Tag Archives: The Comics Journal

Gary Groth Finally Comes to His Senses

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I’ll have a little more to say about our move from tcj in a bit, but I thought I’d include this goodbye post from the homepage here.
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Well, it was bound to happen. After a bit more than a year at tcj.com, the powers that be have come to their senses and sent us packing. We are now at our new home: https://hoodedutilitarian.com. (Update: And you’re here now!)

We’ve had a lovely time of it though, from our first substantive post about why tcj.com sucked to our last post about sentient penises.

Along the way we’ve had roundtables on Ghost World, Asterios Polyp and Genesis. We’ve had posts by Ariel Schrag and Jason Overby, and a comment from Diamanda Galas. We’ve pissed off Tom Spurgeon, Gary Groth, Jeet Heer (too many times to link!), and the entire manga blogosphere (once, and then again.)

We also picked up a ton of new writers over the course of the year, including Caroline Small, James Romberger, Sean Michael Robinson, and many more.

So, as I said, it’s been a really enjoyable and productive year for us. Being at tcj.com has been a great opportunity and (with some bumps) a great experience. I think the editors have probably occasionally (or perhaps more than occasionally!) wondered what they were thinking in inviting us over. But I’m grateful they did, and that they allowed us to be a part of the Journal’s tradition and legacy. So many thanks to Dirk, Michael, and Gary for brining us onboard and letting us write in their space for this past year-and-a-bit.

Later this week at HU, Sean Michael Robinson is going to add some personal notes to his interview with Gerhard (appearing right here at tcj.com.) James Romberger has an exciting interview coming up as well. A little further out we’re going to have a roundtable on Alec: The Years Have Pants and after that another roundtable on the television drama The Wire. And otherwise we’ll just keep on keeping on. All the best to tcj.com, and thank you again to editors, commenters, and readers. Come see us at https://hoodedutilitarian.com. (And don’t forget to fix your feeds: Post; Comments.

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Update: As promised, some more thoughts about the past year and the move are here.

Comics Journal Navel Gazing: A Short Comment

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Caro recently highlighted an article by Craig Fischer at Transatlantica titled “Worlds within Worlds: Audiences, Jargon, and North American Comics Discourse”. I’ve decided to separate out this short comment on one particular section of Craig’s essay since it is only tangentially related to the bulk of Caro’s comments. The following comes from the middle of Craig’s taxonomy of comics writing called, “Essayists” (emphasis mine):

22    As a contributor to the Journal, my problem with Groth’s emphasis on evaluation is the absence of communal standards. In the editorial to Journal#100 (July 1985), Groth reprinted a commentary from the British fanzine BEM where Bernard Leak pointed out that despite the Journal’s commitment to excellence, “muscular standards-raising activity requires some kind of focus, some general agreement on what a good comic is; and there isn’t any such agreement, in the pages of the Journal or anywhere else” (Groth 12). Leak further argued that

“A general theory of comics, such as has been produced (in many conflicting forms, of course) for literary genres like novels and epics, is necessary before any dreams for the future can take on a definite shape and positive content. If someone doesn’t like any particular theory, he can supplement, modify or replace it; but until one appears all criticism of comics will be floating in the void, unsupported by anything more than a consensus of some readers’ uncontrolled intuitions. (12)”

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