A review by greeniezona
McSweeney's Issue 13: An Assorted Sampler of North American Comic Drawings, Strips, and Illustrated Stories, &c by Lynda Barry, Richard Sala, Debbie Drechsler, Jim Woodring, Bud Fisher, Mark Beyer, Gilbert Hernández, Philip Guston, McSweeney's Publishing, Jeffrey Brown, Kim Deitch, Michael Chabon, Dave Eggers, Lawrence Weschler, Glen David Gold, Charles Burns, Ira Glass, Julie Doucet, Chris Ware, Rodolphe Topffer, Milt Gross, Malachi B. Cohen, Sean Wilsey, Ben Katchor, Richard McGuire, Goerge Herriman, David Collier, Daniel Clowes, Mark Newgarden, Robert Crumb, John Updike, Kaz, Joe Sacco, Archer Prewitt, Seth, Charles M. Schulz, Jaime Hernández, Adrian Tomine, Ivan Brunetti, Chester Brown, Chip Kidd, Art Spiegelman, Joe Matt, John McLenan, Gary Panter, Tim Samuelson
3.0
I really don't understand how this book sat on my shelves so long before I read it. When I first heard about it, I wanted it immediately. But I was in a cheap phase, so I only put it on my paperbackswap wishlist. After a lot of patience, I finally scored a copy, but it languished, unread, until I put it on my to-read shelf this year to rectify the situation.
This really is an incredibly interesting sampler of comics. From the inventor of the form, through some classic newspaper strips, to an impressive variety of modern comics, it's hard to falt this collection for its contents. The only thing that grated for me was the editorial writing, which felt casually misogynist. Descriptions of female characters were exclusively restricted to reports on their figures (and not kindly, one woman is described as being the size of an upright Naugahyde couch, even though the actual drawings of said woman seemed not nearly so exaggerated, nor was her size every played derogatively in the printed comics.) There were some female comic writers included, and some "women's stories," but much of the text seemed to reinforce the idea of comics as a boy's club, which disappointed me.
I wouldn't say it was worth passing this book over for, it just could have been better.
This really is an incredibly interesting sampler of comics. From the inventor of the form, through some classic newspaper strips, to an impressive variety of modern comics, it's hard to falt this collection for its contents. The only thing that grated for me was the editorial writing, which felt casually misogynist. Descriptions of female characters were exclusively restricted to reports on their figures (and not kindly, one woman is described as being the size of an upright Naugahyde couch, even though the actual drawings of said woman seemed not nearly so exaggerated, nor was her size every played derogatively in the printed comics.) There were some female comic writers included, and some "women's stories," but much of the text seemed to reinforce the idea of comics as a boy's club, which disappointed me.
I wouldn't say it was worth passing this book over for, it just could have been better.