I gave this link to Steve, and he said I should post it. I didn’t think it was of general interest, but, of course, he’s right. The idea is to connect everything, or at least make it available. Even if you’re not interested, you can learn a lot about the poster from the post. It’s the apotheosis of the editor; the post-modern form of identity. To wit: the Silver Age Marvel Comics Cover Gallery. Images like this one, by the late, great Jack Kirby, made an indelible impression on me, and the Marvel style has become ingrained in our culture. The Silver Age is basically the 60s, when Kirby and Stan Lee transformed the kiddie comic book through the power of cosmic radiation, inflating it to mythic proportions. Actually, they were middle aged hacks, but they had the zeitgeist something fierce. Kirby is (justly) more celebrated today; scripter Lee was also the boss, and hogged the credit$. I’ve done a lot of Kirbyesque drawings in my time, but these days it’s Stan’s influence I recognize in my work. His verbosity remained consistent as he swung from epic drama in King James cadence, to Jewish burlesque comedy. He teetered on the brink of irony, but the good guys won (though not without complications). I should write half so well. Not to mention he was churning out something like ten titles every month! I have a hard time posting once a week. He also taught me about alliteration, the history of which will eventually be an Arboretum topic (bet you can’t wait). Which brings me to this fine rhetoric site (note the tree style) where we can see that alliteration is just one of the many wonderful forms of repetition we have at our disposal. This bit of edification is offered to cover the fact that the real reason I didn’t want to post was that, after 30 years, I’m still embarrassed by my comic books, even though academia has by now embraced pop culture, easing the shame of perpetual adolescence. These kids today don’t know how easy they’ve got it.
Right on my brother, one of the greatest comic issues of all time. Look and learn chumps.
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- alex 3-15-2000 12:57 am
Right on my brother, one of the greatest comic issues of all time. Look and learn chumps.
- steve 3-16-2000 8:12 pm [add a comment]