[PREV - BLISH]    [TOP]

CULTURAL_SCRAPS

                                             July 14, 2008

Gerard Jones on the original
creators of superhero comic books
in his "Men of Tomorrow" (2004):

   "Their relationships with masculinity, sexuality, power,
   individuality, violence, authority, and their modern
   fluidity of the self were so tangled and so heartfelt that
   their work spoke to the anxieties of modern life more
   sympathetically, more completely, more acutely than they
   could have foreseen in their most inflated summer
   daydreams.  With the passage of time, their creations
   become only more relevant.  They forecast and helped
   shape geek culture.  They laid the template for the
   modern concept of the entertainment franchise.  They
   created the perfect packageable, marketable fantasy for
   the culture of consumer narcissism. They spawned artistic
   subcultures.  All without quite knowing what they were
   doing.  All by rushing frantically forward, trying to
   stay a step ahead of the wolves, snatching at the
   cultural scraps they found around them on the Lower East
   Side and in Glenville and the Bronx and shaping them
   into something that could be sold quick and cheap."


--------
[NEXT - GLADIATOR]