This Week in Reading March 2 - 8

The late but extremely popular Dr. Seuss, literary icons Tom Wolfe, Frank Norris, and Nobel Prizewinner Gabriel Garcia-Marquez were born in this week. All have certainly had respectable sales, but from now through the rest of the year, upcoming weeks will be filled with notables but few bestselling authors. You could make a case for the continued popularity of humorist Sholem Aleichem, referred to as "the Yiddish Mark Twain", and Ring Lardner whose humorous stories of innocent street types in bygone New York pleased magazine readers. Unlike Dr. Seuss, Aleichem and Lardner were known more for a specific audience, than broad commercial interest.

In addition to Dr. Seuss, the week also brings us three more illustrators of note in the cartoon spectrum. Howard Pyle drew and wrote adventures for young audiences, particulary his 1883 classic The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood, which is still in print. It was a "Hollywoodized" version of a legend, made easier for mass audiences to swallow, before there even was a Hollywood. It's been said that Van Gogh was a fan. Will Eisner drew and wrote comic books and small magazines from the 1930s to the 1970s. Then he created a novel length story told through pictures--a format we now commonly refer to as a graphic novel. Ronald Searle, an English illustrator with a delightfully twisted sense of humor, gave us St. Trinian's School for Girls as well as many cartoon cats.

This week's question: Which famous playwright and illustrator worked closely as an assistant to Will Eisner during his comic book years?

Answer to last week's question: In his 1957 National Book Award speech, poet Richard Wilbur spoke of the writing of poetry as a solitary endeavor, "an unsocial way of manufacturing a thoroughly social product." He also said, "Yet of course he is pleased when recognition comes; for what better proof is there that for some people poetry is still a useful and necessary thing — like a shoe."

This Week in Reading February 17 - 23

February gives us more super sellers this week. There are the mystery writers Margaret Truman and Ruth Rendell along with suspense specialist Len Deighton and humorist Erma Bombeck, all of whom were very popular in years past and still today. While not being a prolific writer, the unique timeframes of Jean Auel's books set in prehistoric times have always been in high demand.

Then there are the literary greats who also have had respectable sales beyond popular interest, Carson McCullers, Toni Morrison, Nikos Kazantzakis, and Wallace Stegner. As last week saw two cartoonists this week is shared by the two gothically funny illustrators, Edward Gorey and Gahan Wilson.

This week's question: There are several well known poets born in this week. W. H. Auden, James Russell Lowell, Edna St. Vincent Millay, and Nobel prizewinner, the Greek poet, George Seferis.

Which of them wrote the following? "No man is born into the world whose work is not born with him."

Which of the poets wrote this? "No poet or novelist wishes he were the only one who ever lived, but most of them wish they were the only one alive, and quite a number fondly believe their wish has been granted."

Answer to last week's question: The creator of Maus, Art Spiegelman, was not the first graphic novelist in America, but he was the one who brought the underground comic culture to the attention of mainstream America. His 1986 tale, drawn in cartoons, of his parents' experiences surviving the Holocaust actually won him the Pulitzer Prize. Matt Groening's Simpsons franchise has won him nine Emmys and his series Futurama has won him one.

Theories of Everything

I just finished perusing the new collected works of cartoonist Roz Chast, called Theories of Everything. This is a brilliant collection of the cartoonist's work from 1978-2006, full of the kind of deadpan observations and self deprecating humor that has infused and informed her work for the last (almost) three decades. It's a huge coffee table style book, chock full of eccentric humor and triumphs of the mundane.

I was first exposed to Chast's cartoons in the New Yorker and I have looked forward to them in almost every issue since. The nervous, shaky style of the drawings are paired with astute and clever observations about the human condition, with much of the humor coming from quirky, awkward characters placed in recognizable, everyday situations. One of my favorites shows a person sitting at a desk, staring at a computer screen. The caption reads: The guy who took a wrong turn off the electronic superhighway and wound up in a microwave oven in Davenport, Iowa. (Man’s computer screen tells him, ‘Defrost Wingettes 4:15 PM.’)

This book tickled me. I hope you will take a look as well.