Mysterious Travelers: Steve Ditko and the Search for a New Liberal Identity

Great Comics Artists Series

by Zack Kruse

Steve Ditko (1927–2018) is one of the most important contributors to American comic books. As the cocreator of Spider-Man and sole creator of Doctor Strange, Ditko made an indelible mark on American popular culture. Mysterious Steve Ditko and the Search for a New Liberal Identity resets the conversation about his heady and powerful work. Always inward facing, Ditko’s narratives employed superhero and supernatural fantasy in the service of self-examination, and with characters like the Question, Mr. A, and Static, Ditko turned ordinary superhero comics into philosophic treatises. Many of Ditko’s philosophy-driven comics show a clear debt to ideas found in Ayn Rand’s Objectivism. Unfortunately, readers often reduce Ditko’s work to a mouthpiece for Rand’s vision. Mysterious Travelers unsettles this notion. In this book, Zack Kruse argues that Ditko’s philosophy draws on a complicated network of ideas that is best understood as mystic liberalism. Although Ditko is not the originator of mystic liberalism, his comics provide a unique window into how such an ideology operates in popular media. Examining selections of Ditko’s output from 1953 to 1986, Kruse demonstrates how Ditko’s comics provide insight into a unique strand of American thought that has had a lasting impact.

Genres: Comics, Biography, Philosophy, History

286 pages, Paperback

Published February 15, 2021

Reviews

[Danny]

Overall I think this is worth a read, however it does slow down considerably in certain parts where Kruse lets himself be caught repeating the same points made earlier in the same chapter or lean more toward summary than analysis. That said, Kruse presents a lot of great insights into Ditko’s philosophical worldview and how it related to what he expressed in his work, and I learned quite a bit about Ditko’s life and beliefs and put the book down having had my interest in seeking out even more of his comics renewed.

[Dan Newland · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mysterious Travelers is a fantastic book. Kruse combines philosophy, literary criticism, and history in his quest to show that Ditko’s stories and heroes reflect an ideology that has had a great influence on American life and politics.

Full Review: https://www.comicbookyeti.com/post/my...