A bibliophile's guide to Bristol (and beyond)

The Bristol area is pretty ripe for anyone interested in second hand books and the like, so here's a list of my favourite places to browse:

The Book Barn

Located in Hallatrow just outside of Bristol is the UK's biggest second hand bookstore, a massive warehouse, with another warehouse purely for storage! You could literally get lost amongst the shelves as it houses books on almost every subject imaginable, some great rare and vintage finds, a small humour section, and a whole host of orange penguins. At the moment they are having a sale in which EVERYTHING in the warehouse is going for a pound. I'm already salivating. Check out the website here.


Curl&Bloom

Up at the top of Christmas Steps is this cosy little bookshop which barely has enough room in it to swing a cat but the shelves are packed to the rafters full of great second hand books and a pretty extensive section of Penguin Specials, Penguin Crime, plays, and poetry.

The Mighty Miniature

What used to be a regular feature of the more artsy market on Wine Street/Corn Street on a Friday and a Saturday is now confined to the market in the Woolworths Market on Whiteladies Road, Clifton most days of the week. Two ex English Literature students who've built up a mass of second hand books and also specialise in some pretty fantastic collectibles and first editions. I myself have picked up a lot of my orange penguins amongst other things. Highlights of my continuous visits to this stall include The Silent World by ( ), The London Nobody Knows by, and three volume Brothers Grimm collection amongst other things. Friendly and informative and well worth a visit.

Books for Amnesty

At the top of Glouster Road is this fantastic charity shop which has just started selling some comic books and graphic novels as well as housing a massive fiction section and a reasonable section of philosphy/feminism from which I've found a couple of interesting sociologial studies on abortion and girls education and attitudes in the seventies. Very friendly staff and nice quiet atmosphere.

Visit their website here.

The Here Gallery

On the corner opposite The Croft in Stokes Croft is a shop that specialises mainly in illustration, zines, comics and graphic novels, and literary journals like McSweeny's. Also sells handmade
plush toys, expensive wallpaper, cards, and other twee novelties. It houses a gallery in the basement which showcases local and national talent and the shop has been known to stock reprints and originals of such great comic magazines as Weirdo and Arcade.

Visit the website here.

(Warning: Can be a tad pricey!)

10 childrens comics that adults can enjoy

With brilliant characters often seen to outwit their adult counterparts, as well as possessing very mature neuroses that we will all recognise, the children's comic is often ripe with satire and political ideas, and should not be overlooked:

The Moomins

The Japanese produced animated series was a nice mix of cutesy idealism and freakishly terrifying segments which were genuinely unsettling to me as a child (Moomin turning into a hairless monkey, and the eiree pulsating white creatures spring to mind). The original syndicated newspaper strip however as well as being charming and dare I say it 'quaint' can easily be enjoyed as an adult for its satiric elements. Through the adventures of the Moomin family Tove Jansson was able to poke fun at upper middle class pretensions, the world of modern art, and much more besides.

Miss Peach-Mel Lazarus

A lesser known gem of teacher pupil comics by Mel Lazarus about a class of over inquisitive and boisterous who run rings around the adults they encounter.



Pogo-Walt Kelly

Long before the G8 summit Walt Kelly's Pogo made us aware of the environmental crisis with the classic line 'we have met the enemy and he is us'. Walt Kelly managed to make a 'funny animals' comic strip about swamp land critters into a witty and lyrical social and political satire that like George Herrimen's Krazy Kat developed a language all of its own which was inspired by Kelly's American-Irish upbringing (he has often been compared to James Joyce when it comes to his use of language). Kelly himself was considered a progressive independent in terms of his politics and was said to be against the extreme Left, the extreme right, and the extreme Middle. He was also considered enough of a threat that the FBI kept his phone tapped and at one point the U.S Government was in contact with a journalist who claimed that the eccentric jargon Kelly invented for his Pogo strips was actually a secret Russian code (this was of course during the era of the McCarthy communist witch hunts). Not bad for a mere 'funny animals' cartoonist!


Calvin and Hobbes-Bill Watterson

The classic newspaper strip by American Bill Waterson featured the over imaginative high jinx's of a young boy called Calvin and his stuffed toy tiger Hobbes who he sees as a living breathing life sized tiger. Inspired by the likes of Pogo, Krazy Kat, and Peanuts, the strip lends it's six year old protagonist a highly advanced vocabulary, mixed with a child's natural curiosity. Like The Moomins Calvin and Hobbes also pokes fun at the art world, through Calvin's unusual melted snowmen sculptures, pictures of dinosaurs in rocket ships, and pavement art ('suburban postmodernism'). Although being careful never to reference real people or events Watterson lampooned public decadence and apathy, commercialism, the pandering nature of the mass media, the flaws of public opinion polls, education, environmentalism, and much more besides. Witty and with a playful and colourful drawing style the eventual demise of Calvin and Hobbes left a gaping hole in the newspaper strip which would only later come to be filled by Richard Thompson's Cul De Sac.

Cul De Sac-Richard Thompson

This modern day newspaper strip is obviously good enough to warrant a praiseworthy introduction by the creator of Calvin and Hobbes Bill Waterson and follows on by putting sometimes adult voices into the mouths of inquisitive children who are as bemused at their parents odd behaviour as they are at theirs. At times wonderfully colourful with a superb use of watercolours and scratchy and erratic line work Cul De Sac is one of those wonderful rarities, a comic that will make you laugh out loud.






Peanuts-Charles Schulz

Charlie Brown is probably the most depressed figure in children's comics ever and perhaps sewed the seeds for neurotic confessional indie comic artists everywhere even more so than Justin Green and Robert Crumb. Charlie Brown was the ultimate anti-hero, his life a regular Kafkaesque roll call of disappointments. He couldn't fly a kite, kick a ball, or win a game of baseball but we loved him all the same. Of course this Kafka reference could be construed as being a little bit pretentious, but I wouldn't be the first to make it, just look at this satirical strip from R Sikoryak:

As for the strip itself Charles Schulz could read the little idiosyncrasies of children fantastically as well as giving them an almost pure intelligence and inquisitiveness. He mixed social and political satire brilliantly launching attacks on the Vietnam war, the psychiatrist gags and the interaction between Lucy and Shroader, and seemed to ignore gender equalities completely, the singular black character fitting in amongst them without question, and females playing on the baseball team. Not to mention that some of the animated films were pretty great too.

Krazy Kat-George Herrimen

The premise behind this classic 1910's strip is quite simple. Mouse despises cat, cat loves mouse. Mouse throws brick at cats head, cat sees it as a sign of mouses love. In the meantime the local police officer, a dog, tries to prevent mouse from throwing brick because dog loves cat. Repeat with variations. Of course the fact that the cat's gender was never clearly specified gave this strip an almost radical and ambiguous streak (especially considering the time it was created). Herrimen himself lived with a certain amount of ambiguity in his lifetime, being born to two light skinned ('mulatto') parents he often passed himself off as white, or of Greek descent, and he was even recorded as being Caucasian on his death certificate.
Krazy Kat is one of those few comic artists who have been embraced by the world of fine art who see the seeds of surrealism in his work and the similarities between some of his ever changing backgrounds and the work of someone like Miro are quite striking (it was also said that Picasso was a fan).

Little Nemo In Slumberland-Windsor McCay

Created by Windsor McCay (arguably the creator of the first animated film) the artwork for this one of the pioneering strips of early comic strips makes fantastic use of Art Deco landscapes, optical illusions, immense feats of warped perspective, lashings of colour, and an inativive spreading of images across several panels, as well as some spectacular larger panels.
The only criticism I would have of this classic strip, is that being so early, the use of narrative text at the bottom of the panel below the speech balloons would often confuse the reading order and break up the strips continuity.

Malfada-Quino

Similar in appearance to another famous cartoon little girl called Nancy, Argentinian cartoonist Quino's creation Malfada is a young girl with strong political opinions and a desire for world peace and a love of humanity. This is a strip is considered by its creator to be socio-political with strong family values thus explaining the stronger presence of adult characters in it as opposed to Peanuts which featured none (except for the omnipresent yet invisible teacher).

The Kin-der-Kids-Lyonel Feininger

Another pioneer in comics early history and a deliberate step away from the violence of other kids strips like Happy Hooligan etc. Serialised in The Chicago Sunday Tribune between the years 1906 and 1907 The Kin-der-kids is a beautifully coloured, painted, detailed, whimsical strip similar in vein to Little Nemo in which a group of children travel the world in an antique bath tub and use their various 'skills' (bookishness, huge appetite, strenght etc) to help them out in their adventures. Visually stunning and sparing and effective in its use of dialogue, some of the adult characters possessing strange almost malnourished faces.

10 magazines with great design (and content too)

The New Yorker

The New Yorker has always had close ties with the world of classic cartooning. Charles Addams, Gardener Rea, William Steig, James Thurber, Sempe, Peter Arno, Saul Steinberg...need I go on? However since Françoise Mouly (the wife of Art Speigelman, co-editor of RAW and the fantastic Little Lit series) took over duties as art editor, we've been treated to lushious covers by some of comics modern greats-Adrien Tomine, David Heatley, Chris Ware, Seth, Joost Swarte, Dan Clowes Ivan Brunneti, Richard McGuire etc. I'm particularly fond of Richard McGuire's playful optical illusion covers which force you to interact much more with the cover, turning it upside down, searching for visual clues, he comes across a bit like a cartoon Escher in these instances.


Mad Magazine

Probably the most famous cover of Mad magazine (and a perfect example of classically simple design) is the infamous parody of Life magazine drawn by Basil Wolverton to which the editors of Life took considerable offence. Some other great feature of Mad are the fake adverts, Harvey Kurtzman's hand drawn borders and the insides of letters which are insanely and hilariously detailed. Artists like Kurtzman and Will Elder carried a great sense of design in their art (Harvey Kurtzman pre-mad comic 'Hey Look' is fantastic), Elder himself was fond of sticking about ten different jokes (with fake brand names etc) in per panel. His later work with Kurtzman on Playboy's Little Annie Fanny is pretty sensational too (being in full gorgeous colour). After Mad Kurtzman's Help looked a little more like your standard magazine (Kurtzman had always sought to publish a big budget magazine) with understated photographic covers instead of cartoons and bold but relatively straightforward fonts. However it did boast some brilliant fummeti's (photo comics for those not in the know) starring a young Woody Allen and John Cleese. The John Cleese one is particularly brilliant and stars Cleese as a man who becomes dangerously obsessed with a Barbie doll, and Kurtzman's then assistant Terry Gilliam directed the comic, sparking the first meeting of the two Pythons.

Comic Art

This magazine edited by Ivan Brunetti really upped the stakes in design terms with it's last two issues. Issue 8 featuring a wraparound cover by Richard Mcguire and a nice pocket size book by Seth, presented with his usual visual nostalgia (in the introduction to the book done in comic book form Seth tells us about discovering gag cartoons and in particular the early cartoons of The New Yorker which if you look at Seth' s work you can clearly see he is influenced by). Issue 9 has another great pocket book 'Cartooning Philosophy', this time by Brunetti himself, done in his stick figure style

Giant Robot

Aside from great covers Giant Robot lets us delve into the world of kitsch and cute, from toys to comics to Asian trends. But despite this Giant Robot is much more than just an Asian and American-Asian pop culture magazine, and as well as reviews of canned coffee drinks and instant ramen packs it has also featured historical articles on foot binding, the Yellow Power Movement, Asian-American gangsters etc. This brilliant magazine is in financial danger at the moment, and need your help, to donate click here.



Little White Lies

A nice little compact independent film magazine which often themes issues around a particular film and has great covers.

Electric Sheep

Now switched to a purely online version Electric Sheep is another independent film magazine which uses illustrators and comic artists to bring a sense of design. Tom Humberstone being one such contributor.

Graphic

Graphic magazine is the kind of overpriced graphic design magazine that grows in abundance in London, but the new narratives issue I picked up (for a measly £18) features interviews with and reproductions of artwork by Killoffer, Matt Madden, and Jochen Gerner, and a great interview with one of the people responsible for the Orange adverts you see just before the start of a film in the cinema.

Raw

80's seminal anthology/magazine which came after Art Speigelman and Bill Griffith's Arcade. It had a changing headline each issue ('the graphic magazine that lost its faith in nihilism') and features never before translated comics by European and Japanese artists, and generally had a more artistic and in depth feel than Mad or some of the 60's undergrounds, yet didn't really loose it's satirical edge.

True Detective Magazine

Classic pulp fiction pin ups and painting 50's style, you can buy a big hardback book covering many of the main true crime magazines of this era here.

Mcsweeny's Quarterly Concern Comics Issue

Not exactly a magazine but this literary journal that comes in various shapes and sizes and always has a pretty strong design outlook came up trumps when it got Chris Ware to edit and design its comic issue. With a removable cover that folds out into a poster which is a mock up of an American Sunday comics supplement (the flip side is a poster by Gary Panter with extensive written references) it has gold leafing and the combination of its covers, end pages, title and contents page are down to Panter, Heatley, and Brunetti. The content is pretty spot on as well.

Comics and controversy

Following on from a comment I made in the post above, I've decided to compile a short list of cases of censorship, criminal trials, and even death, all related to the world of comics. The majority of these cases have to do with the underground comics of the sixties, a time where head shops were constantly raided for such material, and the export of underground comics to the UK was strictly monitored:

(1 The Oz School Girls Issue

I remember watching an episode of The Secret Millionaire in which the presumably well educated millionaire confesses to the camera about his expulsion from college, not on the grounds of smoking drugs or being violent towards a member of staff, but simply for reading and being in possession of what the college obviously considered dangerous and radical material, that is Oz magazine. Oz was a counter-cultural magazine started in Sydney Australia in 1963 which moved its based of operations to London in 1967. It was the famed 'School Kids Issue' that became the centre of one of the longest obscenity trials in the UK. The issue was a response to the criticism that Oz had lost touch with the kids, so the editors of the magazine invited a whole host of secondary school children (mostly all from public schools) to edit an issue of Oz. The image/s in question that caused the Obscene Publications Squad to clamp down on Oz, was an act of simple schoolboy humour produced by a 15 year old school boy: the pasting of Rupert the bear's head, onto the body of a character of one of Crumbs obscene cartoons, to give everyone's favourite British institution of childhood innocence, a sexual edge. The trial was pretty well publicised and defence witnesses included DJ John Peel, artist and drugs activist Caroline Coon, and academic Edward De Bono . John and Yoko even became involved forming the Elastic Oz Band and writing a song 'God Save Oz' (later renamed 'God Save Us' to minimise confusion with the US listeners) to raise publicity and funds. The 'Oz three' (as they came to be known) famously turned up to the trail wearing rented schoolgirl costumes and wigs. The result of the trial was that the attempted charge of 'conspiracy to corrupt public morals' failed to stick, however, this didn't stop them from being charged for two lesser offences, and being sentenced to imprisonment, the final nail in the coffin being the police shaving their heads upon arrival at the prison. A copy of the School Kids issue currently goes for between £80-£180 on ebay!

(2 The Trial of Nasty Tales

Another UK obscenity trial, again sparked by the reprinting of a Crumb comic, was sparked when an eight year old boy managed to buy a copy of the adult comic Nasty Tales at a newsagent, and his mother complained to the police (it was later revealed that his mum put him up to it). The police proceeded to raid the offices of Nasty Tales and made off with several boxes worth of the comic. The charge brought against the editors was that of 'possessing an obscene publication for gain' although as one of the defences witnesses (none other than Germaine Greer!) boldly stated: 'Among comic strips and comic books this is rather better than most and a good deal less insidious in its effect on public taste than Superman'. A similarity between this and the Oz obscenity case was that the prosecution seemed to jump on the representation of (and therefore encouragement of) 'perverse' sexual behaviour such as sadism, and (shock horror!) homosexuality. The verdict was an outstanding 10 to 2 of not guilty and Nasty Tales celebrated by printing a comic book version of the trial transcripts drawn by Dave Gibbons, Edward Barker, Chris Welch, George Snow, and Martin Sudden (a comic which you can still see lurking around on Ebay now again, and it's quite cheap at that!)

(3 The Pirate and the Mouse

In 1971 a group of underground cartoonists lead by Danny O'Neil were foolish enough to take on Walt Disney when they printed two issues of an underground comic called 'Air Pirate Funnies' in which they had characters that strongly resembled Disney characters (O'Neil had claimed that changing the names would dilute the satire) partaking in sexual activities and drug taking. O'Neil saw Disney as a symbol of conformist hypocrisy in America and therefore as being ripe for satire. This of course is not a unique case of satirising Disney see also: Will Elder's 'Mickey Rodent' from MAD magazine, Wally Wood's 'The Disneyland Memorial Orgy' spread from The Realist magazine, and even the Swedes were in on it at some point with Charlie Christensen's Arne Anke(*1). Apparently O'Neil was so keen to be sued by Disney that he had copies of his comic smuggled into a board meeting at the company, by a board members son. By the end of 1971 O'Neil got his wish and Disney filed a lawsuit against him and the other members of the Air Pirates for copyright infringement, trademark infringement, and unfair competition. The first impression was that they were going to loose, and O'Neil urged his fellow Air Pirates to settle with Disney and let him carry on the case defending himself. During this time the remaining members of the Air Pirates went against a temporary restraining order and published more material intended for the third Air Pirates comic, in a comic called The Tortoise and The Hare. 10,000 copies of this comic and Disney won a preliminary hearing of $200,000 and another restraining order, which O'Neil continued to defy by drawing more Disney characters. Other underground comic artists also began selling original artwork (mainly of Disney characters) in order to raise money for O'Neil's defence. The case dragged on for several years and finally in 1978 O'Neil lost the case (although they weren't able to pin trademark infringement on him) and in 1979 the court refused to hear an appeal. However it wasn't over for O'Neil yet, in mid 1979 he formed a secret artist organisation called The MLF (Mouse Liberation Front) holding an art show in new york and creating another four page Disney story, which with the help of sympathetic Disney employees he delivered in person to the Disney studios, where he posed at an animation table drawing Mickey Mouse, and apparently smoked a joint in the office of the late Walt Disney. Finally weighing up the massive legal fees and loss in damages, Disney finally agreed to drop the charges if O'Neil promised to no longer draw Disney characters. Opinions on what good this case actually did for the comics business and freedom of speech/the press are divided, and some people believe O'Neil set satire back 20 years.

For more details about this case and to see some original Air Pirates art, you can buy Bob Levin's book on the subject, published by Fantagraphics books, entitled 'The Pirate and the Mouse'

(4 Hector Oesterheld 'disappears'

Argentinean journalist and writer of graphic novels and comics goes missing in 1976 (presumed dead) and a year later his four daughters and their husbands are arrested and never seen again. It is widely believed that the reason for his disappearance is linked to the publication of a biography of Che Guevara published a year after his death and removed from circulation, with the original artwork destroyed by the Argentine government. Now I'm not exactly pro Che's actions and think the prevalence of Che's face in popular culture today is a bit odd (I love to quote Mark Corrigan from Peep Show at this point, where he calls the phenomenon 'the ironic verification of tyrants') but I think this is an interesting and extreme example of censorship and comics. Osterheld's work had at this point become increasingly political, (although sometimes disguised as science fiction) and he was also (along with his daughters) believed to be part of a leftist guerrilla group called Montoneros. Whether or not this political activity had anything to do with his disappearance remains to be seen, to me it seems a bit far fetched that he would be kidnapped and killed on the basis of a comic (Alberto Breccia the artist behind the biography was not punished) but when an Italian journalist asked about his disappearance in 1979 he was met with the reply: 'We did away with him because he wrote the most beautiful story of Che Guevara ever done'.

(5 Busted Jesus Comix

Another American obscenity trail and the first recorded trail to land a cartoonist with a criminal conviction in America. In 1990 teenage school janitor Mike Diana began producing issues of his own adult comic book Boiled Angel using the school's photocopying machines. In 1991 while investigating a Florida murder case, a police officer came across a copy of Boiled Angel and desperate for clues, phoned Diana to inform him he was a suspect, and requested a blood sample. The real killer was soon apprehended and Diana was not pursued. However the police officer in question collected additional copies of Boiled Angel and sent them to the State Attorney's Office where they went on file, and two years later the Assistant State Attorney came across the comics and sent Diana a certified letter telling him that he was being charged for three counts of obscenity under the Florida Statute 847.011-that is for publishing, distributing. and advertising the material. Diana was found guilty on all three counts, and was sentenced to a three-year probation, during which time his residence was subject to inspection to determine if he was in possession of or was creating obscene material. He was to avoid all contact with children under 18, undergo psychological testing, enrol in a journalistic ethics course, pay a $3,000 fine, and perform 1,248 hours of community service. He was also ordered to cease drawing for personal use, and his place of residence was to be open to inspection by the police, without warning or warrant, at any time, for illustrations violating this ruling. He was not sentenced to any jail time, but spent four days in jail between the dates of the verdict and the sentencing. To fulfill the requirement of undergoing a psychiatric evaluation, Diana was informed that the doctor whom he would see charged $100 an hour, which he would have to pay for himself, and that his evaluation would take two hours. After the evaluation, Diana was informed the session would cost $1,200 because the doctor claimed to have spent 10 hours reading Boiled Angel in preparation. Out of funds, Diana was unable to pay, and the doctor refused to give her evaluation to the court, effectively making him in violation of his probation. Diana was eventually allowed to move to New York to serve the remainder of his sentence and his legal ordeal inspired a 2005 off-Broadway play called Busted Jesus Comix. Despite all this, the cynic in me can't help thinking that the legal proceedings and the eventual conviction gave Diana a lot more publicity and acclaim than if it never happened, because upon looking at extracts of Boiled Angel, aside from the nice use of colour in parts, I am reminded a bit too much of the sex blood and shit shock tactics of Vice magazine's resident cartoonist Johnny Ryan (whose only work of merit in my opinion is Prison Pit Volume 1-which yes, is a blood and gore fest, but done in a manga style similar to Tokyo Zombie, which makes it acceptable)(*2) , and perhaps some of the gorier aspects of Ivan Brunetti.

(6 The Infamous Dr Wertham

No list like this would be complete without mentioning Dr Wertham's notorious tirade against the comics, in particular the crime and horror comics of EC, the summary of his ideas (comics as the cause of juvenile delinquency) can be found in his famous book 'The Seduction of The Innocent', which even if you don't agree with it, still makes for a fascinating read. Modern day critics like Bart Beaty have returned to Wertham to suggest that he wasn't as right wing as his most famous work suggested. He was actually anti-censorship, and did a lot of work on the psychological effects of racial segregation in school children, and was a key speaker for the defense in the famous Brown vs Board of education case to end segregated schools in America. In fact the main misunderstanding in the whole Wertham affair is that he wanted to burn comics and ban them all together, he just wished for a system whereby comics were classified as having adult material and therefore could not be bought by children. Whatever you think of him however, without Wertham and the introduction of the Comics Code (which he didn't agree with anyway) things might not have shaped out in quite the same way for comics as we know them today, the underground comics being a direct response to the kind of moral panic Wertham set in motion.

(7 Metro banned

In April 1008 Egypt's first Graphic novel 'Metro' by Magdy L Shafe was banned and all copies seized after the Egyptian courts ruled the author and the books publisher guilty of printing and distributing a publication infringing public decency, and handed down a LE 5,000 fine against both of them. The obscene content in question was the limited sexual content of the book which the author and publisher had tried to safeguard against by putting 'for adults only' stickers on the books. Arab Network for Human Rights Information director Gamal Eid said that defence lawyers submitted to the courts images published in daily newspaper Rose El-Youssef which were "more lewd" than the graphics in "Metro" that the court objected to.

(8 The Anti-Cartoon Legislation and beyond

In 1897 the advancement of printing creates a powerful surge of political cartoons, in response to this politicians in America create an anti-cartoon legislation to regulate political cartoons (the last anti-cartoon legislation is put in place in 1913). In 1903 the regulation of cartoons comes to a head when Walter McDougall challenges Pennsylvania's law forbidding the depiction of political figures of animals. His drawings of Governor Pennypacker, as a tree, a beer, mug, and a variety of tubers leads to the law's repeal.

(9 Those Danish cartoons

There's almost an air of 'the Scottish Play' about me posting about this, but I am of course talking about the twelve editorial cartoons published in a Danish newspaper back in 2005 under the heading 'The face of Muhammad' the most famous of which was Kurt Westergaard's depiction of Muhammad as a man with a bomb in his turban. The details are too extensive to go into in any great detail here, but the backlash from the Muslim community was enormous, with more than 100 people dead in protests around the world, and the burning of Danish flags, and indeed Danish embassies in Syria, Lebanon, and Iran. There was also a recent attempt on Kurt Westergaard's life. For more information on this, wikipedia have a pretty extensive account of the event (and if you type Danish cartoons into google this is the first thing that will come up) and The Comics Reporter has a regularly updated news item which follows critical responses. There is also a critical book on the controversy surrounding the cartoons called The Cartoons That Shook The World (by Jytte Klausen), which I will be taking out from my library very soon.

(10 The Beano and Ideology

There are numerous creative rights cases in the world of comics, perhaps the most famous of which was the Siegel and Shuster case for the rights to their creation of Superman(*3), but I thought I'd include a homegrown favourite here instead. Inc 1980 Leo Baxendale (the creator of beloved comic strips from our youth such as Minnie the Minx, The Bash Street Kids, and Little Plum) started a seven year legal battle with DC Thompson over the rights of his characters, eventually settling out of court. Baxendale wrote a book on the subject called 'On Comedy: The Beano and Ideology', and now runs his own publishing company (Reaper Books) and continues to self-publish his comics.

For more information, and a pretty good timeline of censorship and comics, go to
The Comics Legal Defence Fund

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(*1) Arne Anka was a Donald Duck satire that when the artist was threatened with legal action, he responsed by drawing a story where the duck had plastic sugery to replace his rounded beak with a pointed one, thus erasing the resembelance.
(*2) I'm not against blood and gore in comics, far from it, I just think there's a certain way of doing it that's trying too hard to shock us (e.g. the whole severed head doing something sexual) and as a result falls a bit flat
(*3) Another famous case of property rights in the world of comics was when Crumb had to pay out thousands of dollars when it was decided that 'Keep on truckin'' was an image in the public demain, and therefore did not belong to him.