Autobiographical Comics: Bloomsbury Comics Studies
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Overview
A complete guide to the history, form and contexts of the genre, Autobiographical Comics helps readers explore the increasingly popular genre of graphic life writing. In an accessible and easy-to-navigate format, the book covers such topics as:
· The history and rise of autobiographical comics
· Cultural contexts
· Key texts – including Maus, Robert Crumb, Persepolis, Fun Home, and American Splendor
· Important theoretical and critical approaches to autobiographical comics
Autobiographical Comics includes a glossary of crucial critical terms, annotated guides to further reading and online resources and discussion questions to help students and readers develop their understanding of the genre and pursue independent study.
From Art Spiegelman's Maus to recent comics such as Persepolis and American Splendor, this is a complete guide to the history, forms and contexts of autobiographical comics.
Explores the history, forms and contexts of autobiographical comics and graphic memoir
Guides to key texts and surveys of major critical approaches give students a complete study resource on the genre
Discussion questions, annotated further reading and online resource guides and glossary of terms support independent study
List of Figures
Acknowledgements
1. Introduction: What Are Autobiographical Comics?
2. The History of Autobiographical Comics
3. Critical Questions
4. Social and Cultural Impact
Trauma
Adolescence
The Quotidian and the Confessional
Gender and Sexuality
Race and Ethnicity
Graphic Medicine
Censorship and Controversy
Self-Publishing and Web Comics
5. Key Texts
Justin Green, Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary
Robert Crumb and Aline Kominsky-Crumb
Harvey Pekar, et al, American Splendor
Keiji Nakazawa, Barefoot Gen: A Cartoon Story of Hiroshima
Art Spiegelman, Maus and In the Shadow of No Towers
Phoebe Gloeckner, A Child's Life and The Diary of a Teenage Girl
Joe Matt, Chester Brown, and Seth
Lynda Barry, One Hundred Demons
Craig Thompson, Blankets
Marjane Satrapi, Persepolis
Alison Bechdel, Fun Home
6. Appendix
Appendix 1: Autobiographical Comics Panel
Appendix 2: Interview with Jennifer Hayden
Appendix 3: David Chelsea
Appendix 4: Ryan Claytor
7. Glossary
8. Resources
Primary Texts
Critical Bibliography
9. Index
Bloomsbury has launched a Comics Studies Series that has kicked off with Andrew Kunka's Autobiographical Comics ... It's an excellent resource, combining a brief history of this sub-genre with critical questions, key texts and a glossary. Kunka shows us that you can learn a lot about comics by how cartoonists organize their lives on the page.
Kunka offers a useful overview of the subject, with an inclusive approach that includes everything from "proto-autobiographical comics" (such as Winsor McCay's inclusion of a cartoonist character in his early strips) to the latest web comics, and scrupulously cites his sources, making it easy to locate relevant literature on any of the topics he discusses … [The book] offer[s] insightful and specific analysis that can be comprehended without requiring total immersion in the latest and trendiest academic jargon.
Autobiographical Comics is a well-informed, highly readable, and perceptive overview that will be extremely useful for students and teachers looking for introductory material and bibliographic references for further study … Kunka balances depth and brevity with skill … The endnotes, glossary, and extensive bibliography highlight the author's deep knowledge of the field and are indispensable tools for further scholarship. As a studying and teaching tool, Autobiographical Comics is a superb introduction to the field that achieves accessibility without diminishing scholarly rigor … Autobiographical Comics is the best study guide available, and Kunka's generosity of scholarship and tone provides a robust platform for teaching and researching graphic life narratives.
As an introduction to a genre, a reference guide, and a critical study, Andrew J. Kunka's Autobiographical Comics represents a necessary foray into the particulars of autobiographical graphic narratives. His book contributes to the Bloomsbury Comics Studies series, upholding its commitment to expansive and accessible introductions to comics and Comics Studies. Kunka deftly juggles concepts new and familiar to Comics Studies, as his thorough survey of this genre takes up questions of reliability, authenticity, and objectivity … A tremendous resource for anyone crafting a syllabus and hoping to include popular or lesser known works. Kunka's introduction guides and helps us interrogate the genre of autobiographical comics. His careful survey and his attention to texts and critical questions both popular and lesser known make this book a clear and compelling resource for readers of comics who might wonder about the narrative, stylistic, or thematic questions behind comics that represent, in so many different ways, autobiographical experiences.
- Title: Autobiographical Comics
- Author: Andrew J. Kunka
- Series: Bloomsbury Comics Studies
- Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
- Print Publication Date: 2017
- Logos Release Date: 2024
- Pages: 304
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Ebook
- ISBNs: 9781474227865, 9781474227841, 1474227848, 1474227864
- Resource ID: LLS:9781474227865
- Resource Type: Monograph
- Metadata Last Updated: 2025-04-22T11:04:37Z
Andrew J. Kunka is Professor of English at University of South Carolina Sumter, USA. He is co-editor of May Sinclair: Moving Towards the Modern (2006).