Skepticism and the Illustrated Classics

Jones, W.B. Classics Illustrated: A Cultural History, with Illustrations. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, Inc. 2002.

Acknowledged by many as a "road map to the real books," Illustrated Classics were an integral part of the literary growth from the period of 1941 to 1971. By the mid 1950's more than 100 titles had been published. They appeared in 26 languages and were wildly popular with the Baby Boomer generation.

Employed by Elliot Publishing Company, it was Albert Kanter who was responsible for the idea of the Classics comic. In 1941 he commissioned a 62-page adaptation of Dumas' The Three Musketeers, which was met with enthusiastic approval from the public. Designating themselves as the Gilberton Company, Kanter and his partner Raymond Haas, found their idea to be a great success. Kanter hoped to appeal to educators by incorporating "Back-of-the-book" sections that contained educational or patriotic materials.

After dying down in the 1970's, well after the "Golden Age" of the comic, Classics Illustrated experienced a revival in the 1990's through the First Publishing company in Chicago. Their ambition was to redraw the classics using the contemporary and rising styles of the graphic novel in order to appeal to a waning young-adult audience. Prominent artists of the day (indeed some with seeming Rock Star status) in the field, were invited to contribute their artwork to each endeavor.

More on Classics Illustrated here.
More skepticism on Classics Illustrated here.

My thoughts:
After spending the large part of this week trying to track these titles down, I'm feeling a bit daunted. The WMU librarians raise an eyebrow when I mention "comics" and while they are helpful at maneuvering through searches, they haven't found anything that I wasn't able to come up with on my own. I headed out to the Kalamazoo Public Library to see if their YA section had any of these texts. What I discovered was a multitude of Great Illustrated Classics published by Baronet Books. I found an old copy of one of these such texts, Moby Dick, in the used bookstore beneath Crow's Nest and spent some time skimming through it. What I discovered about these texts is that while they are "graphic" in the sense that every other page is a black and white illustration of the text that it accompanies, they do not conform to what is largely considered the sequential or graphic novel format. There are no text bubbles, frames, or pictorial movements for the reader to follow. The story is contained on one side of the book, and the pictures on the other side.

Perhaps for a young person--or more likely, an adult hoping to get his/her child into the classics--this might be a good "gateway" type of a text. The language of the classic the book represents has been immensely simplified. In fact, other than understanding the basic story of the classic, it would be impossible to glean the language or art of the original author.

From what I have read about the Classics Illustrated series, the artists and storytellers try to remain as true to the original author's tone, style, and text as possible.

I'm still trying to find one of these texts......back to Amazon for me.