You are invited to the world premiere of Jules Feiffer‘s long-awaited collection, Explainers, featuring the complete first decade of his legendary and groundbreaking comic strip, Sick, Sick, Sick (and later redubbed Feiffer), from the Village Voice. Feiffer will read from the book and answer questions before signing copies of the deluxe hardcover collection.
“Samuel Johnson said he hoped God would think he had made good of his God-given talents. Jules Feiffer need have no dread of such an audit… What has made his services so welcome for so many years now is his possession, in addition to high intelligence, of something no hypocrite or egomaniac could claim, which is a human sense of humor.” – Kurt Vonnegut
WHO: Jules Feiffer
WHAT: Explainers: The Complete Village Voice Strips 1956-66
World premiere book release reading and signing
WHERE: THE STRAND
828 Broadway at 12th St. (Union Square)
New York, NY 10003-4805
212.473.1452
WHEN: Thursday, May 15, 7PM
This event is free and open to the public.
ANNOUNCING EXPLAINERS: THE COMPLETE VILLAGE VOICE STRIPS 1956-1966
In 1956, a relatively unknown cartoonist by the name of Jules Feiffer started contributing a strip to the only alternative weekly published in the US, a small radical newspaper called The Village Voice. His strip tackled just about every issue, private and public, that affected the sentient American: relationships, sexuality, love, family, parents, children, psychoanalysis, neuroses, presidents, politicians, media, race, class, labor, religion, foreign policy, war, and one or two other existential questions. It was the first time that the American public had been subjected to a weekly dose of comics that so uncompromisingly and wittily confronted individuals’ private fears and society’s public transgressions. Explainers is the first of four volumes collecting Feiffer’s entire run of weekly strips from The Village Voice. This deluxe hardcover edition contains approximately 500 strips originally published between 1956 and 1966 in a brick-like landscape format, reproduced better than ever and with a lengthy introduction and interview with Feiffer by Fantagraphics Publisher Gary Groth.
ABOUT JULES FEIFFER
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Jules Feiffer was born in 1929 in New York City. He attended the Art Students League and Pratt Institute, and served an apprenticeship assisting Will Eisner on his syndicated Spirit comic from 1947 to 1951. In 1949 he was allotted a page for his own strip, Clifford. In 1951 Feiffer was drafted into the army, an experience that would change his outlook radically, and when he was discharged he became determined to incorporate his personal convictions in his cartoons.
In 1956 he began contributing a weekly strip called Sick, Sick, Sick to the Village Voice and over the next several years Feiffer’s notoriety steadily grew. His strip was picked up by the prestigious London Observer. He became a regular contributor to Playboy, and later The New Yorker. In 1959, the weekly strip, redubbed Feiffer, was nationally syndicated by the Hall Syndicate. An animated cartoon based on his story Munro received an Academy Award in 1961. Also that year, Second City founder Paul Sills commissioned Feiffer to write a one-act play called “Crawling Arnold.” The theater rapidly became Feiffer’s second love. His award-winning plays include: Little Murders; Knock, Knock; The White House Murder Case; Grown-Ups; and several revues based on his strips. His screenplay for Carnal Knowledge is a landmark of the 1970s. He has written two acclaimed novels, Harry the Rat with Women and Ackroyd, created one of the very first graphic novels (Tantrum), and authored the landmark book of comics criticism, The Great Comic Book Heroes. In recent years, he has become a popular children’s book author; his Flies On the Ceiling is considered a classic. He lives in New York, NY.
EXPLAINERS By Jules Feiffer
THE COMPLETE VILLAGE VOICE STRIPS 1956-1966
$28.99 Hardcover • 568 pages, 9 1/2″ x 5 1/2″
ISBN: 978-1-56097-835-0 • PUB DATE: MAY 28, 2008
A selection of images in a variety of formats (and ratings) is available for publication. For additional information contact Eric Reynolds.
Download the press release: Microsoft Word (1.0 MB), PDF (2.1 MB)