Last night I attended an event at the KGB Bar on the Lower East Side
launching Paul Buhle’s latest foray into the interrelated topics of
American Jewry, popular culture and the left-namely “Jews and American
Comics,” an anthology that ranges from Rube Goldberg to Art Spiegelman.
In an interview by Brian Heater of the Daily Cross Hatch, an online
publication devoted to the comic genre, Paul is asked whether he
embarked on the project because of his involvement with underground
comics in the 1960s. Paul replies:
"No, really, a lot of it is based on my growing up reading Mad comics,
before it became Mad Magazine. When it became Mad Magazine, it wasn’t as
good, but it was still sort of Jewish liberal and New York reaching out
to me, in the middle of Illinois, which was appreciated, but also,
Classics Illustrated, which we always called 'Classic Comics.' That was
the place I where I first read my classics. Since my sister, who is four
years older, taught me how to read after kindergarten using those books,
comics always had a really warm spot in my heart. Mad comics, because it
was so wonderful about showing what was stupid and hypocritical about
the coporate world, it was sort of like my book of knowledge. I wrote a
high school paper as a junior about Harvey Kurtzman. I got a B from a
teacher who liked me, but always thought that comics were degraded, as
almost everyone did think."
I picked up a copy of “Jews and American Comics” at the event and
browsed through it on my way to work this morning. As a fan of Mad
Magazine in the 1950s, I was pleased to see Harvey Kurtzman’s work in
Paul’s anthology. Kim Deitch, a veteran underground comic book artist
and an invited panelist who is from the same generation as Paul and I,
told the audience that Mad Magazine was not just a source of humor for
12 year olds like us. It was a window into broader culture. For many of
us, it was the way we were introduced to literature or film, even as
they were being satirized. For example, Deitch first learned about “My
Fair Lady” through a lampoon interestingly enough revolving around
radioactivity “on the street where you live”.
full: http://louisproyect.wordpress.com/2008/09/11/jews-and-american-comics/
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