COMICS, narratives told by means of a series of drawings arranged
in horizontal lines, or strips, or rectangles called panels, and read
like text from left to right. The term applies especially to comic
strips in newspapers but also to comic books. Comics usually depict
the adventures of one or more characters in a limited time sequence.
Dialogue is represented by words encircled by a line, called a
balloon, which issues from the mouth or head of the character
speaking. Captions may also appear. Black and white comics are usually
published in daily newspapers, each feature occupying a single strip.
Comics in color usually appear in Sunday editions in a special section
and may occupy part or all of a page. Comics are also called
“funnies.” Early Comic Strips. Some characteristics of the comic
strip, including the balloon, were derived from the cartoons of
English caricaturists of the 18th and 19th centuries, such as William
Hogarth, Thomas Rowlandson, James Gillray (1757–1815), and George
Cruikshank (see CARICATURE,). “Dr. Syntax” by Rowlandson was
perhaps the first regular cartoon character. The Swiss artist and
educator Rodolphe Töpffer (1799–1846) created a precursor of the
comic strip with a picture story he devised for students in 1827. The
modern comic strip originated in the late 19th century and achieved an
almost instant popularity. The first American cartoon with the
essential characteristics of a comic strip was drawn by Richard Felton
Outcault (1863–1928) and appeared in the series Hogan’s Alley,
first published on May 5, 1895, in the New York Sunday World. The
setting was squalid city tenements and backyards filled with dogs and
cats, tough characters, and ragamuffins. One of the urchins was a
flap-eared, bald-headed, Oriental-looking child with a quizzical, yet
knowing, smile. He was dressed in a long, dirty nightshirt, which
Outcault often used as a placard to comment on the cartoon itself. The
printers, experimenting with yellow ink, chose the urchin’s
nightshirt as a test area. The yellow was a success, and so was the
“The Yellow Kid,” as he became known. When Outcault left the
World, he began to draw The Yellow Kid series for the New York
Journal. The World, however, continued to publish Hogan’s Alley,
then being drawn by the noted painter George Luks. Two other early
cartoons, each having its own supporters who considered their favorite
the first true comic strip, were The Katzenjammer Kids by Rudolph
Dirks (1877–1968), which first appeared in The American Humorist in
1897, and Little Bears by James Guilford Swinnerton (1875–1974),
which first appeared in the San Francisco Examiner in 1892. The Yellow
Kid series proved that comics sold newspapers, and they rapidly became
a newspaper staple. The most popular early strips included Buster
Brown, also created by Outcault; Foxy Grandpa by Carl Emil Schultze
(1866–1939); Little Nemo in Slumberland by Winsor McCay
(1869–1934); Happy Hooligan and Alphonse and Gaston by Frederick
Burr Opper; and Hairbreadth Harry by Charles William Kahles
(1878–1931). The first successful daily comic strip, by Bud Fisher
(1884?–1954), Mr. A. Mutt (later retitled Mutt and Jeff), appeared
in the San Francisco Chronicle on Nov. 15, 1907. Newly formed
newspaper syndicates, such as King Features, founded in 1914, made
mass circulation of comics possible. Every small-town newspaper could
obtain, for reprinting, matrices of the strips from the syndicates,
which employed the comic-strip artists. Eventually American comics
were distributed worldwide. Blondie by Chic Young (1901–73) was
probably the most widely syndicated comic strip of the mid-20th
century. Comic Books. Collections of comic strips of one title,
generally printed in color on newsprint in magazine form, have been
popular since the early 20th century. One of the first comic books was
a collection of the Mutt and Jeff comic strips reprinted from the
Chicago American in 1911. The first comic book published independently
of any newspaper, containing material specially prepared for it, was
The Funnies, a four-color book with pages the size of a tabloid
newspaper, which ran for 13 issues in 1929. Starting in 1933, a number
of comic books, again reprints of well-known newspaper comic strips,
such as Joe Palooka and Connie, were published and distributed as
premiums with certain merchandise. The first comic book to sell on
newsstands was Famous Funnies, which first appeared in 1934. A great
impetus was given to the publication of comic books by the phenomenal
success in 1938 of the comic book Action Comics, of which the
principal feature was the Superman comic strip, later published in
Superman comic books. Since that time hundreds of comic books have
been published, some containing collections of noted comic strips,
others consisting of new material. Some deal with contemporary
American life; some are condensations of literary classics; still
others are adventure stories. They appear periodically or as special
issues. In the U.S. in the last quarter of the 20th century a great
majority of young people between 5 and 17 years of age read comic
books regularly. Many adults seek comic books as collector’s items.
Evolution of Comics. Immigrant and ethnic themes were the basis for
much of the humor of the early 20th century, a period of great
emigration from Europe. Many of the first comic-strip cartoonists were
themselves immigrants or first-generation Americans. Opper, for
example, was the son of an Austrian immigrant. Bringing Up Father, by
George McManus (1884–1954), chronicled the life of an Irish
immigrant worker who had made good and his social-climbing wife. Harry
Hershfield (1885–1974) created his classic strip Abie the Agent in
1914, in which he depicted the milieu of a Jewish middle-class
businessman; it has been called the first truly adult comic strip in
America. While the Sunday comics were primarily for children, the
daily strip began to attract a new, adult audience. In addition to
Abie the Agent, such strips as The Hallroom Boys and Hazel the
Heartbreaker, by Harold A. McGill (1877–1952), reflected this new
pattern of readership. In 1912, at the time of the woman suffrage
movement, Cliff Sterrett (1883–1964) created a strip about an
independent woman, Polly and Her Pals. The beginnings of the adventure
strip and story continuity appeared as early as 1906 with Hairbreadth
Harry, the first strip that instead of having a distinct ending each
week, introduced a suspense situation. This device extended enormously
the story potential of the comic strip. The “cliff-hanger,” as the
final panel of impending danger was called, became an essential
technique in the modern adventure strip; the idea was later adapted to
film serials. One of the earliest and most influential contributors to
the evolution of the adventure strip was Roy Crane (1901–77), who
created Wash Tubbs in 1924. On Jan. 7, 1929, two epic strips—Tarzan
and Buck Rogers—were introduced coincidentally on the same day, and
the adventure genre in the comics began. Tarzan, adapted from novels
by the American novelist Edgar Rice Burroughs, was first illustrated
by Harold Foster (1892–1982), who later created Prince Valiant. Buck
Rogers was illustrated by Richard W. Calkins (1895–1962) and written
by Philip Nowlan (1888–1940), who adapted his own story, Armageddon
2419. Gasoline Alley, by Frank O. King (1883–1969), which started in
1919, marked a unique departure from the comic strip dogma that the
cast of characters never ages; its characters have grown up day by day
since 1921, along with generations of its readers. Dick Tracy, created
by Chester Gould (1900–85), was also responsible for a radical
innovation. The first character to be gunned down in the funnies was
dispatched in the strip’s first week, and the term comics became
something of a misnomer. Dick Tracy pioneered a new, hard-hitting
realism focusing on contemporary themes. In 1934 two other features
that were to further the development of the adventure strip made their
debut: Flash Gordon by Alex Raymond (1909–56) and Terry and the
Pirates by Milton Caniff (1907–88). Raymond proved to be one of the
most brilliant creators of illustrative fantasy, and Caniff integrated
the narrative and its visual expression into a uniform, aesthetic
balance utilizing so-called film techniques. The writer’s role
became more significant, and the genre began to attract professional
writers such as Lee Falk (1915–99), who created Mandrake the
Magician (1934) and The Phantom (1936). Political and Social Satire.
The Inventions of Professor Lucifer Gorgonzola Butts, created in 1914
by Rube Goldberg, epitomized humanity’s insurrection against the
tyranny of the machine with wildly complex and ingenious
“contraptions” that accomplished trivial ends. A “Rube Goldberg
Contraption” has become a part of the American vocabulary. Milt
Gross (1895–1953) created Count Screwloose from Toulouse, in which
the hero continuously escapes from a madhouse only to find the outside
world even crazier. Billy DeBeck (1890–1942) depicted the eternal
born loser in Barney Google, created in 1919. Satire in the tradition
of the British writer Jonathan Swift and the American writer Mark
Twain came to the comics in 1934 with Li’l Abner by Al Capp
(1909–79). Capp’s work is best exemplified in the epics of the
Shmoos, who supply all of humanity’s material needs and, therefore,
pose a grave threat to the establishment. Although Little Orphan Annie
(1924) gave voice to the conservative philosophy of its creator,
Harold Gray (1894–1968), it was Walt Kelly (1913–73) who
contributed a new dimension of political allegory in Pogo. Jules
Feiffer (1929– ) further enlarged the scope of the comics in 1956
with his literary cartoons of radical politics and vignettes of
psychological torments; he received a Pulitzer Prize in 1986. Among
others who have contributed perceptive comedic portraits of American
life were Tad Dorgan (1877–1929) with Indoor and Outdoor Sports;
Clare Briggs (1875–1930) with Mr. and Mrs.; H. T. Webster
(1885–1925) with The Timid Soul; and Mort Walker (1923– ), whose
Beetle Bailey continued the American tradition of the soldier’s
healthy irreverence for military authority. Charles Schulz
(1922–2000) with Peanuts and Johnny Hart (1931– ) with B.C. and
Wizard of Id, the latter created with artist Brant Parker (1920– ),
brought to the comic strip a new sophistication and philosophical
insight. Doonesbury, with its political satire and ironic sketches of
“counterculture” lifestyles, won Garry Trudeau (1948– ) a
Pulitzer Prize in 1975; a satirical strip in a similar vein was Bloom
County, created by Berke Breathed (1957– ), who won a Pulitzer Prize
in 1987. Jim Davis (1945– ), with Garfield, cast a comical eye upon
the hedonistic antihero figure, in the form of a crotchety, overweight
cat. Impact on Society. Cartoons not only reflect American life, they
help mold it. They have set the style for clothing, coiffure, food,
manners, and mores. They have inspired plays, musicals, ballets,
motion pictures, radio and television series, popular songs, books,
and toys. Modern language has been permeated with idioms and
onomatopoeic words created in the comics. For example, the code word
for the Allied Forces on D day was “Mickey Mouse,” and the
password for the Norwegian Underground was “The Phantom.” With the
birth of the comic strip and the American pioneer cartoonist-painters
such as George B. Luks, Lyonel Feininger, and John Sloan, there has
been a continuous interplay with the fine arts. The influences of Art
Nouveau can be seen in the work of McManus and McCay. Numerous
painters and sculptors, including Pablo Picasso, Roy Lichtenstein,
Andy Warhol, and Claes Oldenburg, have in turn recognized the
potential of the cartoon idiom and iconography and found the comics a
rich source of inspiration. Motion picture directors Federico Fellini,
Jean Luc Godard, and Alain Resnais (1922– ) have adapted techniques
of the comics in their films. A number of strips have found a devoted
following among intellectuals; most notable, perhaps, is Krazy Kat by
George Herriman (1881–1944), which has been regarded by many as one
of the most amusing and imaginative works of art ever produced in
America.
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