Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0009223, Thu, 29 Jan 2004 20:02:04 -0800

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Fw: Cartoon questions...
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----- Original Message -----
From: "ben schwartz" <benjy@earthlink.net>
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> On Tuesday, January 27, 2004, at 12:00 AM, Automatic digest processor
> wrote:
>
> I've written about and interviewed a number of cartoonists and the one
> I know of most openly devoted to Nabokov is Daniel Clowes. Dan is the
> creator of EIGHTBALL comics and screenwriter of the Oscar-nominated
> film GHOST WORLD, which has faint echoes of LOLITA in it. I know he
> and his wife have read just about everything Nabokov ever published in
> English and have a bookcase in their home filled with different
> editions of VN's works.
>
> As for Brian Boyd's claim that only Spiegelman can be put alongside the
> great novelists, I agree to a point. But Spiegelman is only comparable
> to those novelists because he structured MAUS as a Dickens-style
> serialized novel. There are plenty of cartoonists equal to Spiegelman
> -- George Herriman, Frank King, Charles Schulz, Harvey Kurtzman, Saul
> Steinberg, Robert Crumb, Harold Grey, James Thurber, Jaime and Gilbert
> Hernandez, to name but a few -- who work in different story structures
> and short form storytelling more comparable to great music, poetry, and
> painting. And MAUS is the great exception in Spiegelman's career, as
> he's done wonderful work in short single-panel and 1 to 3 page
> sequences. He also created the WACKY PACKAGES trading card and sticker
> series, which you couldn't put alongside great novels so much as adhere
> them to the covers.
>
> Ben Schwartz
>