Mad
Robot reviews: Humbug
Humbug
Humbug
by Harvey Kurtzman, Jack Davis, Will Elder, Al Jaffee and Arnold Roth
Fantagraphics Books, 476 pages, $60.
It’s very easy with a book of this nature to engage in wild hyperbole. “The most important publishing project of the year! No, the decade!” one wants to type. “There won’t be a better collection out this year!” “If I had to choose between breathing and reading this book, I’d choose the latter!!” “You’re a fool if you don’t buy this book, you hear me? A fool!”
And yet, how else to talk about a project of this nature, a large collection of work featuring some of the most stellar cartoonists of their day, originally edited by one of the most important and influential humorists (and I really don’t think this is hyperbole here — I’d put him up there with Richard Pryor in terms of significance) of the 20th century? Regardless of the bad economy, it’s got to say something incredibly positive about the current state of the industry that Fantagraphics sees publishing a book this massive and to a certain extent obscure as a viable financial venture.
- March 17, 2009 @ 10:00 AM by Chris Mautner
Sharing is caring: McCarthy, Mort Walker and more
OK, so I was getting a bit tired of saving up all the good art links and stuff until Friday, so I’ve decided to start to piecemeal it out over the week in short posts like these. Freaky Friday will still be around (assuming folks enjoy it) but will lean more towards the oddball and weird than the obligatory pretty art post.
All clear? Good. Moving on …
Mort Walker Mad strip
Mike Lynch shares some great original art from an old Mad magazine piece, which invited comic strip artists like Charles Schulz and Mort Walker to try their hand at “what they’d really like to do.” I actually remember this bit, but only because it was reprinted in one of those later “Super Specials.”
- March 4, 2009 @ 11:12 AM by Chris Mautner