All PostsThere’s a roundtable going on at The Comics Journal, about the Best American Comics Criticism anthology. I wrote a little bit about it a few weeks ago. So far, the entries (six at this point), are oddly divided into contributors (Ben Schwartz, Jeet Heer, and Brian Doherty), who are mostly positive about the book, and non-contributors (Noah Berlatsky, Ng Suat Tong, Caroline Small), who are less so (to varying degrees). That’s an interesting divide. Though, the non-contributors have taken on the book at greater length and depth, while the contributors have been more general, less involved (though editor Ben Schwarzt’s post does take on two critics of the anthology at length). I can understand the contributors being less desirous to write too much about a volume in which they are included. I hope the roundtable continues with some more non-contributors participating (perhaps some who will praise the book?). It’d be real interesting to here what non-comics critics/writers have to say about it, but maybe none of them would bother to read it in the first place.
I’ve been going through a bunch of blog posts I had saved in my Delicious account for future reading or blogging, and one that caught my eye in regards to this book is Ken Parille’s post about “analytical criticism.” I’ll quote his elaboration:
What matters to me is: does the critic help me to understand something about the comic I likely couldn’t/didn’t figure out myself? does the critic’s reading help me to pay attention to other comics in a new/different way? does the critic challenge conventional wisdom about reading/interpretation that goes beyond praise or condemnation and into thoughtful analysis? Often, if I come away from critical writing with one new concept or way of thinking, that’s enough.
This is the type of criticism mostly missing from the anthology. I did not, for the most part, walk away feeling like the answer to any of these questions was a resounding “yes!” And that left me saddened a bit, by a book that puts itself out as the best comics criticism has to offer.
I’d love to see someone/more people/more blogs take on some of Ken’s ideas, such as:
1. a recurring feature in which different writers analyze at length an influential comic of, say, the last 10 years. It should be heavily illustrated with examples, something I’d like to see much more of in writing about comics in general — people digging deep into images
Maybe I’ll have to start.
[Edit: Looks like I already quoted that section from Parille's post in a previous post over 2 years ago. Oh well, it bears repeating.]