Orgy Bound

by Daniel Clowes

Book by Clowes, Daniel

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Fiction

80 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1996

About the author

Daniel Clowes is an American cartoonist, graphic novelist, illustrator, and screenwriter whose work helped define the landscape of alternative comics and bring the medium into mainstream literary conversation. Rising to prominence through his long-running anthology Eightball, he used its pages to blend acidic humor, social observation, surrealism, and character-driven storytelling, producing serials that later became acclaimed graphic novels including Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron, Ghost World, David Boring, Ice Haven, and Patience. His illustrations have appeared in major publications such as The New Yorker, Vogue, and The Village Voice, while his collaborations with filmmaker Terry Zwigoff resulted in the films Ghost World and Art School Confidential, the former earning widespread praise and an Academy Award nomination for its screenplay. Clowes began honing his voice in the 1980s with contributions to Cracked and with his Lloyd Llewellyn stories for Fantagraphics, but it was Eightball, launched in 1989, that showcased the full range of his interests, from deadpan satire to psychological drama. Known for blending kitsch, grotesquerie, and a deep love of mid-century American pop culture, he helped shape the sensibilities of a generation of cartoonists and became a central figure in the shift toward graphic novels being treated as serious literature. His post-Eightball books continued this evolution, with works like Wilson, Mister Wonderful, The Death-Ray, and the recent Monica exploring aging, identity, longing, and the complexities of relationships, often through inventive visual structures that echo the history of newspaper comics. Clowes has also been active in music and design, creating artwork for Sub Pop bands, the Ramones, and other artists, and contributing to film posters, New Yorker covers, and Criterion Collection releases. His work has earned dozens of honors, including multiple Harvey and Eisner Awards, a Pen Award for Outstanding Body of Work in Graphic Literature, an Inkpot Award, and the prestigious Fauve d’Or at Angoulême. Exhibitions of his original art have appeared across the United States and internationally, with a major retrospective, Modern Cartoonist: The Art of Daniel Clowes, touring museums beginning in 2012. His screenplay work extended beyond Ghost World to projects like Art School Confidential and Wilson, and he has long been a touchstone for discussions about Generation X culture, alternative comics, and the shifting boundaries between the literary and graphic arts.

Reviews

[Batmark · Rating 5 out of 5]

http://morethansuperhumans.blogspot.c...

Orgy Bound contains 36 brief stories from the early issues of Clowes's Eightball comic book series. You will not find an angrier or more disturbing collection of short stories anywhere in comics--with the possible exception of R. Crumb's mid-period work. Early in his career, Clowes perfected the "angry young man" aesthetic to an almost alarming degree, and Orgy Bound contains the absolute best examples of his rage in comic book form.

Highly recommended, particularly for the 20-something male--but with obvious caveats.

[ComicNerdSam · Rating 3 out of 5]

A mixed bag like the rest of his Eightball shorts, but some fun stuff in here.

[drown_like_its_1999 · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a small collection of content from the early issues of Eightball. The trade starts out with my preferred Clowes tone utilizing cynical satire and farce in strips like Needledick the Bugfucker, Art School Confidential, and a series of Zubrick and Pogeybait comics among many others. The latter half of the collection contains more surreal tone pieces that while, somewhat alluring, never quite deliver anything more than curiosity.

[Rstarin74 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eightball. Read it.