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Raggedy Ann and Andy
Mr. Twee Deedle: Raggedy Ann's Sprightly Cousin
A spectacular re-presentation of a lost classic. The second Marschall Books collection from Fantagraphics is a magnificent collection of Mr. Twee Deedle , Johnny Gruelle’s masterpiece, unjustly forgotten by history and never before reprinted since its first appearance in America’s newspapers from 1911 to 1914. The title character in the Sunday color page, Mr. Twee Deedle, is a magical wood sprite who befriends the strip’s two human children, Dickie and Dolly. Gruelle depicted a charming, fantastical child’s world, filled with light whimsy and outlandish surrealism. The artwork is among the most stunning ever to grace an Amercian newspaper page, and Gruelle’s painterly color makes every page look like it was created on a canvas.
Gruelle’s creation was the winning entry out of 1500 submissions to succeed Little Nemo , which the New York Herald was losing at the time to the rival Hearst papers. With such import, the Herald added a $2000 prize, a long contract, and arguably the most care devoted to the reproduction of any color newspaper comic strip before or since. Yet the wood sprite and his fanciful world have been strangely overlooked, partly because Gruelle created Raggedy Ann immediately after the strip’s run, eclipsing not only Mr. Twee Deedle but almost everything else the cartoonist ever did.
Mr. Twee Deedle stands as a bizarre time-warp: at a time when most children’s literature and kids’ comic strips were somewhat violent or starkly moralistic (the Brothers Grimm; the Katzenjammer Kids; and even Little Nemo itself, which often depicted nightmares, fears, and dangers), Twee Deedle was sensitive and whimsical. Instead of stark moralizing, it presented gentle lessons. It reads today like a work for the 21st century… indeed for all times, all ages.
Mr. Twee Deedle is edited and includes an introduction by comics historian Rick Marschall. The volume will present the first year of the forgotten masterpiece and selected episodes from later years, as well as special drawings, promotional material, and related artwork. 128 pages of full color
Gruelle’s creation was the winning entry out of 1500 submissions to succeed Little Nemo , which the New York Herald was losing at the time to the rival Hearst papers. With such import, the Herald added a $2000 prize, a long contract, and arguably the most care devoted to the reproduction of any color newspaper comic strip before or since. Yet the wood sprite and his fanciful world have been strangely overlooked, partly because Gruelle created Raggedy Ann immediately after the strip’s run, eclipsing not only Mr. Twee Deedle but almost everything else the cartoonist ever did.
Mr. Twee Deedle stands as a bizarre time-warp: at a time when most children’s literature and kids’ comic strips were somewhat violent or starkly moralistic (the Brothers Grimm; the Katzenjammer Kids; and even Little Nemo itself, which often depicted nightmares, fears, and dangers), Twee Deedle was sensitive and whimsical. Instead of stark moralizing, it presented gentle lessons. It reads today like a work for the 21st century… indeed for all times, all ages.
Mr. Twee Deedle is edited and includes an introduction by comics historian Rick Marschall. The volume will present the first year of the forgotten masterpiece and selected episodes from later years, as well as special drawings, promotional material, and related artwork. 128 pages of full color
- GenresComics
128 pages, Hardcover
First published April 17, 2012
2 people are currently reading
43 people want to read
About the author
Johnny Gruelle
325 books42 followersJohnny Gruelle was an American artist, political cartoonist, children's book author and illustrator (and even songwriter). He is known as the creator of Raggedy Ann and Raggedy Andy. He had such confidence in his design that often he would create the final ink work without first sketching in pencil.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnny_G...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnny_G...
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
August 20, 2019
Sickly sweet, and yes 'twee'. But still nice to see because of sometimes lovely art and whimsical creatures.
November 9, 2023
Long has this book haunted my dreams, from the time that it was announced back in 2010 to the time that it was released. Then I saw the price tag...a MSRP of $75 for a 128 page book? Egads, surely they must be insane, I thought. Then I saw a copy in a store and saw that this book was frickin' huge, measuring 14 inches by 18 inches (That's 35.56 centimeters by 45.72 centimeters for readers in the non-English measuring unit world outside of the United States, Liberia, and Myanmar...and, mostly, England). Still, there was no way that I could justify spending 75 bucks on this book, so I passed on it...but it still haunted my dreams. Lo, the many sleepless nights, fitfully tossing and turning and counting the ceiling fan blade rotations with visions of Mr. Twee Deedle dancing through my head. Praised be Fantagraphics for their Memorial Day sale. I was one of the lucky ones who was home when the email first went out and got their order in at the nanosecond that the sale started for 75 percent off of cover price! Woo hoo! Twee Deedle would be mine!
I finally got around to reading it, and I tore through it fairly quickly. There is a lengthy introduction which does a superb job of putting this strip, as well as all of the work of Johnny Gruelle, in proper historical context. It's mindblowing to think of people sitting around reading this a hundred years ago. Comics are still a relatively young artform, but 100 years seems like a long time to me.
I have always been a sucker for Americana. When I was a child I always used to check out Beatrix Potter books from from the library. I have always loved oil based paintings found in old children's books, and Mr. Twee Deedle is rooted in that same pastoral Victorian English artistic sensibility. The sense of awe and wonderment of those Beatrix Potter books is present in every strip. Mr. Twee Deedle is a magical sprite-like creature, who uses his powers to shrink himself and the children, Dickie and Dolly, to go on adventures as well as gently teach adults lessons.
This strip bleeds charm. It is quaint and old-fashioned. It reads okay in its own right but is more enjoyable when you think of just how old and obscure this stuff is. I read some of it to my four year old daughter and she liked it for three strips. Then she got up and walked away. Children, with their home computers and surround sound television, no longer have a need for Mr. Twee Deedle. (Special No-prize offer to the first reader who can tell me where I stole that last line from. Use the comments section below, and NO GOOGLING!! Limit one No-prize per household. No purchase necessary. Offer void where No-prizes are taxed or otherwise restricted. Many will enter, few will win.)
The pre-Mr. Twee Deedle strips collected, such as Bud Smith from 1908, are virtually unreadable. The gags are completely unfunny and the strips completely uninteresting except for historical interest.
This is as much a Johnny Gruelle artbook as it is a collected edition. Here's a breakdown of what this book contains: A 21 page illustration heavy introduction which features full page reproductions of the Raggedy Ann patent office filing, the January 29, 1911 New York Herald page which announced Mr. Twee Deedle with illustrations and John B. Gruelle's written introduction to the character and his world, and the April 20, 1911 New York Herald page featuring the public's reaction to the character. Could this be the very first “letters page” dedicated to a character? Serious comic historians could answer this more ably than I. Also featured during the course of this lengthy introduction is the full page July 12, 1914 strip, presented in it's original size without any restoration, like the other two featured in this introduction. Yellowed, flaked, and creased, it makes me appreciate the work that the restoration team did on the rest of the book.
There is an Early Years Art Portfolio, showing caricatures, political cartoons, and Gruelle's famous “bird's-eye view” of rural dystopia pages. (4 pages) World Color Printing Company Sunday Pages, with multiple pre-Mr. Twee Deedle strips like Handy Andy and Bud Smith The Boy Who Does Stunts. (10 pages) Early Book Illustration: 1911-1921, collecting work done for Brother Grimm storybooks. These were all brilliant. (8 pages)
Mr. Twee Deedle Part One- These are brilliantly illustrated and charming to read. Easily my favorite period. My OCD flared up like a pack of hemorrhoids upon the realization that there were no original publication dates provided for each strip, only the original copyright date as stamped upon the printed product. Worse still, they are printed out of original publication order, an OCD blasphemy if ever there were one! The breakdown for this section is as follows: Two strips from 1910, 34 from 1911, and two from 1912. All are full page strips.
Nine more pages of Gruelle's “bird's-eye view” drawings/strips.
Mr. Twee Deedle Part Two- The format morphed from comic strip with word balloons to picture story form, with text found below each picture. This was not uncommon in strips as varied as Prince Valiant and Flash Gordon, among others. Most of these were black and white, although some of the later strips were also two-color (as opposed to four-color printing found in the earlier strips). Things were more whimsical and fantastical in the later strips. I found the introduction of the Scarecrow and the Scarecrowess, obvious precursors to Raggedy Ann and Andy, to be utterly fascinating. Here is the breakdown for the strips collected in this section: Two strips from 1912, 10 from 1914, two from 1915, 12 from 1916, six from 1917, and seven from 1918. Also of interest is the cover of one two hardcover reprint books from 1918. Could these be the earliest collected editions? The mind boggles.
So while my completist OCD wants to read every strip in order of original publication, the realist in me fears that these strips no longer exist in any form. In short, I fear that the bulk of the Mr. Twee Deedle strips have been lost to the mists of time, and that is a damn shame.
There are two post-Mr. Twee Deedle strips, titled Brutus, also reprinted after the main course, one from 1929 and the other from 1930. They are mind-numbingly dull, and it is hard to believe that the same genius created them.
While I enjoyed reading the non-Mr. Twee Deedle strips as a historical curiosity item, I cannot call them great or even good. The artwork is nice, and the stories are pleasant enough, but that's about it. Rating is based on my enjoyment of the Mr. Twee Deedle strips and presentation of the book, which is superb.
This book is a difficult read because of its unwieldy size. It is too large and awkwardly heavy to hold at five pounds. It lays flat and can be read on a bed or table, but you must do a forward fold to really study the top of the page. The material was presented in the size of the original Sunday pages. The only possible solution that I could come up with would be to cut the strips in half like Titan's Flash Gordon Sunday strip books. Still, there would be a few problems with even this approach, as the earliest strips shown in the introduction were full page, single frame shots, as well as the bird's-eye view full page illustrations. So you see, there is no perfect solution. I advise practicing your yoga, especially forward folds to limber up for reading this book.
I finally got around to reading it, and I tore through it fairly quickly. There is a lengthy introduction which does a superb job of putting this strip, as well as all of the work of Johnny Gruelle, in proper historical context. It's mindblowing to think of people sitting around reading this a hundred years ago. Comics are still a relatively young artform, but 100 years seems like a long time to me.
I have always been a sucker for Americana. When I was a child I always used to check out Beatrix Potter books from from the library. I have always loved oil based paintings found in old children's books, and Mr. Twee Deedle is rooted in that same pastoral Victorian English artistic sensibility. The sense of awe and wonderment of those Beatrix Potter books is present in every strip. Mr. Twee Deedle is a magical sprite-like creature, who uses his powers to shrink himself and the children, Dickie and Dolly, to go on adventures as well as gently teach adults lessons.
This strip bleeds charm. It is quaint and old-fashioned. It reads okay in its own right but is more enjoyable when you think of just how old and obscure this stuff is. I read some of it to my four year old daughter and she liked it for three strips. Then she got up and walked away. Children, with their home computers and surround sound television, no longer have a need for Mr. Twee Deedle. (Special No-prize offer to the first reader who can tell me where I stole that last line from. Use the comments section below, and NO GOOGLING!! Limit one No-prize per household. No purchase necessary. Offer void where No-prizes are taxed or otherwise restricted. Many will enter, few will win.)
The pre-Mr. Twee Deedle strips collected, such as Bud Smith from 1908, are virtually unreadable. The gags are completely unfunny and the strips completely uninteresting except for historical interest.
This is as much a Johnny Gruelle artbook as it is a collected edition. Here's a breakdown of what this book contains: A 21 page illustration heavy introduction which features full page reproductions of the Raggedy Ann patent office filing, the January 29, 1911 New York Herald page which announced Mr. Twee Deedle with illustrations and John B. Gruelle's written introduction to the character and his world, and the April 20, 1911 New York Herald page featuring the public's reaction to the character. Could this be the very first “letters page” dedicated to a character? Serious comic historians could answer this more ably than I. Also featured during the course of this lengthy introduction is the full page July 12, 1914 strip, presented in it's original size without any restoration, like the other two featured in this introduction. Yellowed, flaked, and creased, it makes me appreciate the work that the restoration team did on the rest of the book.
There is an Early Years Art Portfolio, showing caricatures, political cartoons, and Gruelle's famous “bird's-eye view” of rural dystopia pages. (4 pages) World Color Printing Company Sunday Pages, with multiple pre-Mr. Twee Deedle strips like Handy Andy and Bud Smith The Boy Who Does Stunts. (10 pages) Early Book Illustration: 1911-1921, collecting work done for Brother Grimm storybooks. These were all brilliant. (8 pages)
Mr. Twee Deedle Part One- These are brilliantly illustrated and charming to read. Easily my favorite period. My OCD flared up like a pack of hemorrhoids upon the realization that there were no original publication dates provided for each strip, only the original copyright date as stamped upon the printed product. Worse still, they are printed out of original publication order, an OCD blasphemy if ever there were one! The breakdown for this section is as follows: Two strips from 1910, 34 from 1911, and two from 1912. All are full page strips.
Nine more pages of Gruelle's “bird's-eye view” drawings/strips.
Mr. Twee Deedle Part Two- The format morphed from comic strip with word balloons to picture story form, with text found below each picture. This was not uncommon in strips as varied as Prince Valiant and Flash Gordon, among others. Most of these were black and white, although some of the later strips were also two-color (as opposed to four-color printing found in the earlier strips). Things were more whimsical and fantastical in the later strips. I found the introduction of the Scarecrow and the Scarecrowess, obvious precursors to Raggedy Ann and Andy, to be utterly fascinating. Here is the breakdown for the strips collected in this section: Two strips from 1912, 10 from 1914, two from 1915, 12 from 1916, six from 1917, and seven from 1918. Also of interest is the cover of one two hardcover reprint books from 1918. Could these be the earliest collected editions? The mind boggles.
So while my completist OCD wants to read every strip in order of original publication, the realist in me fears that these strips no longer exist in any form. In short, I fear that the bulk of the Mr. Twee Deedle strips have been lost to the mists of time, and that is a damn shame.
There are two post-Mr. Twee Deedle strips, titled Brutus, also reprinted after the main course, one from 1929 and the other from 1930. They are mind-numbingly dull, and it is hard to believe that the same genius created them.
While I enjoyed reading the non-Mr. Twee Deedle strips as a historical curiosity item, I cannot call them great or even good. The artwork is nice, and the stories are pleasant enough, but that's about it. Rating is based on my enjoyment of the Mr. Twee Deedle strips and presentation of the book, which is superb.
This book is a difficult read because of its unwieldy size. It is too large and awkwardly heavy to hold at five pounds. It lays flat and can be read on a bed or table, but you must do a forward fold to really study the top of the page. The material was presented in the size of the original Sunday pages. The only possible solution that I could come up with would be to cut the strips in half like Titan's Flash Gordon Sunday strip books. Still, there would be a few problems with even this approach, as the earliest strips shown in the introduction were full page, single frame shots, as well as the bird's-eye view full page illustrations. So you see, there is no perfect solution. I advise practicing your yoga, especially forward folds to limber up for reading this book.
February 13, 2016
Mr. Twee Deedle is a collection of children's comic strips from the early 20th century by Johnny Gruelle, the creator of Raggedy Ann. Each strip illustrates a world of idyllic childhood innocence spent outside in untouched fields and streams, a childhood experience that, for most of us, is long gone. Still, I delighted at the whimsical adventures of Dickie and his sister Dolly, who, with the help of the wood sprite, Mr. Twee Deedle, have various adventures that range from dancing with fairies, riding upon bumblebee backs, and visiting the man-in-the-moon! Charming! While Mr. Tweedle Dee does impart 'morals,' it is usually done in a gentle manner that teaches such valuable wisdom as respecting all of Nature's creatures, considering others, and looking beneath surface appearances.
While I loved these strips now, I can only imagine how I would have loved them if I had discovered them as a child!
While I loved these strips now, I can only imagine how I would have loved them if I had discovered them as a child!
February 18, 2013
Quiet, lovable, and beautifully drawn comic strip by the creator of Raggedy Ann. This is a great-looking, oversized collection that does the strips justice. It's not complete though, and the strip eventually degraded in quality as it changed format to small, black-and-white, text-heavy pieces. Still, the collection is worth exploring for the early, full-page, gloriously painted strips alone.
July 26, 2013
A thing of beauty. The stories are a bit fey, but the huge pages of gorgeous early 20th Century art will make you forgive that slight indescretion.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews