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2009 Reading #66: I Shall Destroy All the Civilized Planets
Books 1-10.
Books 11-20.
Books 21-30.
Books 31-40.
Books 41-50.
Books 51-60.
61. Hmong in Minnesota by Chia Youyee Vang.
62. Myths and Legends of the Sioux by Marie L. McLaughlin.
63. Heir of Sea and Fire (Book Two of the Riddlemaster trilogy) by Patricia McKillip.
64. Sea, Swallow Me and Other Stories by Craig Laurance Gidney.
65. Essential Incredible Hulk Volume 1 by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko, et al.
66. I Shall Destroy All the Civilized Planets: The Comics of Fletcher Hanks by Fletcher Hanks and Paul Karasik. Post-Sycamore Hill a few of us spent the afternoon in Asheville and stopped by Malaprop's Bookstore. There, glancing at their graphic novel selection, Colonel Rowe and I were looking at a volume of reprinted nuttiness from '40s comics and came across a story by Fletcher Hanks. We showed it to Alice who, in her knowing way, said that a volume of his work had been reprinted and it was even crazier all at once. And it is. At first glance Hanks' art looks unschooled, almost naive--the proportions of his figures, particularly on Stardust the Super Wizard, are elongated or distorted. But a look at Hanks' villains makes it clear that he's working in the sphere of the grotesque, and a survey of the crimes and punishments he depicts only reinforces that. A mob of criminals launches a hyperbolic assault on New York City; a madman called the Demon sends a thousand-foot wave against it. In both cases--in most of these stories, in fact--the hero waits until after a few (or a few thousand) people have died to intercede, even when they know what's being planned beforehand. Villains are punished by being frozen alive, hurled into space, changed into rats, combined into one body (!), and perhaps craziest of all, turned into a giant head, hurled at a headless space giant, and absorbed into the giant's body. Yeah. AND THEN there's the afterword, in which Karasik, who edited this collection, tells the story (in comic form) of meeting Hanks' son, who enlightens him as to the abusive and drunken nature of his father. This is seriously weird shit, people. By which I mean that you should read it, of course.
Books 11-20.
Books 21-30.
Books 31-40.
Books 41-50.
Books 51-60.
61. Hmong in Minnesota by Chia Youyee Vang.
62. Myths and Legends of the Sioux by Marie L. McLaughlin.
63. Heir of Sea and Fire (Book Two of the Riddlemaster trilogy) by Patricia McKillip.
64. Sea, Swallow Me and Other Stories by Craig Laurance Gidney.
65. Essential Incredible Hulk Volume 1 by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko, et al.
66. I Shall Destroy All the Civilized Planets: The Comics of Fletcher Hanks by Fletcher Hanks and Paul Karasik. Post-Sycamore Hill a few of us spent the afternoon in Asheville and stopped by Malaprop's Bookstore. There, glancing at their graphic novel selection, Colonel Rowe and I were looking at a volume of reprinted nuttiness from '40s comics and came across a story by Fletcher Hanks. We showed it to Alice who, in her knowing way, said that a volume of his work had been reprinted and it was even crazier all at once. And it is. At first glance Hanks' art looks unschooled, almost naive--the proportions of his figures, particularly on Stardust the Super Wizard, are elongated or distorted. But a look at Hanks' villains makes it clear that he's working in the sphere of the grotesque, and a survey of the crimes and punishments he depicts only reinforces that. A mob of criminals launches a hyperbolic assault on New York City; a madman called the Demon sends a thousand-foot wave against it. In both cases--in most of these stories, in fact--the hero waits until after a few (or a few thousand) people have died to intercede, even when they know what's being planned beforehand. Villains are punished by being frozen alive, hurled into space, changed into rats, combined into one body (!), and perhaps craziest of all, turned into a giant head, hurled at a headless space giant, and absorbed into the giant's body. Yeah. AND THEN there's the afterword, in which Karasik, who edited this collection, tells the story (in comic form) of meeting Hanks' son, who enlightens him as to the abusive and drunken nature of his father. This is seriously weird shit, people. By which I mean that you should read it, of course.
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Fletcher Hanks
(Anonymous) 2009-08-18 02:02 pm (UTC)(link)A second volume has just been released collecting ALL of the rest of the work by this madman cartoonist whom R.Crumb called, "a twisted dude".
PLUS if you order "You Shall die By Your Own Evil Creation!" from the publisher, you'll get a FREE Fletcher Hanks coloring book with a cover by Charles Burns! (that's probably more than the value of what you might save through Amazon and you support a great small publisher).
-Paul Karasik
www.fletcherhanks.com
Re: Fletcher Hanks