A good coffee table book for comic book admirers.
Author:
Nicky Wright
What They Say
The world has never seen the like of the American comic book. In their heyday, the top 500 titles sold over sixty million copies a month between them. Nicky Wright tells the fascinating story of the rise of this popular art form, from the Depression-weary 1930s through to the decline that set in with the self-censorship imposed on publishers by Congress and the churches in the 1950s. Highly illustrated with a stunning range of front cover art and comic strips, iconic heroes such as Superman and Batman, and ravishing females such as Wonder Woman and Lorna of the Jungle, the book also documents the artists and editors who created them to provide a history of the industry that will enlighten newcomers and delight collectors.
Nicky Wright was a comics collector and writer/photographer who spent two years travelling through America metign artists and publishers, listening to their stories and phographing collections everywhere.
The foreward is by Joe Kubert, who was one of America’s leading comic artists and an editor of DC Comics for twenty-five years.
The Review:
There are few art forms more quintessentially American than comics. They are bright, bold, and larger than life. At times ridiculous, they nevertheless radiate a sense of optimism and energy that is so emblematic of American culture, and never was that energy greater than in the so-called classic era. In a scant twenty years comics went from short strips in newspapers to top-shelf magazines selling close to sixty million copies a month. The stories ranged from funny animal tales, Westerns, crime dramas, grotesque horror stories, and (my favorite) superhero adventures. Anyone who has studied the genre’s history even just a little bit knows that the people behind the comics were often just as colorful and unbelievable as their four-color characters.
It’s those stories that Nicky Wright is interested in telling. The Classic Era of American Comics chronicles the history of the art from its beginnings in the Great Depression to its near death at the hands of Frederick Wertham and the United States Senate. While not a comprehensive history, Wright does an excellent job of leading readers through the high points of this period, aided with gorgeous illustrations gathered from comic book covers and comic strip panels.
While the history is good, the illustrations are the real reason to buy this book. They’re bright and fun and provide a nice visual record of the progression of the art form. There were a few times when the text became a little too dry, but the pictures always saved the page for me and kept me from skimming.
Which brings me to my main issue with this history: it’s a bit too dusty and bloodless. Having just recently read Sean Howe’s excellent Marvel Comics: The Untold Story, I was expecting some sort of narrative underlying the history, but there really isn’t one here. It’s a rather by-the-books recitation of who was there and what they did. That’s perfectly fine, but given the colorful nature of the subject matter, I would have liked a writing style that matched it, even if just a little bit. This lack of narrative extends to the chapters, which feel unconnected to each other. The disconnection occurs around chapter five when the book switches from a predominantly historical organization and begins talking about “Good Girl” comics. From there the book changes focus to various genres, such as Westerns and horror stories and the sense of flow is greatly interrupted.
In Summary:
While the text is a bit dry and lacking a cohesive narrative focus, it does do a good job of outlining the basic history of this particular era in comics history and the illustrations included were superb. The illustrations alone make this worth checking out if you’re a comics fan. Recommended.
Content Grade: B
Published By: Carlton Books
Release Date: September 1, 2013
MSRP:$19.99