{"id":21728,"date":"2020-02-26T08:00:26","date_gmt":"2020-02-26T08:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=21728"},"modified":"2020-02-25T16:15:01","modified_gmt":"2020-02-25T16:15:01","slug":"incognegro-a-graphic-mystery-new-edition-10th-anniversary-edition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2020\/02\/26\/incognegro-a-graphic-mystery-new-edition-10th-anniversary-edition\/","title":{"rendered":"Incognegro: A Graphic Mystery (New Edition\/10th<\/sup> Anniversary Edition)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"\"\"
\nBy Mat Johnson<\/strong> & Warren Pleece<\/strong>, with Clem Robbins<\/strong> (Berger Books\/Dark Horse)
\nISBN: 978-1-50670-564-4 (HB) eISBN: 978-1-50670-591-0<\/p>\n

What’s prejudice? How does bigotry and that unthinking fear and hatred of otherness work? What happens when haters can’t tell the difference between \u00e2\u20ac\u0153us\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and \u00e2\u20ac\u0153them?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Those are frankly disturbing and astonishing questions first asked in 2008 in an Original Graphic Novel released by DC’s Vertigo imprint that made a lot of noise and changed some lives. The book won acclaim and awards and its subject matter started a few conversations in exactly the right places: classrooms where it became a selected text for high schools and colleges.<\/p>\n

This 10th<\/sup> Anniversary edition reprints the original tale in all its moody monochrome glory, backed up by a contextualising Author’s Note (‘I grew up a black boy who looked white’<\/em>) and Afterword; a copious sketchbook section featuring designs by Pleece and ‘Reading Group Guide\/Questions & Topics for Discussion’<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The tale itself is set in the segregationist South in the early 1930s and opens at a social gathering in Tuscaloosa with families all happily gathering to see a black boy strung up. As the attendees patiently queue for a picture with the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153strange fruit\u00e2\u20ac\u009d, a newcomer takes their names and addresses. It’s only when the photographer denies hiring him that Zane Pinchback<\/em> of New York City’s African American newspaper The New Holland Herald<\/strong> realises he’s pushed his luck and needs to run for his life\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

Sadly, however, not before a visiting bigwig from the Ku Klux Klan gats a good look at him and starts wondering\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

Safely back north of the Mason-Dixon Line, Zane’s latest headline grabber upsets liberals and shames the perpetrators but the journalist is still unhappy. His expos\u00c3\u00a9s change nothing and he feels a fraud: a proud black man who makes a living pretending to be white. He can’t even use his own name – hence the byline \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Incognegro\u00e2\u20ac\u009d – or face on his widely syndicated columns: that would instantly negate the genetic advantage of a negro who can \u00e2\u20ac\u0153pass\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

Things are liberal enough in Manhattan that he and his debonair wastrel pal Carl<\/em> can intermingle with most folk and go drinking in swish clubs, but Zane knows things can go bad easily enough and resolves to quit and go legit\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

His editor staunchly refuses to accept, instead offering him a deal: one more undercover assignment. He is certain Zane will accept. The negro jailed in Tupelo, Mississippi and accused of killing a white woman is a man he’s known his entire life. Heading off in a hurry and readying himself to play the high stakes game of his life, Zane has no idea how complex and convoluted this case will be, or that blithely incautious Carl has invited himself along to a place where his kind of idiocy has lethal consequences\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

Author Mat Johnson took inspiration from his own childhood and the activities of Walter White<\/em> (ultimately Chief Exec of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) who began his career investigating lynchings because of the same genetic quirk as Zane Pinchback\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

Available in hardcover, trade paperback, digital editions and even in its original DC\/Vertigo edition – Incognegro<\/strong> is smart, funny where it can be and devastatingly effective whenever it needs to be. As well as the racial injustice so savagely skewered here, this is a cunning and engrossing murder mystery with plenty of twists, which even finds room to have a stab at the still largely unaddressed problems of women’s independence and transgender acceptance. If you love great storytelling underpinned by real-world issues, this is something you must see.
\nIncognegro\u00e2\u201e\u00a2 \u00c2\u00a9 2008, 2018 Mat Johnson and Warren Pleece. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Mat Johnson & Warren Pleece, with Clem Robbins (Berger Books\/Dark Horse) ISBN: 978-1-50670-564-4 (HB) eISBN: 978-1-50670-591-0 What’s prejudice? How does bigotry and that unthinking fear and hatred of otherness work? What happens when haters can’t tell the difference between \u00e2\u20ac\u0153us\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and \u00e2\u20ac\u0153them?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Those are frankly disturbing and astonishing questions first asked in 2008 in … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Incognegro: A Graphic Mystery (New Edition\/10th<\/sup> Anniversary Edition)”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[75,122],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21728","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-crime-comics","category-historical"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4AFj-5Es","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21728","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21728"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21728\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21728"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21728"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21728"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}