Comics and Metaphors

Comic books represent one of the greatest vehicles of imagination in the 20th century. I began reading comic books in the early 1980's and I still remember my first copy of the X-Men. The stories were dark. The characters couldn't always win. They struggled to know one another, and themselves. Not coincidentally, it seemed to have all of the right ingredients of teenage life. But comic books do more than that. When I was in my early 30's I began to appreciate a different dimension to writing and drawing graphic novels. One of my favorite complete stories was The Watchmen, by Alan Moore. Along with millions of fans, I read and re-read that story dozens of times, entralled with the narrative, the not so subtle cultural overtones, the hidden messages in panels and perspectives, and more. Then I was introduced to The Sandman, by Neil Gaiman and my whole world changed. Gaiman (and later Moore with his work on Promethea) began to clarify the purpose of comic storytelling. It wasn't juvenille. It was profoundly literary. I think I began to understand that a new mythology was being created in the modern world. I had read enough of Joseph Campbell to see some of the metaphors being lived through these stories, ones we desperately need in the 21st century. I am excited to see who follows in their footsteps.

On that note, this summer I'm reading an interesting book by David Hajdu called The Ten Cent Plague: The Great Comic Book Scare and How it Changed America. It offers an account of the government's (and major media's) efforts to criminalize and censor comic books in the 1940's and 1950's. We see a cultural shift today through the integration of technology in all forms of media (Iphones, sidekicks, Blackberries, wii, etc.), but 70 years ago this cultural shift was represented with the introduction of comic books. Hadju cites that comics were selling between 80 to 100 million copies per week and reaching more people than movies, television, radio or magazines. Obviously the media has changed, but not its impact. Blogs, wikis, forums, MySpace, Facebook and other forms of collaborative communication are transforming not only how we access information, but how we value imagination. I'd like to think that the myths and metaphors of the 21st century will reflect these challenges. I'll read them.