Vi har ikke hørt det sidste fra den nu afdøde godfather af indy comics, Harvey Pekar. Heidi MacDonald gør opmærksom på flere titler i hendes blog, The Beat. Så det er for tidligt at springe over Vertigo sektionen i det månedlige Previews. Jeg skulle jo altid granske Vertigo sektionen, bare i tilfælde af, at der skulle være mere Harvey Pekar. Resten af Vertigo’s titler var og er jeg i det store hele temmelig ligeglad med, men altså ikke Harvey Pekar, som jeg har fulgt siden 1980’erne.
fra http://www.comicsbeat.com/2010/08/13/new-pekar-project-strips/
Several Pekar Project strips are appearing after the death of Harvey Pekar, including the new Untitled, with art by Rick Parker.
Two more strips remain: “Jewish Chops,” by Vanessa Davis and Part 2 of the 4-part Harvey Pekar / Doug Rushkoff team-up illustrated by Sean Pryor.
Og Vertigo’s redaktør mindes Harvey Pekar:
fra http://vertigo.blog.dccomics.com/2010/07/12/harvey-pekar-dies-at-70/
Monday, July 12th, 2010
“I am terribly sad today. Working with Harvey Pekar was one of my first experiences at Vertigo and it’s still one of my best, not only in comics but in my life. Underneath the well-known gruff exterior, Harvey was a deeply compassionate person and of course, a brilliant mind. He created, almost singlehandedly, an entirely new kind of comics and his commitment to what he did was absolute and uncompromising. We’ve all suffered a huge loss today, in comics of course, but also in American culture.”
–Jonathan Vankin, Editor
Og Charlie Blizz har læst en af Vertigo’s Harvey Pekar titler, “The Quitter”:
fra http://looseleafbound.wordpress.com/2010/02/24/the-quitter-by-harvey-pekar-review/
So what is the title all about? Well, it seems to go hand in hand with a string that ran through the early part of Pekar’s life: his ability and willingness to quit anything the moment it showed the least bit difficulty. The Navy. College. Women. etc. etc. etc. Pekar blames this trait, at least partially, on a crippling lack of self-esteem fed by an overly critical and depressed mother and a father with whom he shared nothing concerning culture, social views or anything.
Pekar’s success in life, in comics, seems to stem from his eventual overcoming of this fear. It was his success as a jazz critic that seemed to have stemmed the tide of self-doubt and provide the stepping stone for his later determination and success as a comic writer.
One of the things that I find most interesting with “Quitter” is the conversational tone of the work. It reminds me very much of a script. Stage directions are provided but the real meat of the story is in the dialog. Even in panels where the exposition isn’t dialog, Pekar’s writing makes it feel as if he is in the room telling you the story. It is a trait of a story teller and is immediately engaging. Such a conversational tone engages the reader in a way that a more distanced tone is incapable of.