Howard Cruse

Howard Cruse
Author: Janine Utell
Publisher: Univ. Press of Mississippi
Total Pages: 149
Release: 2023-03-02
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1496843517

Howard Cruse tells the life story of one of the most important figures in LGBTQ+ comics. A preacher’s kid from Alabama who became “the godfather of queer comics,” Cruse (1944–2019) was a groundbreaking underground cartoonist, a wicked satirist, an LGBTQ+ activist, and a mentor to a vast network of queer comics artists. His comic strip Wendel, published in The Advocate throughout the 1980s, is considered a revolutionary moment in the development of LGBTQ+ comics, as is his inaugurating the editorship of Gay Comix with Kitchen Sink Press in 1979, which furthered the careers of important artists like Jennifer Camper and Alison Bechdel. Cruse’s graphic novel Stuck Rubber Baby, published in 1995, fictionalizes his own coming out in the context of the civil rights movement in 1960s Birmingham and was a significant forerunner to contemporary graphic novels and memoirs. Howard Cruse draws on extensive archival research and interviews and covers Cruse’s entire body of work: the cute and zany Barefootz, the unexpected innovations of the Gay Comix stories, the domestic intimacies of Wendel, and the complexity and power of Stuck Rubber Baby. The book places Cruse’s art in the context of his life and his times, including the historic movements for gay rights and against the AIDS crisis, and it celebrates this extraordinary and essential figure of LGBTQ+ comics and American comics art more broadly.

From Headrack to Claude

From Headrack to Claude
Author: Howard Cruse
Publisher: Northwest Press
Total Pages: 114
Release: 2009
Genre: Comics & Graphic Novels
ISBN: 0578032511

A compilation of Howard Cruse's gay-themed comic strips and comic book stories published between 1976 and 2008, with supplementary background material and a few unpublished extras. Some stories originally appeared in adults-only underground comix; for that reason this book carries a "for mature readers" warning

The Life and Comics of Howard Cruse

The Life and Comics of Howard Cruse
Author: Andrew J. Kunka
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Total Pages: 161
Release: 2021-12-10
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1978818874

Nominated for the 2022 Eisner Award - Best Academic/Scholarly Work The Life and Comics of Howard Cruse tells the remarkable story of how a self-described “preacher’s kid” from Birmingham, Alabama, became the so-called “Godfather of Gay Comics.” This study showcases a remarkable fifty-year career that included working in the 1970s underground comics scene, becoming founding editor of the groundbreaking anthology series Gay Comix, and publishing the graphic novel Stuck Rubber Baby, partially based on his own experience of coming of age in the Civil Rights era. Through his exploration of Cruse’s life and work, Andrew J. Kunka also chronicles the dramatic ways that gay culture changed over the course of Cruse’s lifetime, from Cold War-era homophobia to the gay liberation movement to the AIDS crisis to the legalization of gay marriage. Highlighting Cruse’s skills as a trenchant satirist and social commentator, Kunka explores how he cast a queer look at American politics, mainstream comics culture, and the gay community’s own norms. Lavishly illustrated with a broad selection of comics from Cruse’s career, this study serves as a perfect introduction to this pioneering cartoonist, as well as an insightful read for fans who already love how his work sketched a new vision of gay life.

QU33R

QU33R
Author: Rob Kirby
Publisher: Northwest Press
Total Pages: 267
Release: 2013-08-01
Genre: Comics & Graphic Novels
ISBN: 1938720377

Winner of the 2014 Ignatz Award for Outstanding Anthology! QU33R, from editor Rob Kirby, features 241 pages of new comics from 33 contributors—legends and new faces alike. In 2012, Justin Hall edited a book called No Straight Lines: Four Decades of Queer Comics, that took readers on a journey from the beginnings of LGBT comics history to the present day. QU33R is an all-new project featuring queer comics legends as well as new talents that picks up where No Straight Lines left off. We've set down our history, now QU33R shines a light on our future! QU33R had its genesis in an all-color queer comic zine called THREE, which featured three stories by three creators or teams per issue. Rob Kirby published three installments of THREE annually from 2010 to 2012, and the series did well, garnering not only an Ignatz nomination for Outstanding Anthology or Collection but also earning Rob the Prism Comics Queer Press Grant in 2011. Producing the anthology was immensely gratifying, but featuring just three comics and publishing only once per year meant a lot of cartoonists weren’t getting the exposure they deserved. The publishing opportunities for queer cartoonists and queer subject matter are still limited, even today, and Rob longed for a wider distribution than he was able to manage on his own. He approached Northwest Press about doing a bigger compendium of all-new work. While THREE was happening, Justin Hall was preparing his book No Straight Lines: Four Decades of Queer Comics, which Fantagraphics published in the summer of 2012. No Straight Lines traced the history of queer comics from their humble beginnings in the late 60’s/early 70’s all the way up to the present. The book was a whopping, award-winning success. Rob got to thinking that a follow-up volume—a sort-of-sequel focusing on all new work—would seal the deal, informing the world at large that we are still here, still queer, and still producing fresh and innovative work. He wanted to include not only several queer comics veterans, but also some fresh new faces and a few folks who haven’t necessarily belonged to the orthodox "queer comics scene" but have been doing non-heteronormative work all along. QU33R features over 240 pages of new comics from a cross-generational lineup of award-winning LGBTQ cartoonists: Amanda Verwey (Manderz Totally Top Private Diary) Andy Hartzell (Fox Bunny Funny, Xeric grant recipient Bread and Circuses) Annie Murphy (Gay Genius, I Still Live) Carlo Quispe (Uranus) Carrie McNinch (You Don’t Get There From Here, The Assassin and the Whiner) Christine Smith (The Princess) Craig Bostick (Darby Crash, Go-Go Girl, Boy Trouble) David Kelly (Rainy Day Recess: The Complete Steven’s Comics, Boy Trouble) Diane DiMassa (Hothead Paisan: Homicidal Lesbian Terrorist) Dylan "NDR" Edwards (Transposes, Politically InQueerect) Ed Luce (Wuvable Oaf)Edie Fake (Gaylord Phoenix) Eric Kostiuk Williams (Hungry Bottom Comics) Eric Orner (The Mostly Unfabulous Social Life of Ethan Green) Howard Cruse (Stuck Rubber Baby, Wendel, Barefootz) Ivan Velez, Jr. (Tales of the Closet, Dead High Yearbook) Jennifer Camper (Juicy Mother, Rude Girls and Dangerous Women, subGURLZ) Jon Macy (Teleny and Camille, Fearful Hunter, Nefarismo) Jose-Luis Olivares (Pansy Boy) Justin Hall (No Straight Lines: Four Decades of Queer Comics, Glamazonia, True Travel Tales) Kris Dresen (Manya, Max & Lily, She Said) L. Nichols (Flocks, Jumbly Junkery) Marian Runk (Not a Horse Girl, The Magic Hedge) MariNaomi (Kiss and Tell: A Romantic Resume, Smoke in Your Eyes, Estrus Comics) Michael Fahy (Boy Trouble) Nicole Georges (Calling Dr. Laura, Invincible Summer) Rick Worley (A Waste of Time) Rob Kirby (THREE, Boy Trouble, Curbside) Sasha Steinberg (Stonewall, Queerotica) Sina Sparrow (Art Fag, Boy Crazy Boy) Steve MacIsaac (Shirtlifter) Terrance Griep (Scooby-Doo) Tyler Cohen (Primahood) Released by Northwest Press, which has been publishing quality LGBT-inclusive comics and graphic novels since 2010.

Stuck Rubber Baby

Stuck Rubber Baby
Author: Howard Cruse
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2010
Genre: Civil rights
ISBN: 9781401227135

A tale of Toland Polk, a young man caught in the maelstrom of the civil rights movement and the intrenched homophobia of small-town America

The LGBTQ+ Comics Studies Reader

The LGBTQ+ Comics Studies Reader
Author: Alison Halsall
Publisher: Univ. Press of Mississippi
Total Pages: 332
Release: 2022-09-20
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 1496841360

Winner of the 2023 Eisner Award for Best Academic/Scholarly Work Contributions by Michelle Ann Abate, William S. Armour, Alison Bechdel, Jennifer Camper, Tesla Cariani, Matthew Cheney, Hillary Chute, Edmond (Edo) Ernest dit Alban, Ramzi Fawaz, Margaret Galvan, Justin Hall, Alison Halsall, Lara Hedberg, Susanne Hochreiter, Sheena C. Howard, Rebecca Hutton, remus jackson, Keiko Miyajima, Chinmay Murali, Marina Rauchenbacher, Katharina Serles, Sathyaraj Venkatesan, Jonathan Warren, and Lin Young The LGBTQ+ Comics Studies Reader explores the exemplary trove of LGBTQ+ comics that coalesced in the underground and alternative comix scenes of the mid-1960s and in the decades after. Through insightful essays and interviews with leading comics figures, volume contributors illuminate the critical opportunities, current interactions, and future directions of these comics. This heavily illustrated volume engages with the work of preeminent artists across the globe, such as Howard Cruse, Edie Fake, Justin Hall, Jennifer Camper, and Alison Bechdel, whose iconic artwork is reproduced within the volume. Further, it addresses and questions the possibilities of LGBTQ+ comics from various scholarly positions and multiple geographical vantages, covering a range of queer lived experience. Along the way, certain LGBTQ+ touchstones emerge organically and inevitably—pride, coming out, chosen families, sexual health, gender, risk, and liberation. Featuring comics figures across the gamut of the industry, from renowned scholars to emerging creators and webcomics artists, the reader explores a range of approaches to LGBTQ+ comics—queer history, gender and sexuality theory, memory studies, graphic medicine, genre studies, biography, and more—and speaks to the diversity of publishing forms and media that shape queer comics and their reading communities. Chapters trace the connections of LGBTQ+ comics from the panel, strip, comic book, graphic novel, anthology, and graphic memoir to their queer readership, the LGBTQ+ history they make visible, the often still quite fragile LGBTQ+ distribution networks, the coded queer intelligence they deploy, and the community-sustaining energy and optimism they conjure. Above all, The LGBTQ+ Comics Studies Reader highlights the efficacy of LGBTQ+ comics as a kind of common ground for creators and readers.

Comics through Time [4 volumes]

Comics through Time [4 volumes]
Author: M. Keith Booker
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Total Pages: 2803
Release: 2014-10-28
Genre: Social Science
ISBN:

Focusing especially on American comic books and graphic novels from the 1930s to the present, this massive four-volume work provides a colorful yet authoritative source on the entire history of the comics medium. Comics and graphic novels have recently become big business, serving as the inspiration for blockbuster Hollywood movies such as the Iron Man series of films and the hit television drama The Walking Dead. But comics have been popular throughout the 20th century despite the significant effects of the restrictions of the Comics Code in place from the 1950s through 1970s, which prohibited the depiction of zombies and use of the word "horror," among many other rules. Comics through Time: A History of Icons, Idols, and Ideas provides students and general readers a one-stop resource for researching topics, genres, works, and artists of comic books, comic strips, and graphic novels. The comprehensive and broad coverage of this set is organized chronologically by volume. Volume 1 covers 1960 and earlier; Volume 2 covers 1960–1980; Volume 3 covers 1980–1995; and Volume 4 covers 1995 to the present. The chronological divisions give readers a sense of the evolution of comics within the larger contexts of American culture and history. The alphabetically arranged entries in each volume address topics such as comics publishing, characters, imprints, genres, themes, titles, artists, writers, and more. While special attention is paid to American comics, the entries also include coverage of British, Japanese, and European comics that have influenced illustrated storytelling of the United States or are of special interest to American readers.

Good White Queers?

Good White Queers?
Author: Kai Linke
Publisher: transcript Verlag
Total Pages: 333
Release: 2021-03-31
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 3839449170

How do white queer people portray our own whiteness? Can we, in the stories we tell about ourselves, face the uncomfortable fact that, while queer, we might still be racist? If we cannot, what does that say about us as potential allies in intersectional struggles? A careful analysis of Dykes To Watch Out For and Stuck Rubber Baby by queer comic icons Alison Bechdel and Howard Cruse traces the intersections of queerness and racism in the neglected medium of queer comics, while a close reading of Jaime Cortez's striking graphic novel Sexile/Sexilio offers glimpses of the complexities and difficult truths that lie beyond the limits of the white queer imaginary.

American Comics: A History

American Comics: A History
Author: Jeremy Dauber
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Total Pages: 593
Release: 2021-11-16
Genre: History
ISBN: 0393635619

The sweeping story of cartoons, comic strips, and graphic novels and their hold on the American imagination. Comics have conquered America. From our multiplexes, where Marvel and DC movies reign supreme, to our television screens, where comics-based shows like The Walking Dead have become among the most popular in cable history, to convention halls, best-seller lists, Pulitzer Prize–winning titles, and MacArthur Fellowship recipients, comics shape American culture, in ways high and low, superficial, and deeply profound. In American Comics, Columbia professor Jeremy Dauber takes readers through their incredible but little-known history, starting with the Civil War and cartoonist Thomas Nast, creator of the lasting and iconic images of Uncle Sam and Santa Claus; the golden age of newspaper comic strips and the first great superhero boom; the moral panic of the Eisenhower era, the Marvel Comics revolution, and the underground comix movement of the 1960s and ’70s; and finally into the twenty-first century, taking in the grim and gritty Dark Knights and Watchmen alongside the brilliant rise of the graphic novel by acclaimed practitioners like Art Spiegelman and Alison Bechdel. Dauber’s story shows not only how comics have changed over the decades but how American politics and culture have changed them. Throughout, he describes the origins of beloved comics, champions neglected masterpieces, and argues that we can understand how America sees itself through whose stories comics tell. Striking and revelatory, American Comics is a rich chronicle of the last 150 years of American history through the lens of its comic strips, political cartoons, superheroes, graphic novels, and more. FEATURING… • American Splendor • Archie • The Avengers • Kyle Baker • Batman • C. C. Beck • Black Panther • Captain America • Roz Chast • Walt Disney • Will Eisner • Neil Gaiman • Bill Gaines • Bill Griffith • Harley Quinn • Jack Kirby • Denis Kitchen • Krazy Kat • Harvey Kurtzman • Stan Lee • Little Orphan Annie • Maus • Frank Miller • Alan Moore • Mutt and Jeff • Gary Panter • Peanuts • Dav Pilkey • Gail Simone • Spider-Man • Superman • Dick Tracy • Wonder Wart-Hog • Wonder Woman • The Yellow Kid • Zap Comix … AND MANY MORE OF YOUR FAVORITES!

Stuck Rubber Baby 25th Anniversary Edition

Stuck Rubber Baby 25th Anniversary Edition
Author: Howard Cruse
Publisher: First Second
Total Pages: 240
Release: 2020-07-21
Genre: Comics & Graphic Novels
ISBN: 1250791375

Painstakingly researched and exquisitely illustrated, Stuck Rubber Baby is a groundbreaking graphic novel that draws on Howard Cruse’s experience coming of age and coming out in 1960s Birmingham, Alabama. This 25th anniversary edition brings this rich and moving tale of identity and resistance is back in print—complete with an updated introduction from Alison Bechdel, rare photographs, and unpublished archival material that give a thorough, behind-the-scenes look at this graphic novel masterpiece. As a young gay man leading a closeted life in the 1960s American South, Toland Polk tries his best to keep a low profile. He’s aware of the racial injustice all around him—the segregationist politicians, the corrupt cops, the violent Klan members—but he feels powerless to make a difference. That all changes when he crosses paths with an impassioned coed named Ginger Raines. Ginger introduces him to a lively and diverse group of civil rights activists, folk singers, and night club performers—men and women who live authentically despite the conformist values of their hometown. Emboldened by this new community, Toland joins the local protests and even finds the courage to venture into a gay bar. No longer content to stay on the sidelines, Toland joins his friends as they fight against bigotry. But in Clayfield, Alabama, that can be dangerous—even deadly.