Comics as history, comics as literature : roles of the comic book in scholarship, society, and entertainment

275 Pages·2014·4.27 MB·English

by  Annessa Ann Babic

Comics as History, Comics as Literature
Comics as History, Comics as Literature
Roles of the Comic Book in Scholarship, Society, and
Entertainment
Edited by
Annessa Ann Babic
FAIRLEIGH DICKINSON UNIVERSITY PRESS
Madison • Teaneck

Published by Fairleigh Dickinson University Press
Copublished with Rowman & Littlefield
4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706
www.rowman.com
10 Thornbury Road, Plymouth PL6 7PP, United Kingdom
Copyright © 2014 by Annessa Ann Babic
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means,
including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a
reviewer who may quote passages in a review.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Comics as history, comics as literature : roles of the comic book in scholarship, society, and entertainment / edited
by Annessa Ann Babic.
pages cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-61147-556-2 (cloth : alk. paper) -- ISBN 978-1-61147-557-9 (electronic)
1. Comic books, strips, etc.—Influence on mass media. 2. Comic books, strips, etc.—Cross-cultural studies. 3.
Comic books, strips, etc., in education. I. Babic, Annessa Ann, editor of compilation.
PN6714.C653 2013
741.5'9—dc23
2013034608
TM The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for
Information Sciences Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.
Printed in the United States of America
For those I’ve loved and lost along the way
and for those who still love me.
Acknowledgments
The old adage says that success has many owners and failure, one. In compiling
this anthology I have little issue taking ownership, or parentage, of what lies forth. I
hope that it lies somewhere between the two categories, and on that note, I also
gladly admit that writing and compiling a manuscript takes a small army of people for
completion.
The editors at the publishing house have been generous and receptive to me and
this project. Through a series of delays, everything from human error to Hurricane
Sandy, persistence finally won through. I thank them for their time and support,
especially Harry Keyishian. I worked most closely with Harry, and I am certain that
we are both delighted to see this project come to a successful conclusion. The
writers included here were a wonderful lot, taking my slashing of their chapters,
rewrite demands, and attempts at humor in stride. Their essays are passionate and
entertaining, so much so that in the final phases of edits, I endured nightmares of
Wonder Woman becoming a zombie. I thank them for their patience, energy, and
commitment.
Leigh Harrell-Williams allowed me to take over her dining room table, den, and
spare bedroom on more than one occasion. She never complained about the mass of
books, articles, and shreds of paper I traipsed throughout her house. She even
digitally retrieved an article for me when I could not. I owe her a huge debt of
gratitude for not balking while I terrorized her house in the name of comic scholarly
research. Tanfer Emin-Tunç has remained a mainstay in my life since our Stony Brook
days. She engages in my random side trails of conversations about comic culture and
comic characters appearing in Turkey and ignores the often capricious nature of our
conversations when I am deep in research thought. We collaborated on our first
book, and while we did not pair up this time, she has certainly remained with me in
more ways than one. Jen Zuniga tells me that she will read these works alongside
comics to her daughters as a nod to our long-standing friendship and thirst for
scholarship. Steve Mccullough also did some light proofing for me. Nick Bloom, who is
technically my chair, spends more time reading my e-mail and listening to my rants
than we care to admit. Accordingly, our random conversations have been a welcomed
aspect to this project. For anyone left out, I apologize . . . after all there is only so
much space on the metaphorical page.
That family of mine, whom wishes I would just write about something normal,
such as World War II or the Great Depression, deserves its own note here. The
Babics have always been a strange lot, and by dent and design, we are an odd
combination of error, humor, and comedy. I thank them for their continued support,
even when I know they are less than enthused. Toward the final phases of this
manuscript, my life changed from a single-jaded gal, accustomed to her own schedule
and path, to one shared with someone. Rich Willette tries his best to understand the
editing process, and he makes daily points to ask about my work. For his love and
support, I deeply thank him. My life is fuller and richer with him in it, and as much as
this work is a reflection of me and my writers, it is an image of his compassion, love,
and understanding for the wife who never stops working, rarely sleeps, remembers to
cook dinner but forgets to turn the coffee pot off, and leaves the dirty laundry for him
to wash.
Finally, as with every manuscript I have completed, loss has been associated
with it. Sometimes life has dark paths that never fully make sense. For those I have
lost in the course and phases of this project, a part of it will always be marked by
them and for them.

Annessa Ann Babic
Astoria, New York
Introduction
Annessa Ann Babic,
New York Institute of Technology
When I was in middle school, my best friend had a disturbingly strong affection
for comic books. Okay, so maybe it was not all that disturbing, but I never understood
his fascination with the pages and stories of superheroes and villains. I saw his books
as pages riddled with comically clad and multicolored figures with unbelievable
storylines. Even then, at the not-so-tender age of thirteen or so, I rolled my eyes at
the skintight costumes, the fainting women, the body proportions of said women, and,
in general, at the comic character. Men in tights and women acting as second chair
just did not appeal to me. Yet, Steve continued to push his comics my way, beg me to
read them, get frustrated when I just did not get them in the same way that he did,
and tell me about them. Steve may have been my comic book connection in middle
school, but he was not my only one. My older brother and I had once—or twice—
decided to play Wonder Woman and Batman. I, even at younger ages than thirteen,
refused to be predictable, and I played Batman. I remember draping a blanket over
my shoulders for a cape, and he donned red running shorts and wielded a garbage
can lid as his shield, with a rope tied to his hip for a lasso. Jumping off the garage
roof landed us in the soft-tilled soil of the garden, so we luckily did not break any
bones . . . though a few plants may have met their maker along the way. Even with
these moments of comic book glory, I never read comics in my formative years.
Instead, I became a comic book reader by default.
While researching female patriotic iconography in graduate school, my paths
crossed with Wonder Woman, and I suddenly found myself reading golden age
Wonder Woman stories by the dozens. I have now read almost all the issues (from
conception to the early 1970s), histories, and general comic book overviews. Yet, in
the midst of all this information, comics still remain on the fringes of popular culture,
and readers, researchers, and nonreaders are still left to wonder what constitutes
comic books, what makes their longevity, and what are the layers within them. In the
spring of 2008, I taught an honors course on comic book history, and the question
“What is the comic book?” continually peppered our lively conversations. The group of
fifteen students ranged from avid comic book fans—mostly of X-Men, Spiderman,
and the Justice League characters—to two students who had never picked up a
comic in their lives. These students were apt to admit what they did know and did not.
I particularly remember when two of them came to class after having visited their first
comic book shop—specifically, their glee at what they found. However, they did ask
me how I managed the comic shop world with the “comic geeks” and diehard fans. I
was brutally honest. Sometimes I boded well inside the deepest bowels of the shops,
and sometimes my gender, appearance, and purpose for comics kept me on the
edge of the social network within these walls. Yet, within these group conversations,
we continually probed the meaning of comics, what makes them, and what they are.
These questions and conversations are what brought me to compile this reader,
which takes another look at comics—American and European—to put them within a
political, social, and constructive context. Chapters on the gendered, racial, and
political definitions within comics will bring us one step closer to bridging the gaps in
literature and history on this discursive mainstay of popular culture.
The image of the comic book reader still stands as a young teen or socially
outcast older individual; the reader is predominantly male; and comic book readers in
general are often closely associated with gamers or role-players. Comic shops
usually have Dungeons and Dragons players who meet weekly or more often, and
store regulars can intimidate the novice comic shopper with their knowledge of
superheroes, villains, and book editions. The popular comedy The Big Bang Theory
makes frequent use of comics, with its nerd casted characters, and Penny—the
attractive, blonde, non–comic book reading female—reacts with rolled eyes and
nonchalant understanding. These observations led to the question, what are comic
books’ place in history and literature? More so, how much of a place should they
have?
HISTORICAL OVERVIEW
Rudophe Töpffer, a writer from Switzerland, published The Adventures of Obadiah
Oldbuck in 1837, and his forty-page tale is considered the first known comic book. In
1842, it became the first comic book published in the United States. By the early
twentieth century, the genre began to slowly grow, with such titles as The Yellow Kid
in McFadden’s Flats (1897) and The Blackberries (1901). In 1934, the industry was
born with the publication of a bound volume of comic strips. Yet, the genre did not
really blossom until later in the twentieth century, with cheaper printing methods and
the growth of child culture. In the 1920s and 1930s, inexpensive forms of
entertainment rapidly captured the market—most notably, pulp novels and movies.
Movies quickly became a centerpiece of working- and upper-class entertainment,
which paved the way for comics.
Beginning with the publication of Moving Picture World in 1907, theater owners
were encouraged to embrace the new medium, and by 1913, the feature film began
in earnest. These early one-hour films focused on the female audience—mostly
middle class—because the ideals of social property, refined manners, and
impeccable taste danced across the screen. In the early years, women and children
dominated attendance at night showings in suburban venues, with men attending
downtown shows, and the mass of women attending these movies were dubbed
“movie-struck girls.” They often found themselves characterized as being fascinated
with the onscreen stories and narcissistic absorption of their own image. This
atmosphere of grandeur led to a mood of indulgence and relief from society and life.

So successful was the movie medium, with its escape from life’s troubles, that in
1909 the National Board of Censorship of Motion Pictures began. In the decade that