Below Critical Radar: Fanzines and Alternative Comics From 1976 to Now

by Roger Sabin (Editor), Teal Triggs (Editor)

Twenty-five years of print (and web) anarchy from the fringe publishing culture. This is the first study on both fanzines and alternative comics, from the end of the hippie underground press to the start of the Internet publishing boom. Publications covered include Sniffin Glue, Buffy zines and Ghost World as well as the Konvention of Alternative Komix. Essay contributors include Gary Groth of Fantagraphics and Steven Heller, author and NY Times art editor; interviews are with Peter Bagge Hate, and Joe Sacco of Safe Area Gorazde.

120 pages, Paperback

First published January 9, 2001

About the author

Roger Sabin is a Professor of Popular Culture, and as well being a researcher, supervises PhD students. He also teaches across the BA and MA Culture, Criticism and Curation, and is based in the Culture and Enterprise Programme.

His writing includes books, essays and journalism (please see Research Profile), with other work involving broadcasting, consulting and curating for The Guardian, BBC and Tate Gallery. He serves on the boards of academic journals, and runs book lists for Palgrave Macmillan.

His interests and specialisms include comics studies, cultural studies, subcultural studies, cultural history and comedy studies, and he is currently researching the 19th century entertainment business.

Reviews

[Drew · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was an incredibly dated read with both some weird outmoded ideas about how edgelord-ism is awesome and the only valid approach for the TRULY enlightened. A product of a time when ANSWER Me! was still heralded as a groundbreaking high-water mark for the medium, no doubt. Also, all the stuff about how the internet would affect zines was hilariously off-the-mark. The plentiful archival material is the best reason to grab this one. Essays about comics were the most trenchant and least dated; a couple of the non-comic essays basically felt like wastes of time unless you were reading to laugh at how naive and unable to predict the future the authors were 15+ years ago. But not a total waste of time, on the whole. Worth the $5 I paid for it in an antique mall.

[Karina · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is a bit over the place but if you can pass that the information is interesting.