I spent a significant portion of fourth through sixth grade, which spanned 1985-1988, reading Marvel comic books. My main source for reading material was my classmate JJ, who had two or three much older brothers, which meant he had a library of comics that covered some of the 60’s, mostly what was available as reprints, and all of the 70’s and 80’s. I read them as often as possible during class, keeping them hidden beneath my desk and ready to slip into the storage area under the hinged top in case of an emergency. It is difficult to convey how steeped I was in the Marvel Universe without inciting incredulity, but among the comics I read included: some Fantastic Four, Alpha Flight, Punisher, Captain America and Master of Kung Fu; a lot of Spider-Man, especially the Venom suit saga; the bulk of Thor, The Incredible Hulk and The (East Coast) Avengers (all of which were already long-running titles) and virtually the complete works of X-Men, both the “Classics” written by Stan Lee and the more familiar revamp mostly authored by Chris Claremont, Silver Surfer, Daredevil, West Coast Avengers, Iron Man, Moon Knight, The New Mutants, X-Factor, Excalibur and, of course, Wolverine. I asked the art teacher if she could teach me how to draw super heroes and she suggested I might be better suited at being a comic book writer. Chris Claremont was my favorite writer but it seemed obvious to me that the penciller had the superior job, and John Buscema and Frank Miller were my favorite artists. Bescema was a pioneer who had established the typical style of the time, but Miller did his own heavy, high-contrast inking that would set the tone for the future.
Something hard-wired into my nature, which would take me, oh, about 35 years to realize is not a trait ingrained in everyone, is a compulsion to be loyal. I am passionate, some would say to a fault, about the things and people I enjoy. I stand by my convictions, which fortunately prioritize the importance of conceding to logic and humility, and don’t do ambivalence well. Once I start on a course, I tend to see it through to its completion. I don’t jump ship and never make alternate plans. One thing that highly irritates me is when others start second-guessing or changing plans. I always try to keep my word, even when I know doing so will be detrimental to me, because from my perspective, my word is more important than myself. In my worldview, this is known as integrity, which, if I am to be frank, is a thing few others seem to understand.
Anyway, it should go without saying that I didn’t read DC comics… that is, until Frank Miller wrote and drew their Batman: The Dark Knight Returns saga. It was good; really good. This created not only a moral but practical dilemma, because the only person I knew who had DC comics was a junior high kid named Jay, whom I had never personally spoken to, although I often stood beside JJ while they quickly traded comics between backpacks. Jay had a quirk of being highly secretive about his comic book reading habits, which I found strange. Beyond that, discussing comics with him was complicated by the fact that I have always been and probably always will be uncomfortable engaging in conversations with people I don’t know well.
I went to a Kindergarten-12th grade school which had 100 students total, so we all ate lunch at the same time. One day during lunch, when I was in sixth grade, the cafeteria was disrupted by a kid in the table behind me loudly taunting another kid. The latter, I discovered when I turned around, was Jay. Suddenly, and without speaking a word, Jay slammed down his fist onto the other kid’s lunch tray and smashed the unopened milk carton with a loud pop that exploded white liquid all over everyone in the vicinity. Then, Jay stood up and walked straight into the principal’s office. This was a highly-unique and therefore memorable event. In other words, it was basically the coolest thing I had ever seen. Without ever knowing the full story, I egocentrically assumed Jay was being mocked for reading comic books and milk-smashing was his Marvel-esque way of defending his honor. I resolved to always defend my comic book-reading ways no matter how old I got.
I never did speak to Jay. After sixth grade we moved, and I found myself in a school where nobody read comics. I wouldn’t pick them up again until several years later, when I was 16 and armed with a driver’s license. There were three comic book shops in Des Moines, and I started a routine of driving from one to another, getting caught up on X-Men and Wolverine as well as discovering Frank Miller’s Sin City and Neil Gaiman’s Sandman. Along the way, I would also read the current issues of those same comics at Barnes & Noble. In this fashion, I could read 10-12 comics in a day while paying only for gasoline, although I did occasionally purchase Wolverine back-issues. I also began reading Shakespeare’s plays precisely because they had been a sub-plot in several Sandman issues. Even after college, Sandman and Frank Miller’s 300, as well as Howard Zinn, inspired an interest in world history that I had never had while in school.
When I moved to the San Francisco Bay Area in 2000, I got a part-time job as a barista at Borders Books and began reading Japanese manga while there. Eventually, I once again started hanging out in comic book stores to discover more manga and even got into playing sanctioned Yu-Gi-Oh tournaments until the cards got too expensive and I sold my two decks for a profit. I still read manga occasionally today, religiously refusing any edition that doesn’t read right to left. A couple weeks ago, I found myself correcting a random lady in a thrift shop calling it “anime.” I watch a lot of anime, too, but it should go without saying that graphic novels and television shows are vastly different mediums. One advantage of comics is the pace of the story’s development is dependent upon the reader. Instead of passively watching the characters, you move alongside them, discovering as they do. Another difference is instead of viewing a rectangle of a fixed size, comic panels can change size, shape and location at will. This can be used to great effect in keeping the reader actively engaged in both focus and mood. During a chaotic climax, for example, a reader can find himself feverishly attempting to decipher the order in which the panels unfold.
Even with the exploding popularity of conventions like Comic-Con, comic books themselves have mostly remained a niche consumed by introverts. One difference is many characters that began their lives there are now popular mainstream successes. To say I have mixed feelings about this would be a lie; I flat out hate it. I’d like to smash the milk carton of every jock in America who thinks he’s a big Thor fan but doesn’t even know who Jack Kirby is. You have to be pretty pathetic to be too lazy to read a picture book. I can’t really explain why I find it so annoying, but it has something to do with loyalty and integrity.
A couple years ago I was dating a talented poet who, presumably for lack of anything better to do, attended a Neil Gaiman lecture at the university where she was attending grad school. She had never heard of him before, so was very confused as to why hundreds of students had shown up to see him talk. “He read a few excerpts and they weren’t very good,” she declared. I shrugged and said, “Yeah, his work is pretty popular but maybe he’s not that great of a writer.” I am ashamed to admit I had forgotten about Jay. In part, I knew any attempt to defend Gaiman’s work to this person in particular would be futile. But, to be honest, the first thought to cross my mind was, Well, he does just write comics.
And Shakespeare just wrote skits.
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