McSweeney's Issue 13: An Assorted Sampler of North American Comic Drawings, Strips, and Illustrated Stories

McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern #13

by Chris Ware (Editor), Dave Eggers (Editor), Lawrence Weschler

Issue 13 is a Very Special Issue. We might say that a lot, and we mean it every time, but this time we really really mean it. This issue is all comics. It is edited by Chris Ware (author of Jimmy Corrigan: Smartest Kid on Earth), and features so many artists to know and love: R. Crumb, Art Spiegelman, Daniel Clowes, Lynda Barry, Los Bros Hernandez, Adrian Tomine, Julie Doucet, and on and on.

The issue also includes essays from Michael Chabon, Ira Glass, John Updike, Chip Kidd, and others. Hardcover, clothbound, with an enormous dust jacket that does much more than guard against dust.

This one makes our throats go tight.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Fiction, Anthologies, Short Stories, Art, Graphic Novels Comics

368 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2004

About the author

Chris Ware is an American cartoonist acclaimed for redefining the visual and narrative possibilities of the graphic novel, known especially for his long-running Acme Novelty Library series and major works including Jimmy Corrigan, the Smartest Kid on Earth, Building Stories, and Rusty Brown. His work is distinguished by its emotional depth, frequently exploring loneliness, memory, regret, and the quieter forms of pain that shape ordinary lives, rendered with extreme visual precision, intricate page designs, and a style that evokes early twentieth-century American illustration, advertising, and architecture. Raised in Omaha and later based in the Chicago area, Ware first attracted attention through his strips for The Daily Texan, where an invitation from Art Spiegelman to contribute to Raw helped encourage him toward an ambitious, self-publishing approach that would define his career. Acme Novelty Library disrupted conventions of comic book production in both format and tone, presenting characters such as Quimby the Mouse and later Rusty Brown in narratives that blend autobiography, satire, and psychological portraiture. Building Stories further expanded his formal experimentation, released as a boxed set of interconnected printed pieces that require the reader to assemble meaning from varied physical formats. Ware’s artistic influences range from early newspaper cartoonists like Winsor McCay and Frank King to the collage and narrative play of Joseph Cornell, and he has spoken about using typography-like logic in his drawing to mirror the fragmented, associative way memory works. His practice remains largely analog, relying on hand drawing and careful layout, though he uses computers for color preparation. Ware has also been active as an editor, designer, and curator, contributing to volumes reprinting historic comic strips, serving as editor of The Best American Comics 2007, and organizing exhibitions such as UnInked at the Phoenix Art Museum. His work has extended into multimedia collaborations, including illustrated documentary materials for This American Life and visual designs for film posters, book covers, and music projects. His later projects include The Last Saturday, serialized online for The Guardian, and Monograph, a retrospective volume combining autobiography with archival material. Widely recognized for his influence, Ware’s books have received numerous honors, including multiple Eisner and Harvey Awards, and Jimmy Corrigan became the first graphic novel to win the Guardian First Book Award. He has exhibited at major institutions including the Whitney Museum of American Art and Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, and his contributions to the medium have led many peers and critics to regard him as one of the most significant cartoonists of his generation.

Reviews

[Bryan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I would like to congratulate Dave Eggers for letting Chris Ware ruin what could have been one of the most memorable issues of McSweeney’s ever. Ware hates humanity and likes to force the reader to hate it too by making his texts completely inaccessible both emotionally and (sometimes) visually. The essays interspersed between the comics might be insightful, poignant, or (typical of Ware) absurdly humorous but printing them in four point font sort of spoils the entire deal. I get the joke but the joke is over.

Those are my grumps. My grumps! my grumps! My gnarly manly grumps! There is some wizened wisdom to Ware’s overall structure of the book. Case in point: closing the volume with contrasting biographic sketches; 1) David Heatley’s loving, complex, vulnerable father (the kind of person me on a good day wishes there was more of in the world) and 2) the pitifully self-loathing masochist Soren Kierkegaard - whose true life biography mirrors the shame factory efficiency of one of Ware’s fictional characters. (Is it necessary I indicate a biography as “true life?”) [Was it as necessary to do that in the past as it is now?]

It would appear too that most American underground comics creators are as neurotic and self-obsessed as Ware. There are a handful though that have the bravery, talent, and vision to deal with issues bigger than themselves even when working in an autobiographical mode; namely, Joe Sacco (war), Debbie Drechsler (abortion), and Chester Brown (minority rights).

[Dave Schaafsma · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best comics collections ever, a must for serious comics scholars and fans. Eloquently edited and put together, a treat in every way. I've owned it since it came out in 2004 from Egger's outfit, but I thought if anyone is reading about comics that I know, they should know about this, and it is typically immaculate for that press, but even better because The Champ Ware puts it together.

Included are essays by Ira Glass, Chris Ware, John Updike, and others. You get a sense of history because there are pieces on Rodolphe Topffer, George Herriman, and Charles Schulz.

Faves: Charles Burns, Seth, Joe Matt, Art Spiegelman, Joe Sacco, Adrian Tomine, R. Crumb, Dan Clowes, Lynda Barry, Julie Doucet, and Chester Brown. You can't possible read the selections and dismiss comics. You have to see this work as serious art. (Okay, sometimes silly, but you know . . .).

At the very least check it out of the library to see whose work you want to read more deeply.

[Sam Quixote · Rating 5 out of 5]

Edited by Chris Ware, McSweeney's 13 is a beautifully produced hardback with a design your own wraparound cover by Chris Ware and 2 bonus mini-comics.

Inside are comics essays by Ira Glass, Chris Ware, John Updike, Glen David Gold, Malachi B. Cohen, and Chip Kidd. There are also appreciations of the work of Rodolphe Topffer (a 19th century cartoonist and arguably America's first comics artist), George Herriman, and Charles Schulz.

And onto the comics themselves! Most of the samples are of larger works by their authors which, if you're familiar with indie comics then you'll have already heard of/read them already: "Black Hole" by Charles Burns, "Clyde Fans" by Seth, "Spent" by Joe Matt, "Underworld" by Kaz, "In the Shadow of No Towers" by Art Spiegelman, "The Fixer" by Joe Sacco, "Shortcomings" by Adrian Tomine, and "Louis Riel" by Chester Brown.

There are also contributions from R. Crumb, Dan Clowes, Mark Newgarden, Jim Woodring, Archer Prewitt, Lynda Barry, Chris Ware, Mark Beyer, Richard Sala, Kim Deitch, Ben Katchor, Richard McGuire, Jeffrey Brown, Julie Doucet, Debbie Dreschler, David Heatley, Gilbert Hernandez, and Ivan Brunetti.

There's no better place to start if you're new and interested in comics. For those who are more familiar with a few of the names above, you'll find samples by all the artists and might discover some new ones for yourself. I discovered the work of the excellent Richard Sala and Kim Deitch through this issue. The samples of other artists also allowed me to get an idea of what their work was like and I ended up reading/buying most of the artists' books off the back of this issue!

An excellent volume from McSweeney's, one of their best in fact, and a totally engrossing read. Highly recommended.

[Kevin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I recently wrote a short thing about Dave Eggers and then realized that I hadn't rated or reviewed the many issues of McSweeney's I've read. The early issues were especially influential and inspiring to me. This comics one is aces.

[Aaron · Rating 4 out of 5]

An anthology that starts out great and finishes lukewarm. I think I may lack context regarding when this was published, but surely there were more than three talented female cartoonists that could be included here. I also believe that Lynda Berry was the only cartoonist of color included. No anthology will be perfect in this regard, but I am happy that the explosion of comics creators in the years since this was published will change the demographics of future anthologies meant to invite new readers to this wonderful medium.

I found the selections here nearly identical to the other anthologies edited by Ware or Ivan Brunetti (and all other mainstream "alternative" comics anthologies, to be honest), including Ware's Best American entry and The Anthology of Graphic Fiction, Cartoons, and True Stories. I understand that Adrian Tomine is talented, but I swear if I see another excerpt from Shortcomings in an Anthology I'm going to scream. Some of the more creative writers had very short entries while others had very long excerpts that were less interesting.

The most valuable parts of this collection were, for me, the sections of drafts from Charles Schulz and George Herriman. It discusses their creative processes and the development of their work over time. They are very valuable sections and pieces that I'm happy to own now. Some of the essays were interesting, like Ware's discussion of painter Philip Guston. However, many were less interesting anecdotes about reading super hero books as children. The attitude taken by Ware here in his approach to the book was very self-effacing, as he tends to be, and recently I've started to reject that attitude of comic artists as something more detrimental to the form than endearing. He is a genius, undoubtedly, and he could stand to be more proud of what he's done for the medium and it's place in the world of literature today.

Again, my expectations are based on what I want out of these books in 2018, but I am now committed to them and can't overlook these flaws any longer.

Second thought: I don't feel like rewriting this so I'll just admit that I should cut it some slack for being the first of its kind, just noting that it has not aged as well as it could have.

[Alan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is, perhaps, the book that I wanted Arie Kaplan's recently-read Masters of the Comic Book Universe Revealed! to be... a chunky anthology of graphic art pieces and essays about graphic arts, put together by Chris Ware for McSweeney's and full to bursting with examples both historical and contemporary... with nary a superhero in tights to be seen.

Some of my own favorites are here, such as Ben Katchor, Robert Crumb and Chris Ware himself, as well as some surprising entries—who knew that John Updike had started out as a cartoonist? There's also some interest in Ware's essays about Charles Schulz' methods and about the "inventor of comics," Rodolphe Töpffer.

My only real complaint about this book is that the reproductions are tiny, and therefore sometimes hard for my aging eyes to read... something to be aware of if you're in similar straits. Other than that, though... pick it up!

[Melina · Rating 3 out of 5]

I feel like this was a really brilliant idea that got tarnished by worries about 'attitude', but still came out rather decently.

Some of the stories grabbed my interest, others were (perhaps purposefully) bland. The articles were much the same way.

Unfortunately, I developed an insidious hatred for the dust jacket. I acknowledge that the design is clever and still plan to read Chris Ware's graphic novel "Jimmy Corrigan, the Smartest Kid on Earth," but it was a bad start. I did like his excerpt inside, though.

Favorites:
Ira Glass's preface
the article on Rodolphe Töpffer
Mark Newgarden's "The Little Nun"
feature on Charles Schulz (I've got a soft spot for "Peanuts")
Charles Burns's "Black Hole"
Glen David Gold's story "...nothing less than a bursting shell could penetrate his skin!"
Richard Sala's "Strange Question"
Ben Katchor's "Hotel & Farm"
Richard Mcguire's work
Jamie and Gilbert Hernandez's juxtaposing comics

[MacDara Conroy · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you're snobbish about the comic book medium, then this might just change your mind; it's certainly given me an invaluable primer. Even if it does curiously ignore the superhero genre, the exquisite design and layout and the sheer quality of the work contained within should immunise it against most criticism.

[Bert · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very glad to have found this! Wonderfully published book (as only Chris Ware can, you can just feel his love for books). The dust jacket is a fold-out Chris Ware comic, and it's got some small comic books with it. Interesting collection of American comics creators and artists inside along with passionately written articles on comics history and artists. To read and enjoy again and again...

[Gwen Hurd · Rating 2 out of 5]

only read this under a magnifying glass. took me 2 days to read it because I kept getting dizzy. type frustratingly small. and beyond the hazards of reading, the stories were mostly narcissistic depressing memoir.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

The best and worst of comics -- mostly incredibly storytelling with a mix of whiny alternative cartoonists.

PS -- Chris Ware must love the fine print at the bottom of contracts.

[Lui Vega · Rating 5 out of 5]

Man this collection was cool as hell.

[Dominick · Rating 3 out of 5]

A lot about this book bugs me, despite its merits. First off, Ware's whingeing about comics not being taken seriously enough as art is old, even if this book did come out nearly twenty years ago. Second, as is always the case with Ware books, there are readability issues, either because all the type in the book is tiny, or because some of the strips are printed smaller than their intended size so the lettering is reduced, or, in the case of Ware's own contributions, because he has a fetish for tiny, unreadable lettering. That the dust jacket is a complexly-folded sheet the size of a newspaper page that has to be unfolded to read (and it has content on both sides--the reverse has tiny-font biographies of all the contributors) also doesn't help. The pain in the ass factor doesn't really compensate for the innovation. Third, I am not sure how much (if any) of what is included here in terms of contemporary cartooning was actually commissioned for this book, but a LOT of what appears here is excerpted from other works. I was fine with that in some cases, as I haven't read the larger works and generally the excerpts work fine as individual pieces, but it still irks me. I don't like reading excerpts, generally. I am especially glad I have read Seth's Clyde Fans because the excerpt from that (admittedly labelled as a "perplexing" excerpt) would be pretty hard to make sense of for anyone who hadn't read the rest of the book. There was certainly stuff in here that I liked--I think this is the first time I've read stuff by Ben Katchor that really grabbed me, for instance, and the mini-comics that were included as inserts into the insanely-folded cover were pretty cool, and there are other good sequences--but there's also a lot of the sort of self-involved navel-gazing, or aggressively anti-comics cartooning, that really bugs me. The school of cartoonists who thing badly-rendered art gives their work, I don't know, authenticity or whatever, do not appeal to me. For instance, there's a swatch of Jeffrey Brown's craft-free scribbling, and a bunch of ugly Mark Beyer anti-comics (complete with anti-punchlines), in one of which he moans about being picked on for his shitty comics. Boo hoo hoo. There are also some nice things in here, but it really is a mixed bag and rather a disappointment.

[KaliNoel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Notable stories: A Precursor of the Cinema by Steven Millhauser
Couting Underwater by Kiara Brinkman
Asusncion by Roy Kesey (although deeply disturbing)
Sales by Judy Budnitz
Orphans by Benjamin Rosenbaum
Seven Stories by Gyrdir Eliasson
My Room by Bragi Olafson
Nerve City by Birna Anna Bjornsdottir, Oddny Sturludottir, and Silja Hauksdorrit
Interference by Andri Snoer Magnason.

Most of the rest I couldn't get through.

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

There's a lot of comics packed into this volume, all of the indie-autobio-underground school. This is right up my street, obviously. Not really a sampler of the style, but a good precis for those already interested in it to read further from.

[Greg · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve been wanting to read this issue for quite awhile and it was definitely worth the wait. Interestingly, I found quite a few pieces that I’d encountered before. I enjoyed everything about this issue!

[Jeremy Carnes · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was good to read a lot of shorter comics by a bunch of different comics artists, but geez if this isn’t a white dude centric collection. And some of the individual comics were so tired. There’s a lot of good throughout, mixed with a lot of bad.

[David Frye · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book presents a diverse array of cleverly designed pieces. The font-size is so small that the physical labor of reading created, for me, a serious impediment to completing the book. I did finish it, though.

[David Meyer · Rating 3 out of 5]

A lot of these didn't jump out at me in any positive way, and some I found I could barely physically read the print (though I am overdue for the eye doctor, so maybe that's all on me), but the pieces that I enjoyed were truly great.

[Greg · Rating 1 out of 5]

I don't toss books aside lightly, but I had no choice with this one. The type in the essays is microscopic, and completely unreadable for me. This was the case with quite a few of the comic strips as well. Overall, a deeply unsatisfying outcome that any competent editor could have avoided..

[Esther · Rating 5 out of 5]

Heartbreak consolation through books. McSweeney’s marathon makes it all better. Just the right dose of humour as band-aid!

[Krys · Rating 5 out of 5]

The tiny print found throughout this work was the only thing about it that bothered me. The question remains, then, whether this work was effective.

[Ulysse · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great collection of artists.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really McSweeys’71. Horror book

[Paolo Z · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars.

Been on my bookshelf at home to read for 10+ years. Some fun comics and stories. Some stinkers too. But overall an enjoyable issue.

[Jay Semeniuk · Rating 3 out of 5]

a great comic anthology

[Nicole · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not my favorite McSweeney's - I'm distracted by pictures.

[Jennifer · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really don't understand how this book sat on my shelves so long before I read it. When I first heard about it, I wanted it immediately. But I was in a cheap phase, so I only put it on my paperbackswap wishlist. After a lot of patience, I finally scored a copy, but it languished, unread, until I put it on my to-read shelf this year to rectify the situation.

This really is an incredibly interesting sampler of comics. From the inventor of the form, through some classic newspaper strips, to an impressive variety of modern comics, it's hard to falt this collection for its contents. The only thing that grated for me was the editorial writing, which felt casually misogynist. Descriptions of female characters were exclusively restricted to reports on their figures (and not kindly, one woman is described as being the size of an upright Naugahyde couch, even though the actual drawings of said woman seemed not nearly so exaggerated, nor was her size every played derogatively in the printed comics.) There were some female comic writers included, and some "women's stories," but much of the text seemed to reinforce the idea of comics as a boy's club, which disappointed me.

I wouldn't say it was worth passing this book over for, it just could have been better.

[Heather · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely gorgeous and the second most impressive looking item on my bookshelf (following only Building Stories). I would give it a 5 based on appearance alone. Obviously, I love Building Stories so was delighted to see that Chris Ware was the editor. Ware's dust jacket is amazing and I was super pleased to discover the mini-comics hidden in its folds.

My tastes do run a little on the heart-wrenchingly miserable side, so I really enjoyed the more crushing comics chosen for this anthology. Charles Burn - check! Underworld series - check! Richard McGuire does an even better job than Ware of making me feel so very, very small. I didn't love everything in this collection, of course, but it would have been unreasonable to expect to. Beautiful addition to my library, for sure.

[Steve Chaput · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book in the series includes new work by Robert Crumb, Linda Barry, Los Bros.Hernandez and many others. There are also new & reprinted articles on the history of the comicstrip and comic art in America. Many of the comics are of an auto or semi-autobiographical nature, so your interest may very from artist to artist. I have to admit that, even though I've been reading comics (alternative & mainstream) for well over 40+ years I found some a bit hard to get through. Certainly not a book you would want to read in a single day, but rather pick up and read a section or two over a week or more.