STANLEY STORIES: August 2012

Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Drawn + Quarterly Plugs The John Stanley 1940s Bibliography!

My pal Tom Devlin posted this very kind promo for the still-available, poorly-selling 1940s John Stanley bibliography. He says on the D+Q blog...

It's been said time and time again--Frank Young is providing one of the great internet services with his Stanley Stories blog. Trenchant commentary on all phases of the great John Stanley's cartooning and writing careers would be enough but Frank also does some serious detective work and constantly discovers new Stanley material in the nooks and crannies of the Dell catalog. Easily my favorite historical comics website.

Okay, so I titled this post "Late to the Party" because I'm at least three months late with this post to celebrate Frank's amazing achievement--A comprehensive bibliography of John Stanley's 1940s comics work. For me, this is one of the great comics nerd resources out there. Check it out. Go buy it... Do it!!

See the original post HERE--and, as ever, thanks, Tom!

Thursday, August 23, 2012

Comics Within Comics: John Stanley's Little Lulu Fairy Tale Meta-Stories

The hundreds of spontaneous fairy-tales that occur in John Stanley's Little Lulu offered their creator a constant, reliable escape route from formula.

These playful comics-within-comics were, themselves, among Stanley's successful recipes for writing a popular monthly comic magazine.

When the two stories presented here today first appeared in print, in two consecutive 1951 issues of Marge's Little Lulu, the title was among the best-selling newsstand publications in America. Stanley was in a position of great potential pressure. He created stories that children and adults read in equal measure, and on completely different planes of enjoyment.

The responsibility might have psyched out anyone who stopped to think about it. Most likely, John Stanley was simply too busy with the work to take stock of his position. Lulu, by dint of its high circulation, was potentially as influential a magazine as Life, Time or The Saturday Evening Post. As a comic book, it, by no means, stood to change public opinion, or address crucial modern issues, as did those slick magazines. But it was as widely read, and its readership depended on its creative team to deliver the goods, month in, month out.

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THE JOHN STANLEY COMICS BIBLIOGRAPHY SERIES

I have compiled a detailed, fully illustrated (in color) story-by-story career bibliography of the comic book and magazine cartoon work of John Stanley, in three decade-specific oversized paperback editions. They're available in book form at Amazon.com.

You can read more about the 1940s volume HERE.

Check out the 1950s edition (the longest of the three books) HERE.

The 1960s volume can be previewed HERE.

Covers of the three books are seen below--and that of THE TAO OF YOW, a lavishly illustrated book of essays on John Stanley's world and his work, including expanded versions of essays first seen on this blog. TAO OF YOW may be perused HERE.

A FERVENT PLEA TO FELLOW BLOGGERS

I would like to suggest that the following grammatical and punctuation errors be avoided by one and all;

1) misuse of the possessive apostrophe-s. It's means "it is," not "its." Appropriate use, e.g.: "It's hot outside today." Wrong usage: "I looked at it's cover."

I see this horrid mistake committed hundreds of times daily on the Internet and elsewhere. If a word ends in an s, chances are someone will ram that apostrophe in there. (e.g., "Today's Special's").

Please, please, PLEASE--unless you intend to convey that a person, place or thing is being discussed, in the present tense, or is in use as a contraction of two words (i.e., "it is, let us, what is"), DO NOT USE THE APOSTROPHE!

2) misuse of the apostrophe in dates. Again: unless it is intended to convey the location or possession of a certain quality, such as "1867's drinking water supplies" or "1978's energy crisis," DO NOT USE THE APOSTROPHE! The same applies to the use of decade-connoting dates. It is the 1950s, or the '50s--NOT the 1950's or the 50's!

3) the two most abused words in the English language are "amazing" and "hilarious." It pains me to see these words used thousands of times a day in print and in conversation.

If everything is amazing and/or hilarious, then NOTHING is amazing and/or hilarious.

There exists a wealth of synonyms--delightful words that convey these two properties. Please, please, please use them in the place of these two horribly over-worked adjectives.

Visit synonym.com for easy access to other words that will help you communicate better and smarter.

4) When in doubt, use Spell Check.

Computer users have a luxury--we can instantly determine if a word we've typed is properly spelled. Any computer's spell checking program will inevitably have bugs, but most of the time it's quite helpful.

There is no good reason (aside from un-caught typos) that Internet writing should have spelling errors. We no longer have to interrupt our work, walk over to the bookshelf, pull out the dictionary, find the word, and return to our task. Right-click on a highlighted word and you'll know if it's correct or not.

The speed of the Internet sometimes inspires sloppiness--in myself and in others. In our excitement to get our writing on-line, it's easy to forget that finely-tuned prose may require a little more time.

It is worth the effort--and it takes little effort anymore--to double-check spelling before you make a post live. I often go over old posts and correct typos or poor writing. I feel it makes a difference, and that it supports my worth as a scholar and critic.

If this plea can prevent the egregious misuse of proper English in the blogosphere, my life will not have been in vain.