| Reading Comics: How Graphic Novels Work and What They Mean by D |
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Customer Reviews: If however you are genuinely interested in an enjoyable book about something that should be enjoyable, then avoid this book. The first 30 or 40 pages are a struggle, filled with sentences containing “… comics I like …”, “I’d also …”, “… I’m talking about …”, ” I find …”, “I mean ….” and “I think …” making it one of the most egotistical pieces of writing I have ever come across. Doug may think he knows a lot about comics, but he knows little about writing. I lost count of the number of times he started writing about something or someone, and then stops and tells the reader there is more in a later chapter. There appeared to be redemption at around page 40, but it was short-lived and the book fell back into the “soapbox” style of the beginning. I didn’t finish the book. Maybe I should have stuck with it, but I tried flicking forward a few pages at a time to see if the writing style improves, but was consistently disappointed. poorly written Needed an editor to really polish it But it’s got some annoying flaws. Particularly in the first third of the book, it can be seriously geeky when it should be introductory and welcoming. You may find yourself stumbling on what seems like fan jargon or expert knowledge. I didn’t(and still don’t) understand the stylistic differences between Jack Kirby’s early and late work. But that’s the kind of thing Wolk more or less assumes at times. At best, the book has some wonderful visual analyses of comic panels and styles. That’s good, because most of the arguments require you to trust the visual descriptions. For a book about comics there aren’t nearly enough illustrations, and none in color. How about a companion website where readers could look at more than a few low-quality black and white reproductions? But Wolk’s writing style gets annoying at this length. The book’s trying to be academic and authoritative, but do it with a casual writing style. It doesn’t work. Wolk often writes like a smart blogger; in other words, like someone who *really* needs an editor with a sharp red pencil. For example, he’ll use annoying terms like “wave at” or “poke at” to mean “show” and “examine.” He has a short “interview” between himself and Mr. Straw Man which feels like a clumsy way of avoiding constructing actual prose. Or he’ll discover a new ten-dollar word (like “somatic”) and use it two or three times in as many pages. He uses cliched writing (calling someone “a god-awful hack”) constantly. Worst, nearly every page has at least two or three parenthetical phrases, which makes following arguments clunky. An editor would have deleted these as either truly side comments, or else rewritten them to be part of the argument. You might not be bothered by these things, though I was. They get in the way of reading and following what’s actually a pretty subtle and worked-out argument. Well written, informative, but title is misleading The author does a great job of talking about classic comics, authors, and illustrators. The first two chapters are also very interesting as they talk about the economics of comic distribution and how it has changed as more independent publishers have entered the market at various times in history. The last half of the book is made of reviews of prominent authors and illustrators. It’s hard for me to read reviews of music, movies, or comics since 15 pages of prose about Will Eisner or Frank Miller isn’t a substitute for just reading their works. Although they are very different, I would recommend buying Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art first, which does a much better job of explaining how comics work and what they mean. I would then read this book if you appreciate a prose-driven history of comics. Comics as literature Plenty of people view comics rather negatively as shallow entertainment for children. Certainly, if you look at the standard comics page in a newspaper, the few quality strips are islands in a sea of mediocrity. As Wolk points out, however (and what many comics fans already know), comics are just a medium like television or books, and there’s a lot more to it than kid stuff. The first portion of Reading Comics looks at the medium as a whole: its history, its fan culture, what it does well and not so well and what makes the comic form unique. Actually, the term “comics” is not really that great as many comics are actually quite serious; on the other hand, other terms - including the often-used “graphic novels” - have their own problems, typically either also being descriptively inadequate or overly pretentious. When one thinks of comic books (or, as Wolk annoyingly calls them, “pamphlets”), the one genre that stands out is the superhero comic. Wolk gives superheroes some acknowledgement, but wants to look beyond that limited area. The second part of the book looks at various comic artists and writers; often times, one person serves both functions. Among the more well-known writers/artists discussed are Alan Moore, Frank Miller, Marv Wolfman, Art Spiegelman and Steve Ditko. Other less commonly known names are also reviewed such as Hope Larson and Kevin Huezinga. Wolk’s choices are of generally significant works, but he is up front about his own biases in selecting material. Wolk sometimes come off a bit snobby in his discussions, but he usually keeps any elitism toned down. If you’re reading this book, chances are you are familiar with much of the work that’s reviewed and will not always agree with Wolk’s opinions. Overall, however, even when I disagreed with him, he provided good arguments for his views. If you’re a comics fan, and you want to start looking critically at the medium, your best introduction would probably be Scott McCloud, particularly with Understanding Comics and Drawing Comics. McCloud, however, focuses more on the “mechanics” of comics rather than particular artists. If you want to delve into comics more in depth - especially as a form of literature - Reading Comics does the job well.
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