{"id":29930,"date":"2024-06-04T14:30:45","date_gmt":"2024-06-04T14:30:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=29930"},"modified":"2024-06-03T17:27:41","modified_gmt":"2024-06-03T17:27:41","slug":"anarchy-comics-the-complete-collection-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2024\/06\/04\/anarchy-comics-the-complete-collection-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Anarchy Comics – The Complete Collection"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\" \"\"
\nBy Jay Kinney<\/strong>, Paul Mavrides<\/strong>, Clifford Harper<\/strong>, Gerhard Seyfried<\/strong>, Spain Rodriguez<\/strong>, Melinda Gebbie<\/strong>, Gilbert Shelton<\/strong>, \u00c9pistolier<\/strong>, Volny<\/strong>, Michel Troblin<\/strong>, John R. Burnham<\/strong>, Ruby Ray<\/strong>, Steve Stiles<\/strong>, Sharon Rudahl<\/strong>, Peter Pontiac<\/strong>, Guy Colwell<\/strong>, Matt Feazell<\/strong>, Gary<\/strong> Panter<\/strong>, Donald Rooum<\/strong>, Albo Helm<\/strong>, Adam Cornford<\/strong>, Norman Dog<\/strong>, Greg Irons<\/strong>, Steve Lafler<\/strong>, David Lester<\/strong>, brooke Lydbrooke<\/strong>, Pepe Moreno<\/strong>, Harry S. Robins<\/strong>, R. Diggs<\/strong>, S. Zorca<\/strong>, Byron Werner<\/strong>, & various, compiled and edited by Kinney<\/strong> (PM Press)
\nISBN: 978-1-60486-531-8 (TPB\/Digital edition)<\/p>\n

During the \u201canything goes\u201d 1960s and early1970s issues of personal freedom, sexual liberation, mind-altering self-exploration, questioning of authority and a general rejection of the old ways gripped the young and terrified the establishment. Artists and cartoonists especially began creating the kind of comics and art they wanted and an \u201cUnderground Commix movement\u201d became the forefront for \u201cradicalisation\u201d (that\u2019s \u201cThe Man\u2019s\u201d terms not mine) of many young intellectuals in America and throughout the world. It consequently led to the rise of and acceptance of comics narrative for adults.<\/p>\n

Whenever anybody discusses the history and influence of the Underground and Counter-Culture movements, focus is generally on the exuberant and often racially or sexually offensive expressions of comedic or violent excess – especially in regard to sex and drugs – but that\u2019s a rather cruel and biased oversimplification. The whole phenomenon stemmed from rebellion and the exercise of new-found freedoms. Equally apparent was a striving for new ways of living one\u2019s life – and that\u2019s Politics, Baby, pure and simple…<\/p>\n

By 1978 that unchecked artistic flourishing had died back in every sphere – especially the wholesale creation of comics – and the mainstream world, having assimilated what it liked of the explosively fresh thought and deeds, appropriated or adopted some of the tone and tenets of the movement before getting back to making money and suppressing masses in a \u201cnew normal\u201d…<\/p>\n

However, once creative passions have been aroused and stoked they are hard to suppress. There is no more powerful medium of expression or tool of social change than graphic narrative – although music and poetry come close – and some kids found it harder to surrender their ideals than others. In 1977, as Disco, indolence, hedonism and the pursuit of money increasingly obsessed media and populace, a bunch of left-leaning liberal intellectual cartoonists got together in San Francisco. They wanted to create a comics anthology dedicated to propounding ideals of willing co-operation, personal responsibility and a rejection of unwanted oppressive authority – governmental, religious or corporate. By entertaining and educating through cartoons they intended to highlight issues of inequality and iniquity: in short, they went to bat for Anarchy…<\/p>\n

Just as the global Punk movement began to take hold in a new generation of angry, powerless and disenfranchised Youth, West Coast cartoonist, satirist designer, editor and socialist political activist Jay Kinney – who had co-created the seminal underground title Young Lust<\/strong> (and yes that was a pun; so sue me!) – reached out to like-minded old associates like Paul Mavrides with the intention of creating an international comic book to promulgate their world view.<\/p>\n

Kinney had been corresponding with British Anarchist artist Clifford Harper (Class War Comics<\/strong>) and had similarly-inclined West German cartoonist Gerhard Seyfried kipping on his floor at that time, so the idea of a forum for graphic expression of political ideas must have seemed like a no-brainer…<\/p>\n

Of course, there\u2019s no such thing as slavish doctrinaire consensus in Anarchist idealism – that\u2019s pretty much the whole point – and the comic was envisioned more as a platform to present wide-ranging Left-Libertarian ideas through satire and historical reportage as a basis for further debate.<\/p>\n

How the project developed from there and its ultimate effects and influence is fully described in author\/historian Paul Buhle\u2019s \u2018Anarchy Comics Revisited\u2019<\/em> and Kinney\u2019s own expansive, evocative \u2018Introduction\u2019<\/em> before the entire 4-issue, 9-year run is re-presented in all its monochrome glory. beginning with Anarchy Comics<\/strong> #1 from 1978. It sports a witty cover by Kinney and deliciously wry intro page Inside Cover<\/em> by Kinney & Seyfried. The editor then opened the attack with \u2018Too Real\u2019<\/em>: using collage images from comic book ads to spoof the American Dream of prosperity and suburban bliss, after which counterculture legend Spain Rodriguez recounts the story of \u2018Nestor Makhno\u2019<\/em> whose fight for independence led to his betrayal by his Soviet allies in the early days of their Revolution.<\/p>\n

Kinney\u2019s \u2018Smarmy Comics\u2019<\/em> presents a decade of strip spoofs dedicated to exposing \u2018Fascism: the Power to Finance Capital Itself\u2019<\/em>, after which the amazing Melinda Gebbie constructs a strident feminist call to arms against female oppression in educational diatribe \u2018The Quilting Bee\u2019<\/em> before Spain returns with a brutal true tale of the Spanish Civil War \u2018Blood and Sky\u2019 <\/em>and an Underground superstar offers a frightening prognostication in\u00a0\u2018Gilbert Shelton\u2019s Advanced International Motoring Tips\u2019<\/em>…<\/p>\n

For someone with no appreciable budget or resources, Kinney was astonishingly successful in securing international contributions. From France\u2019s L\u2019echo Des Savannes<\/em><\/strong> #29 came a translated tale of more Bolshevik perfidy in \u2018Liberty Through the Ages: Kronstadt\u2019<\/em> by \u00c9pistolier (Yves Fr\u00e9mion) & Volny (Fran\u00e7oise Dupuy) wherein a local dispute escalates into an horrific early instance of merciless repression in the People\u2019s Paradise, before Bay area cartoonist John R. Burnham challenges the future with his polemical \u2018What\u2019s the Difference?\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n

True Brit Clifford Harper offers a moving and witty account of grass roots resistance in the tale of \u2018Owd Nancy\u2019s Petticoat\u2019<\/em> (set in the aftermath of the Peterloo Massacre), after which Kinney delivers wry Comic Strip parodies \u2018Safehouse\u2019<\/em>, \u2018On Contradiction\u2019<\/em> and \u2018Today\u2019s Rhetoric\u2019<\/em> – complete with faux ad – before Mavrides hilariously attacks the utopian\/dystopian debate with \u2018Some Straight Talk about Anarchy\u2019<\/em>. The issue ends with a stylish ad for like-minded publications from Kinney & Seyfried, which last also crafted a humorous depiction of a mass anarchist demonstration in Tiananmen Square 11 years before the tragic, monstrous real thing…<\/p>\n

Issue #2 didn\u2019t appear until 1979 and opened with a photographic punk cover by Ruby Ray & Kinney, with the latter & Seyfried collaborating on another hilarious introductory page before the fireworks kicked off with Steve Stiles\u2019 chilling account of his brush with Military Intelligence. Once the brass realised he might have had associations with turn-of-the-century Labour Movement The Industrial Workers of the World, the baffled soldier-boy found himself suspected of crimes he didn\u2019t know existed. How the \u2018Wobblies!\u2019<\/em> could subvert a hapless GI in 1967 is still unclear to the author of this smart but scary tale…<\/p>\n

\u2018Believe It!\u2019<\/em> by Sharon Rudahl exposes true but crazy beliefs from history whilst<\/p>\n

\u2018Kultur Dokuments\u2019<\/em> (Kinney & Mavrides) brilliantly blends styles and metaphors to harangue the working world in a clever tale that starts as pictograms and ends as a vicious swipe at Archie Comics. Harper then adapts \u201cBert\u201d Brecht\u2019s grim ballad \u2018The Black Freighter\u2019<\/em> (perhaps better known in English as \u201cPirate Jenny\u201d via Kurt Weill\u2019s Threepenny Opera<\/strong>), Spain details the life of Civil War freedom-fighter Buenaventura \u2018Durruti\u2019<\/em> and Dutch artist Peter Pontiac exposes sexual fantasy and other anti-spontaneity heresies in \u2018Romantic! Anarchy\u2019<\/em> before Kinney dryly restores order with spoof talk-show \u2018Radical Reflections\u2019<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\u00c9pistolier & Michel Trublin relate how radicals Jerry Rubin and Abbie Hoffman changed the smugly complacent nature of Wall Street in \u2018Liberty Through the Ages: The Yippies at the Exchange\u2019<\/em> before Gebbie potently limns illustrated \u2018Quotes from Red Emma\u2019<\/em> (Goldman) after which \u2018The Bizarre yet Familiar World of Commodity Fetishism!\u2019<\/em> (Kinney) embellishes a Seyfried Inside back-cover ad with the glorious whole finished off in a painted Black Velvet portrait of Chairman Mao<\/em> by Mavrides.<\/p>\n

Anarchy Comics<\/strong> #3 arrived in 1981, sporting a traditional anarchic rampaging rogue by Pontiac & Guy Colwell and – after a clever introduction by Kinney & Mavrides – proceeds with the duo\u2019s hilariously dark time-travel tale \u2018No Exit\u2019<\/em> showing how even the perfect future can\u2019t please some activists. Next is \u00c9pistolier & Trublin\u2019s trenchant examination of Church repression of workers in \u2018Anarchy in the Alsace: The Revolt of the Rustauds\u2019<\/em> and a welcome appearance for Donald Rooum<\/a>\u2019s iconic feline thought-experiment Wildcat<\/strong>.
\n\"\"
\nRooum <\/a>was a spectacularly talented, gentle, fiercely pacifist freedom-fighter, educator and eternal knowledge seeker who contributed brilliant cartoons to British comics, magazines and the Anarchist press for over 60 years. His Wildcat<\/strong><\/a> cartoons have been collected continually and are a must have item whatever your political leaning…<\/p>\n

The merriment continues in \u2018The Act of Creation According to Bakunin\u2019<\/em> by Dutch cartoonist Albo Helm, giving the genesis myth a thorough re-evaluation, after which Harper interprets French politician\/philosopher Pierre-Joseph Proudhon\u2019s pointed \u2018What is Government?\u2019<\/em> with telling graphic savagery.<\/p>\n

More of Kinney\u2019s \u2018Radical Reflections\u2019<\/em> follow before Spain (with Adam Cornford & Kinney) examines the rise of the Red Brigade through Italian labour agitation and student unrest via \u2018Roman Spring\u2019<\/em>, whilst Steve Laffler restores much-needed absurdity through deployment of rude, anti-Capitalist superhero the \u2018Naked Avenger\u2019<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Seyfried crafts a sharp display of police mentality in \u2018Walkie Talkie\u2019<\/em> before then relative newcomer Gary Panter plays with traditional bomb-throwing view of anarchists in his vicious comedy \u2018Awake, Purox, Awake!\u2019<\/em>, whilst Gebbie & Cornford collaborate on a psychedelic tribute to \u2018Benjamin Peret: Poet as Revolutionary <\/em>and Rudahl supplies a slyly effective castigation of workers\u2019 children-turned-capitalists in \u2018The Treasure of Cabo Santiago\u2019<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Comix iconoclast Greg Irons is represented here with moodily scary tale \u2018Who\u2019s in Charge Here?\u2019<\/em> and Canadian cartoonist David Lester tackles sexual politics and the New Man in \u2018Men Strips:<\/em> Men March On\u2019<\/em>, \u2018The Amazing Colossal Men\u2019 <\/em>and \u2018The March of Men\u2019 <\/em>before Marian (now just brooke) Lydbrooke spoofs marital oppression in \u2018At Home With…\u2019 <\/em>with Kinney exploring similar territory in \u2018New Age Politics\u2019<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Matt (Amazing Cynicalman<\/strong>) Feazell debuted here with an impressive bug-eyed view of class warfare and divisive manipulation by the bosses in the excellent \u2018Pest Control\u2019<\/em> before Kinney & Seyfried cobble together an inside back-cover \u2018Bulletin Board\u2019<\/em> and the garrulous German ends the issue with a classy spoof ad touting \u2018New! Improved! Anarchy\u2019<\/em> to end all our global pest woes…<\/p>\n

After this issue Kinney\u2019s time was increasingly taken up with other projects, and it wasn\u2019t until 1987 that new editor Mavrides released Anarchy Comics<\/strong> #4, with both cover and introduction page products of his sublimely prolific satirist\u2019s pen. He nonetheless joined with Kinney on apocalyptic parody on the End of Days \u2018Armageddon Outahere! <\/em>before the always challenging Harper contributes a terrifyingly true case regarding British poet Jimmy Heather-Hayes\u2019 death in police custody at Ashford Prison, Kent \u2018On the Night of March 3, 1982\u2019<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Norman Dog creates a choose-your-own-ending role-playing strip in \u2018You Rule the World!\u2019<\/em> and Spain details the fall of Emperor Napoleon III, the entire Franco-Prussian War and the meteoric coming and going of the Communards in \u20181871\u2019<\/em>, after which Gebbie relates her own clash with British censorship in magically metaphoric fable \u2018Public Enemy\u2019.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018Mr. Helpful\u2019<\/em> is a more traditional cartoon quandary posed by Norman Dog whilst S. Zorca\u2019s prose vignette \u2018Executive Terrorism\u2019<\/em> take a hefty swipe at Presidential Privilege and R. Diggs goes for the jugular in his logical extension of economic Darwinism \u2018Korporate-Rex\u2019<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The final issue closes with Harry S. Robins tapped into his Church of the SubGenius<\/strong> roots, addressing the apparent dichotomy of the philosophy in \u2018Anarchy = Panarchy\u2019 <\/em>before Byron Werner\u2019s \u2018One-page strip\u2019<\/em> suggests the only way we can rationally deal with intelligent extraterrestrial life, Mavrides & Kinney clashwith the Military-Industrial Complex in \u2018Cover-up Lowdown\u2019<\/em> and a final Back Cover offers a photo of Hiroshima after all the dust settled…<\/p>\n

As you\u2019d expect, this fabulous collection doesn\u2019t stick to tradition, and after a standard section of contributing Cartoonist Biographies<\/em>, and a sumptuous colour section including all covers, Outtakes, Sketches Roughs and a fulsome photographic Anarchy Comics Family Album<\/em>, a New Comix <\/em>addendum features a stunning new strip which would certainly have been in a fifth issue… if there had been one.<\/p>\n

\u2018The Amazing Tale of Victoria Woodhull\u2019<\/em> by Rudahl depicts the life of the most incredible woman you\u2019ve never heard of: a libertine, suffragette, opportunist and crusader for women\u2019s rights and female emancipation who started out as an American white trash huckster and died the wife of a British aristocrat.<\/p>\n

This is followed by Sketchbook Drawings and Outtakes<\/em> from Kinney, revealing abortive ideas and graphic dead ends such as Anarchy Chic<\/em>, Shoot-Out at the Circle A Ranch<\/em>, Revolt<\/em>, Sectarianism<\/em>, Marx my Words<\/em>, spoof political mags, the Amazing Rhetoric Translator<\/em> and the marvellous Oppressive Dichotomies<\/em> – all strips that might well have found fans… if…<\/p>\n

A stunning reminiscence of a time when we thought the world could still be changed and, hopefully, a stark example for the current generation who just won\u2019t take it anymore, Anarchy Comics<\/strong> is still, funny, powerful, inspirational and out there.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s not up for debate…
\n\u00a9 2013 Jay Kinney, Paul Mavrides and respective writers & artists. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Jay Kinney, Paul Mavrides, Clifford Harper, Gerhard Seyfried, Spain Rodriguez, Melinda Gebbie, Gilbert Shelton, \u00c9pistolier, Volny, Michel Troblin, John R. Burnham, Ruby Ray, Steve Stiles, Sharon Rudahl, Peter Pontiac, Guy Colwell, Matt Feazell, Gary Panter, Donald Rooum, Albo Helm, Adam Cornford, Norman Dog, Greg Irons, Steve Lafler, David Lester, brooke Lydbrooke, Pepe Moreno, Harry … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Anarchy Comics – The Complete Collection”<\/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":[113,299,122,125,216,111],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29930","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-comedy","category-feminism-sexual-politics","category-historical","category-humour","category-lifestyle","category-satirepolitics"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4AFj-7MK","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29930","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=29930"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29930\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29935,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29930\/revisions\/29935"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29930"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29930"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29930"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}