Welcome back. Last time out, I began writing about how Garry Trudeau addressed the immediate aftermath of the Vietnam war, looking at the experience of Kim and other refugees from Vietnam and Cambodia. The second part of that series is going to look at the ways in which two soldiers, Phred and B.D., adjusted to … Continue reading Doonesbury Goes to War, Part IV: Phred, B.D. and the Heartless Air Pirates.
Author: Paul Hébert
Comics Review: First Year Out, a Transition Story
A while back, I reviewed Julia Kaye’s Super Late Bloomer, a comics journal chronicling the author’s early days in transition. On the heels of Kaye’s book, Vancouver’s Sabrina Symington has published First Year Out: A Transition Story, a comic about a woman’s experience with the process of gender transition. Like Kaye’s story, the story that … Continue reading Comics Review: First Year Out, a Transition Story
Vietnam, the Aftermath: Part I, the Refugees.
Grandpa pissed his pants again He don't give a damn Brother Billy has both guns drawn He ain't been right since Vietnam -- Warren Zevon, “Play it All Night Long.” On 30 April 1975, the last Americans and some of their South Vietnamese allies were evacuated from the United States embassy compound as Saigon – … Continue reading Vietnam, the Aftermath: Part I, the Refugees.
Comics Review: “The Young C.L.R. James: A Graphic Novelette.”
C.L.R. James (1901-1989) was a Trinidadian-British Marxist and pan-Africanist historian, writer, political theorist and activist. If you’re a halfway serious student of twentieth-century radical thought, you know that already. If you’re not, here’s a quick, and incomplete, summary of his achievements: His 1936 novel Minty Alley was the first novel published by a West Indian … Continue reading Comics Review: “The Young C.L.R. James: A Graphic Novelette.”
Comics Review: Julia Kaye’s Super Late Bloomer
VANCAF – the Vancouver Comic Arts Festival – is where I often learn about comics and creators that might otherwise fly underneath my radar. My personal highlight of the 2018 edition of VANCAF was discovering the work of the Los Angeles-based cartoonist Julia Kaye. The strips she had on display immediately caught my eye, as … Continue reading Comics Review: Julia Kaye’s Super Late Bloomer
“Just Some Silly Dame”: Boopsie Takes a Stand.
In a previous post, I discussed how the 1971 arrival of Nicole as a semi-regular cast member signaled an important shift in Garry Trudeau’s approach to writing about women. Before Nicole joined the cast, women in Doonesbury were either sexpots who existed solely to fulfill adolescent sexual fantasies or pathetic figures to be ridiculed because … Continue reading “Just Some Silly Dame”: Boopsie Takes a Stand.
Comics Review: Zerocalcare’s Kobane Calling
Kobane is a city of about 40,000 people in northern Syria; it is the administrative capital of Rojava, a multi-ethnic self-declared autonomous region that Kurdish nationalists claim as part of a greater Kurdistan. The city was besieged by ISIS militants in July 2014 and liberated by the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) and their all-woman … Continue reading Comics Review: Zerocalcare’s Kobane Calling
