Charles Schulz: High Anxiety
The following was originally done as a presentation for Art Spiegelman’s seminar, “Comix: Marching Into the Canon” at Columbia University in 2007. I think it suited Art’s humor to assign me to do the required audio-visual presentation on a cartoonist we both perceived as far from my usual range of interest. He certainly did me...
Toth, Internalized
Since I am precisely the type of brutally obsessive yet overly sensitive observer that qualifies me to write for The Hooded Utilitarian, I am unable to ignore a few references I have seen online to my “fannish adoration” of the work of genius cartoonist Alex Toth. Answering them also gives me the opportunity to address...
Toth vs. Kubert
In “Man of Rock,” Bill Schelly’s recent biography of Joe Kubert, the well-respected graphic novelist and former DC editor says that he and Alex Toth knew each other well from “way, way back” in the 1940s when they were teenaged cartoonists. Kubert is two years older than Toth, which may have seemed like a lot...
The Crisis of the Collaborative Cartoonist
Thought forms in the mind as a combination of word and image. For that reason, cartooning is a direct, intimate means to communicate subjective thought to a reader. This is why many of the greatest comics are by artists who write their own narratives. Still, it is rare that a single person can both draw...
The Unreliable Observer
Gabrielle Bell’s new book The Voyeurs will be released this month in the form of a handsomely designed hardcover with full color interior art. It is the first book format publication by Uncivilized Books, a small press imprint run by artist Tom Kaczynski. Bell’s incisive, often whimsical short stories have won her a substantial following...
