Chester Brown

erm, a few TCJ editorials and lettercolumns of the time, some back and forth in CBG (around an outrageously OTT TCJ response to a fake letter), a huge article in Gauntlet c. 1995 about Gr0th and Ellis0n, in which IIRC the writer and P. David leaned towards suggesting Groth had faked things himself? because S0b0cinski had been nice in person once? ... around 1998, the one guy in the office that she'd browbeat into conspiring with her posted a detailed confessional account of the times on the Journal message board, that was really great.

I recall that Gr0th eventually interviewed Kitch3n sometime (this century?) and asked why he'd not called Gr0th for a reference so that he could be warned off (or not paid any attention to what she'd already done), to which Kitch3n was all "well her resume seemed impressive, I dunno man, who wants to seem like they don't trust a woman?" but I can't remember when.


[sorry for annoying-to-read J0r-E11ing, just don't want this half-arsed gossiping to be a google source for anyone ever trying to remember properly]

I love that you have google guarded Groth even though the ungoogle guarded word is upthread.

There is also a stray Groth in the post.

I didn't mean how many cartoonists are literal members of the Libertarian Party btw. Ditko, for example, talks a very libertarian-esque line, but he's not a partisan.

just noting that there seems to be an odd streak of this type of thinking within the comics industry, that's all

interesting (and old) blog post from Sim re: Chet and prostitution

just noting that there seems to be an odd streak of this type of thinking within the comics industry, that's all

who else? I don't think Bagge's a member of the party

Paul Pope? Ditko (sorta?)

Sim's probably too hardcore conservative to be considered libertarian (by his own admission)

Oh boy, that Sim post...I'm through the looking glass.

lol I know rite

"...and women's obsessive interest in androgyny in all its forms, the borderland where distinctions between men and women get fuzzy around the edges. Women really get off on that. Why? Beats me. "

MAKES YA THINK

yeah, Pope I guess. out of thousands of active creators it's still v far from a streak tho!

There is also a stray Groth in the post.

I'm sure this is legal as long as he's fully franked

Fact (as of 2007): CB didn't own a computer or cell phone.

the Sim post reminded me that someone should check this against the book - is he going to the library for all those john review sites?

someone should try and draw a map of Mike Baron's politics

is he going to the library for all those john review sites?

I think there's a scene in the book where he does exactly this actually...?

Bob Burden's another one with a weird reactionary libertarian streak iirc

@sic, he told me this himself in 2007. I offered him a retired Mac, but he declined.

I mean yeah I'm not talking like a huge majority of the comics industry (which is a LOT of people) just that it pops up enough to be noticeable. Maybe it's all the business experiences of all these creator-owned types...

Mike Baron's an interesting one... there is some kind of implication in Nexus that Ylum is intended as a libertarian paradise.

I think there's a scene in the book where he does exactly this actually...?

yeah, I think he does the first time, but I can't remember if he later gets a computer so he can do it at home

btw I clicked through the blogpost to the Cerebus Yahoo group, thinking "I wonder if it's still active? I remember Sim himself gave up on trying to follow it (circa 2005) because they talked about Star Wars too much" -- and 17 of the last 30 posts are about what order to watch Star Wars in.

lol

Burden is more of an eccentric who sails by his own compass in all matters, I think.

The odd thing about trying to fit Baron in is that he seems to so thoroughly endorse both fascist or vigilante justice - very much a "right is right" thing, but without room for error on the part of the judger.

a lot of cartoonists seem more politically naive* or just dismissive of the whole process. (which, you know, is a problem with creative types [and humans in general] as a whole. you could always tell in those old tcj interviews where groth was trying to steer them toward some discussion of politics and the interviewee was trying to edge back in the opposition direction.)

*maybe that's why shakey is mistaking them for libertarians?

the best were the interviews where he was clearly dealing with someone of a completely different generation/mindset than his own, politically or socially, and he was trying to find common ground, or grill them on their (hard or soft) conservatism. (i remember the frazetta one being particularly hilarious in this regard.)

the Burden thing I was attributing to some stuff he said in the intro columns to several issues of FC (being equally disparaging of communists and politicians and big business), I'd have to go back and dig them out though.

I don't think I've really misrepresented anybody...?

i was mostly making a cheap joke about the political naivete of libertarians.

(i remember the frazetta one being particularly hilarious in this regard.)

GRØTH: So, your perception of the financial inequities in comics was what pushed you towards paperback covers. But did you not see that your independence was still compromised with regards to content?

FRAZETTA: So I leapt off this third-story fire escape, twisting in mid-air, and landed like a cat! I have magnificent reflexes.

oh man

sic is funnin but not by much.

haha actually i'm guessing those are legit quotes. i remember frank's almost homoerotic descriptions of his own physical prowess as a strapping young man.

right the first time, that was joeks but based on vivid memories of how he talked up his body, his ability to beat up entire gangs of hoodlums as a youth, and how when hired to paint for Bakshi's Fire And Ice he took control and acted out all the rotoscoped fight action too, because they were sissyboy filmmakers who had no idea about real movement

haaa

YES!:

Even when we got all that done, then we had to shoot the movie, and of course I was right there on the set. He’s giving them direction. I’m giving them direction. If I didn’t like the way they moved or if the action was kind of silly – and I gotta tell ya, some of those stunt men are hot dogs. I mean, I was trying to get a real nasty moving-type action, and they were trying to make these karate moves, which was ludicrous. Karate! What the hell is that?! We’re talking about primitive Neanderthals, and here they were doing karate! Give me a break. [Groth laughs.] They’d say, “Oh, it’ll be great, it’ll be great.” I said, “It won’t be great.” I wanted it simple and deadly.

So I’d always do the action. They’d always confront me: “Show us what you mean, Frank,” ha-ha, chuckle-chuckle. So the adrenaline gets going, and I found myself doing action that I haven’t done since I was 18. It was incredible. I had them amazed – and I had myself amazed! I don’t know where it came from. It’s interesting, you know? I’ve heard Stallone say that. He says when he makes his movies, the adrenaline gets pumping, and he found himself doing one-hand pushups and he’d never done it before. Adrenaline can make you do things that you can’t imagine you could do.

You were in your early 50s at that time?

Yeah. I jumped from high places, and they’d scream as if I was killing myself, and I landed like a cat, just like I used to. It was really quite remarkable. I felt really good about myself — naturally, considering my age! [Laughs.]

This thread is blowing my mind!!

i know--the things I'm learning (that are, frankly, much more entertaining than brown's prostitute shenanigans)

I never knew Frazetta thought he was one of the guys in his art.

yeah that stuff about acting out Fire and Ice is in the Bakshi book too

thing is, frazetta did look like one of his drawings!

http://thevelvetrocket.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/frank_frazetta-01.jpg

strongo is otm abt the political disconnect between groth and some of his interview subjects - it comes over esp strongly in his schulz interview iirc.

man no wonder "landed like a cat" stuck in my mind for 16 years:

But what’s interesting is that you went on to became an artist, that the violence didn’t really brutalize you.

No, I was always the good guy, you know! [Laughs.] The funny part is, even though it sounds like I must have been some pain in the ass, the fact of the matter is I used to walk the street and I used to eyeball all the tough-looking guys — you know, bullies, shitheads, you know the type, the guys who needed gangs behind them. I used to be a loner. I used to walk through the neighborhoods and defy them. I was crazy. I had such confidence in myself; all I had to do was take on the leader, and suddenly, I had a reputation all over Brooklyn. But I thought that was real cool!

[Laughs.] The difference between us is that I’d always get the shit kicked out of me.

Well, you’ve got to be able to back it up or you’d better split. But I used to think “cat” when I got involved. I had a thing for cats, leopards in particular, and I used to watch them. God, they could move so quickly the eye could not follow them. I could mentally understand it, and make myself do it, up to a point. If you could do that, if you could be like a cat, then nobody could beat you. I don’t care how big they were. If they were much bigger and stronger, I could spin and swirl, and get out of anything, just because I was thinking “cat.” You know what I’m saying?

I think I do.

lol @ all this. young frank f was a good lookin dude though.

the schulz one was another interview that stuck in my mind for that reason, yeah. like come on, gary, you cant be surprised that kindly, near-death sparky schulz has no great feelings about robert crumb and doesnt view merchandising as wholly evil.

the part of that interview that always amazed me came when groth asked schulz if he ever felt frustrated by not being able to explore sexuality in his own work the way crumb did. (i find the thought of anyone asking charles schulz this question kind of unspeakably horrifying.) schulz evidently paused for a long time, then finally answered something like: 'well, you know, these are just little kids i'm drawing here.'

another favorite: the art spiegelman interview where groth keeps badgering him to express an opinion on jack kirby. spiegelman obviously has zero interest but somehow lets himself get drawn into an endless, circular argument about it. (i.e., groth: 'the way kirby would draw the thing hurling a boulder across the river, that didn't grab you?' spiegelman: 'no.')

well: http://boingboing.net/2016/04/20/mary-wept-over-the-feet-of-jes.html

loved it. still reading the (copious) notes but the 170-ish illustrated pages are some of his best work. simple and expressive lines echoed in the dialogue and narration (which is all intertitles) that adds up to a weird powerful argument about something i don't really care about. thus i can admire the mania (good and bad) on display.

Blimey, I've only read Ed the Happy Clown- seems a bit different.

he seems to be slowly turning into some sort of "dave sim with a modicum of self-awareness" figure. not that he's a misogynist (though the libertarianism is just as baffling to me) but that his comics are becoming agitprop for a series of increasingly specific and potentially alienating beliefs. that said i'm on record above as considering the yummy fur gospel strips among his best work, so i'm much more intrigued by this than by "paying for it." (which was a slog.)

Sim is an apt comparison judging from the wikipedia research I've just done.

Very fond of EtHC anyhow, should probably catch up with some of his other work some day.

I did get around to reading "Paying for It" although just the comic part. I'm going to take a deep breath and jump into the appendices sometime soon.

The impression I've gotten is that the brief asides and conversation bits between Brown and his friends that lead into introspection (which are great!) are interpreted completely differently than my own take

everything up through "louis riel" is worth reading. (though "the playboy" is more of a flawed dry-run for "i never liked you" and the book of short stories should only be picked up cheap.) i kind of miss the looseness of his pre-"riel" art, but the samples from the new book look like a nice midway point between the grotesqueries of "ed" and the harold gray homages of his later stuff.