creative and important periods of American comic book history had come to a close. 4 3 No horror comic books are quite as definitive of the genre as EC' s twentieth century illustrated penny dreadfuls. At an early age, I became fascinated with my mother' s c ollection of horror comic books from the 1960s. These were primarily based on licensed properties with recognizable names in other media, like Boris Karloff Presents Ripley' s Belie ve I t or Not and The Twilight Zone Although these were published in the p ost CCA years, and thus lack some of the grotesquery of their EC predecessors, they nonetheless followed as closely in the EC model' s footsteps as the Code of the mid 1960s 4 3 G i f f o r d I n t e r n a t i o n a l 1 8 4 5

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36 would allow. The absolute morality of more idealistic fantasy adventure genres is d arkened a few shades here, becoming more a world of black and grey morality, where there exist only bad people and the worse things that happen to them. However, like the tradition of ghost stories and urban legends upon which they are based, in EC' s horro r comics one can still see morality plays being acted out, but with the role of good strangely absent, the antiheroic and frequently criminal protagonists' labors leading them only to their just desserts, typically a grisly demise. The horror comes as the reader is led to identify with the protagonist and his or her plight, even though it is clear from the first page that this isn' t an upstanding person and they can have little good coming their way. Endings have a pronounced tendency toward ironic twists, although the post CCA stories are less likely to end in graphic death or anything comparably horrible. My story is patterned off of the feel and nocturnal aesthetic of these mid twentieth century horror comic books, although it is far closer in tone to the campy goofiness of the comics from the 60s I grew up with than their more lurid antecedents. The protagonists of the story, once again modeled off of myself and my friends, aren' t intended to be as morally reprehensible as many of EC' s heroes,' although they do behave harshly and judgmentally toward a total stranger. Said stranger serves as the story' s monster' or antagonist,' even though outside of the parodic context of the story, her actions are more absurd than scary. There is no twist ending resul ting in retribution and death; there is no real dramatic resolution at all. Tensions are resolved in the fashion of most curious encounters in real life : one of the parties gets bored or finishes what they are doing and leaves, with no moral message or iro nic denouement in sight. However, there are no shortage of stylistic flourishes to be found in these pages that are ripped from the horror

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37 and monster movie culture of the mid twentieth century. The front cover is closely patterned off of the EC model from the 50s and the covers of Tales from the Crypt in particular (Fig 2 0), and the back cover is a reference to the poster for the cult classic sci fi B movie, Attack of the 50 Foot Woman ( Fig. 2 1 ). My third story, Flight (Appendix III), although it may be less apparent at first, is a take on the conventions and stylistic devices of the super hero genre, only with the larger than life struggle of fantastically powered exemplars of good against evil replaced with the similarly dramatized depiction of a spirit ed streak across a college campus. It seems unavoidable in any treatment of the comic book form to discuss the genre of the super hero, and for me personally, it seems it would be a conspicuous oversight not to. Super hero comics have been a part of my lif e for as long as I' ve been able to read, at least. The world of the super hero setting, of course, is one of black and white morality, where good always prevails because the values and forces it represents are simply more powerful. In the end, the ultimate triumph of good is a foregone conclusion, but that is only because the forces of good labor endlessly toward their goal, overcoming all obstacles. The American adventure story is a goal oriented story: it is where you get more than how you get there that matters, and great toil should yield great rewards. In such a fantastic setting, by accomplishing great things, a figure illustrates that they are not just great, but good. Of course, an illustrated medium such as comics is ideal for the telling of such s tories and creating visions of worlds that functions by such rules, because what can be shown, in dynamic full page action and four color splendor, is limited only by the

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38 cartoonist' s imagination. In such a lavishly illustrated, fantastic world, nothing is impossible. That is not to say that this is an unproblematic approach to fiction. The hierarchies and dichotomies created by black and white ideologies have never once created a society in the real world that I would want to live in, and the propaganda p otential of such a fiction was fully explored in the second World War, as icons of the righteousness of the American way such as Captain America, Superman, and Wonder Woman were pitted against hideous Nazi monsters and vampire like Japs. Still, I think tha t the super hero is important because it represents a new and very American model of adventure fantasy figure; not some Conan in his mystic Hyborean Age or Buck Rogers' impossible space adventures in a far flung century, but a fantastic figure whose specta cular feats are depicted in the setting of our modern world. It is a fantasy that speaks to the unimagined potential of modern men and women now, and it is interesting that this becomes the dominant genre of the comic book in the twentieth century, a dynam ic, contemporary fantasy depicted in a dynamic, contemporary medium. There seems to be a tendency in several texts on comics that I have read to ignore, downplay, or deride the super hero genre in twentieth century American comics, but to me, it seems far more interesting to ponder why the costumed hero' s super ness' and heroics were so compelling in the comics form in the first place. Were these comics often puerile and simplistic? Inarguably, but the superhero seems to be a figure of profound and lasting resonance in the American consciousness nonetheless. Flight borrows upon many core themes of the superhero genre: its sense of dynamic action and forward motion, figures performing incredible' feats as they strive toward a clear and specific

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39 goal. Howeve r, there are no forces of evil to be found here, and how characters get where they are going should be at least as rewarding and interesting as when they get there. I want this to be a story that feels like a classic super hero tale, but about real' peopl e in realistic' situations, without the baggage of black and white ideological struggles or the necessity for grand actions resulting in grand things. This subversion of heroic ideals extends to the book' s covers. I have taken two personal favorite images from the canon of the heroic male nude figure, the Olympic runners of ancient Greek pottery (Fig. 23), and the classicized Renaissance forms of Pollaiuolo' s Battle of the Nudes (Fig. 24), and rather than their original, blandly ideal, identical figures, I have inserted the figures from my story, representing a more dynamic and realistic range of sizes and body types, to portray a variety of modern men placed in a classicized heroic context. The reason that there are so many fantasy adventure comics, I thi nk, is not merely because of any historical association of the form and genre with entertainment for children, but because sequential art has historically been the best medium for telling these types of stories. The type of events and dynamic atmosphere th at such stories seek to express seems best articulated through a visual medium, and until very recently, film could not accomplish the fantastic vistas that modern comics appear predicated upon. Some might argue that it still can' t. While I think, and I fe el that it has been well demonstrated, that comics can be an excellent medium for comedy, drama, memoir, and any number of additional genres, I feel that ignoring the place of traditional adventure genres such as fantasy, horror, and science fiction does n ot only a disservice to comics' history, but ignores much of the form' s strengths and potential as well.

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40 "The comic strip is the perfect medium for fantasy," Gifford tells us. "As with animation, anything can happen in a drawing; the artist' s imagination is the only limit." 4 4 It is this boundless potential for creative expression that we find throughout the history of sequential art, whether in eighteenth century Britain, nineteenth century Japan, or twentieth and twenty first century America, and it is th is history that I attempt to honor and continue with my own art. 4 4 G i f f o r d I n t e r n a t i o n a l 2 0 1

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41 FIGURES Fig. 1 Hiroshige an d Kunisada, from Famous Restaurants from the Eastern Capital 1852 3.

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42 Fig. 2 Hiroshige and Kunisada, from Famous Restaurants f rom the Eastern Capital 1852 3.

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43 Fig. 3 Claude Monet, La Cathdrale de Rouen. Le portail et la tour Saint Romain, plein soleil; harmonie bl eue et or 1892 1893.

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44 Fig. 4 Claude Monet, La Cathdrale de Rouen. Le portail, soleil matinal; harmonie bleue 1892 1893.

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45 Fig 5 Barron Storey, from "Fifte en Portraits of Despair" in The Sandman: Endless Nights 2003.

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46 Fig. 6 William Hogarth, Plate 2 from A Harlot's Progress 1732.

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47 Fig. 7 William Hogarth, Plate 3 from A Harlot's Progress 1732.

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48 Fig. 8 Rodolphe Tpffer, Plate 32 from Monsieur V ieux Bois 1827.

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49 Fig. 9 Thomas Row landson, "Dr. Syntax Stopt by Highw aymen" from The Tours of Dr. Syntax 1809.

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50 Fig. 10 Thomas Row landson, "Dr. Syntax Bound to a Tree by Highw aymen" from The Tours of Dr. Syntax 1809.

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51 Fig 11. Marie Duval and Charles H. Ross, from Some of the Mysteries of Loan and Discount 1867.

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52 Fig. 12 Richard F. Outcault, The Yellow Kid and His New Phonograph 1896.

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53 Fig. 13 Toba, from the Animal Scrolls(Ch j giga) early 12th Century.

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54 Fig. 14 Katsushika Hokusai, from Hokusai Manga c. 1815.

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55 Fig. 15 Rakuten Kitazaw a, Tagosaku to Mokub # no T ky Kembutsu ("Tagosako and Mokub # Sightseeing in Tokyo") 1902.

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56 Fig. 16 Osamu Tezuka, from Astro Boy V ol. 1 1951.

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57 Fig. 17 Chris Bachalo w ith Marvel Bullpen, Generation X #3 Page 19, 1995.

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58 Fig. 18 Terry Dodson and Rachel Dodson w ith Ma rvel Bullpen, from Generation X #53 Page 14, 1999.

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59 Fig. 19 Ryan Sook w ith Wade von Graw badger, X Factor #1 Page 10, 2005.

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60 Fig 20 Al Feldstein, cover from Tales from the Crypt No. 24 1951.

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61 Fig. 21, Artist unknow n, film poster for Attack of the 50 Foot Woman 1958.

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62 Fig. 22 Artist unknow n, ancient Greek vase, c. 525 BC.

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63 Fig. 24 Antonio del Pollaiuolo, Battle of the Nudes c. 1470.

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64 APPENDIX I : BOYS' NIGHT Boys' Night Front Cover, 2009.

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65 Boys' Night Page 1, 2009.

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66 Boys' Night Page 2, 2009.

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67 Boys' Night Page 3, 2009.

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68 Boys' Night Page 4, 2009.

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69 Boys' Night Page 5, 2009.

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70 Boys' Night Page 6, 2009.

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71 Boys' Night Page 7, 2009.

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72 Boys' Night Page 8, 2009.

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73 Boys' Night Back Cover, 2009.

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74 APPENDIX II : TALES FROM THE DRIV E THRU Tales from the Drive In Front Cover, 2009.

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75 Tales from the Drive In Page 1, 2009.

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76 Tales from the Drive In Page 2, 2009.

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77 Tales from the Drive In Page 3, 2009.

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78 Tales from the Drive In Page 4, 2009.

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79 Tales from the Drive In Page 5, 2009.

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80 Tales from the Drive In Page 6, 2009.

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81 Tales from the Drive In Page 7, 2009.

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82 Tales from the Drive In Page 8, 2009.

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83 Tales from the Driv e In Back Cover, 2009.

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84 APPENDIX III : FLIGHT Flight Front Cover, 2009 10.

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85 Flight Page 1, 2009 10.

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86 Flight Page 2, 2009 10.

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87 Flight Page 3, 2009 10.

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88 Flight Page 4, 2009 10.

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89 Flight Page 5, 2009 10.

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90 Flight Page 6, 2009 10.

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91 Flight Page 7, 2009 10.

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92 Flight Page 8, 2009 10.

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93 Flight Back Cover, 2009 10.

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94 BIBILOGRAPHY Carpenter, Kevin. Penny Dreadfuls and Comics: English Pictorials for Children from Victorian Times to the Present London: Victoria and Albert Museum 1983. Dierick, Charles and Pascal Lefvre "Introduction." Forging a New Medium: The Comic Strip in the Nineteenth Century Brussels: VUB University Press, 1998. Eisner, Will. Comics and Sequential Art W.W. Norton and Company, 2008. Eisner, Will. Graph ic Storytelling and Visual Narrative New York, NY: W.W. Norton and Company, 2008. Geipel, John. The Cartoon: A Short History of Graphic Comedy and Satire South Brunswick and New York: A. S. Barnes and Company, 1972. Gifford, Denis. The International Boo k of Comics New York: Crescent Books, 1984. Gifford, Denis. Victorian Comics London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd. 1976. Gravett, Paul. "The Cartoonist' s Progress: The Inventors of Comics in Great Britain." Dierick, Charles and Pascal Lefvre, eds. Forging a New Medium: The Comic Strip in the Nineteenth Century Brussels: VUB University Press, 1998. Groensteen, Thierry. "Tpffer, the Origi nator of the Modern Comic Strip. Dierick, Charles and Pascal Lefvre, eds. Forging a New Medium: The Comic Strip in the Nineteenth Century Brussels: VUB University Press, 1998. Grove, Laurence. "BD Theory Before the Term BD' Existed." Forsdick, Charles, Laurence Grove, and Libbie McQuillan, eds. The Francophone Bande Dessine Faux Titre 265. Faux Titre S. Rodopoi, 2005

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95 Ito, Kinko. "Manga in Japanese History." MacWilliams, Mark W., ed. Japanese Visual Culture: Explorations in the World of Manga and Anime Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 2008 Kosanjin Ikegami Japanese Bookbinding: Instructions from a Master Craftsman Weather hill, 1986. MacWilliams, Mark W., ed. Japanese Visual Culture: Explorations in the World of Manga and Anime Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 2008 Mikhailova, Yulia. "Intellectuals, Cartoons, and Nation alism during the Russo Japanese War." MacWilliams, Mark W., e d. Japanese Visual Culture: Explorations in the World of Manga and Anime Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 2008 McCloud, Scott. Making Comics New York, NY: Harper, 2006. McCloud, Scott. Understanding Comics New York, NY: Harper Perennial, 1994. Napier, Susan Jo lliffe. From Impressionism to A nime : J apan as Fantasy and Fan C ult in the M ind of the West New York : Palgrave Macmillan, 2007. Schodt, Frederik L. Manga! Manga! The World of Japanese Comics Tokyo, New York, and San Francisco: Kodansha International. 19 83.