So yesterday I went into the library and a tome-like monster of a book caught my eye on the new stock shelf. Drawn and Quarterly; 25 Years of Contemporary Cartooning, Comics and Graphic Novels, cover and spine unmistakably by Tom Gauld.
I grabbed it and fortunately had space left to loan one more book before exceeding the limit. Of what I've read so far it details the rise of the publishing company starting from the initial idea of Chris Oliveros to make a comic magazine with intelligent cultured non-superhero comics with a strong feminist agenda to counterbalance the boys club of the comics industry and further the developments RAW and The Comics Journal were making.
It's pretty rivetting, and of course my interest from the beginning has been comics so it makes sense really. I'm not entirely sure what my point of focus will be at the minute, perhaps the effect Drawn and Quarterly had on the comics industry, or feminism in comics with a strong focus on Drawn and Quarterly. Either way I need to finish this book and do some extensive research into this and other publishing companies.
I gathered all of my D + Q books, there's fewer than I thought but I think that's because I lent many of my comics to Tom a while ago. It's a good job because I've absolutely run out of shelf space now. I seem to have mostly Fantagraphics and Jonathan Cape. Inconvenient.
Anyway at the minute I have:
32 Stories: The Complete Optic Nerve Mini Comic by Adrian Tomine
Moomin: The Complete Tove Jansson Comic Strip by Tove Jansson
Wimbledon Green by Seth
Map of my Heart by John Porcellino
I Never Liked You by Chester Brown
My Most Secret Desire by Julie Doucet
Scenes from an Impending Marriage by Adrian Tomine
This should keep me going for research until I get back to the library.
I'm pleased to report I am excited about this proposal, rather than flatly disappointed, as I was with the other.
