However, when I go over and check the Copyright Office’s database, this is what I find. All issues of American Splendor are copyright Harvey Pekar and only Harvey Pekar. No copyright registration was filed for the first Doubleday collection, although a registration was filed for Crumb’s introduction, which is copyright Robert Crumb. The registration for the second Doubleday collection says it is copyright Harvey Pekar and only Harvey Pekar. Four Walls Eight Windows did not file registrations for their editions. Ballantine’s Best of American Splendor anthology is copyright Harvey Pekar and only Harvey Pekar. According to the copyright office, Pekar claimed exclusive copyright to the material, and those claims were reaffirmed on multiple occasions. There is not a single instance on record of a shared copyright between Harvey Pekar and Robert Crumb.

The notice on Taschen’s recently published Crumb Sketchbook Volume 1 says that it’s copyright Robert Crumb 2014.

Thank you for your response

I should have clarified that by “young” creators I was specifically envisioning a unpublished creator under the age of 25. “Straight out of Art School”. A debut similar to Dash Shaw’s “Bottomless Belly Button” was what I’ve convinced myself Fantagraphics are uninterested in replicating on a regular basis. Of course, pointing this out doesn’t really disparage Fantagraphics in anyway since no publishers are giving away debuts of this nature on a consistent basis.

All the artists in the SPX panel “Fantagraphics Next Wave”, (Anya Davidson, Benjamin Marra, Noah Van Sciver, Simon Hanselmann, and Julia Gfrorer) are very cool. “We Told You So” is cool as well. But both of these “waves” translate very clearly to an artist my age as defining the limits of my value. I’m glad I’ve remained anonymous through all of this, as I’m quickly starting to understand insulting my distorted expectations must be to these creators who have labored many years. This might have been the end of my career.

While Crumb and/or his agent CAN offer the rights to a specific effort or efforts non-exclusively, a publisher who isn’t a fool is extremely unlikely to publish the effort(s) if the publisher does not have exclusive rights, including approval for permissions. The reason why is publishers, unless they have a business death wish, want to make money from their publications. Entering into a publishing situation where a competing edition of material can be allowed into the marketplace regardless of your interests is self-destructive. A competing edition means your edition is that much less likely to make money for you.

Publishers are often willing to grant permission for selections from the material they control if it is for a project that is not in direct competition with their offerings. An example is Alice Munro and Random House. RH can and does authorize the use of individual Munro stories to various anthologies, including the PEN/O. Henry Prize and Best American short-story annuals. The assumption is that people are not buying those anthologies strictly for the Munro work–it makes up a small fraction of the publication’s page count–and the inclusion helps promote Munro’s work to readers who have not previously taken an interest in her writing.

The all but certain reason why you haven’t seen, for example, RandomHouse/Pantheon and Drawn & Quarterly editions of Ghost World, is because Fantagraphics has exclusive book rights to the material. I seriously doubt it’s because Daniel Clowes and his agent have decided to be nice to Fantagraphics and chosen not to license the material with competitors.

I’m sure similar reasons are behind why Fantagraphics, despite a decade of promising, have yet to release a Complete Crumb volume featuring Crumb’s Hup! material. Last Gasp, not Crumb and his agent, most likely holds the rights to that work, and they’re not willing to grant permission for a competing edition at least until they sell out their inventory of the original comics.

As I recall, Dan, you went out of business as a publisher. Could your “artist-centric,” non-exclusive philosophy of publishing have been a contributing factor?

Skrillexfan (why would anyone use that handle?) and, uh, Wis:

Like Sammy, I agree that there are many legit complaints one could lodge about Fanta, some of which I’ve written about just recently on this very site and told Gary as well. I think that the history books are sometimes suffering from poor editing; I think the advertising campaign around the superhero books is, at best, socially, morally and aesthetically insulting. But whatever! I don’t let that spill over to my enjoyment of Joe Daly’s work.

But you’re talking about the company ignoring younger creators, and that’s just false. Fanta is publishing more young cartoonists per year than any other publishing company in the world right now. Do I think it’s all good? No, of course not. But it’s a fact. And why in heaven’s name wouldn’t a company the size of Fanta have good signage at a trade show or convention? That’s just good business.

Of course no one expects a young (20? 15?) person to know the history of the company, but at the same time, that’s what the book is for (as well as various looks back on this site). It’s a book that is, as Sammy notes, short on some people and long on others, but is hardly makes anyone central to Fanta look good! And before you say it, the title is transparently ironic. I know, irony is a hold over from the 90s. But so are many of us. Honestly, why would anyone, in 2017, “hate” a publishing company as diverse in its offerings as Fantagraphics? I don’t love it (I don’t love any companies) but it beats the hell out of anything else out there.

And finally, the idea that a publicist would have a “conflict of interest” is just silly. Publicity is all about conflicts of interests! I’ll chalk up that weird obsession to inexperience in publishing. As has been the case for the last few decades, a lot (but not all) of the rage against Groth, TCJ, etc etc is internal to the person raging. It means you’re investing this company, which you know little about, and a person you know even less about, with far more power than they have. It’s a publishing company, not an empire. If only you knew how little money and power is involved. Oy vey. It’s small stakes. It’s great art and it represents a few life’s works, but it’s still, as anyone there would admit, small stakes in publishing.

And finally, Robert Stanley Martin, says: “That’s why I doubt that Last Gasp, Fantagraphics, and Taschen are all publishing Crumb work from Weirdo on a non-exclusive basis. I would expect that one of them has signed a license with Crumb for exclusive control of the publishing rights. The other two would be including portions of that material in their projects with the first publisher’s permission. I don’t know for sure in this instance, but that’s usually how these situations work.”

Actually, that’s exactly NOT how these situations work in independent, artist-centric publishing. That’s how it might work with a licensed property (I don’t know), but in the case of someone like Crumb (or, hell, we can use my own output as an example), he and his agent control the rights and can sell them non-exclusively if they please. It wouldn’t make business or creative sense to leave it all with a single publishing entity. The publishers know (as I would know as a publisher) that you make the book you make, and sell it based on Crumb’s “brand” not on exclusivity.

That’s all! Happy new year.

I agree with Sammy that attacking Simon/Jacq is not a strong approach to take in criticizing fantagraphics. We should all celebrate that comics have the ability to get someone laid. Furthermore, I’m not not sure how many people view fantagraphics today as an entity to any degree concerned with morality, since publishing, advertising and editing seem to be occupations based entirely on arbitrarily personalized preferences. Hopefully Sammy will tell us what he thinks the “legitimate worthy complaints about Groth and Fantagraphics” are and we can all use those to accomplish our goal.

Also, I think this whole thread should return our focus to some of the really strong points I made in my earlier comments

my main complaint with WE TOLD YOU SO is not enough Dennis Worden and Frank Thorne.

http://brookstonbeerbulletin.com/beer-in-ads-2141-its-double-dry/

Thanks.

Perhaps I should have merely recounted my observation of Fantagraphics at SPX2016. As niche celebrities they walked among us but the niche architecture favored them. What is an impressionable youth like myself to make of this? For a new generation, the conceit that fantagraphics are the underdog is something that must be taught as an historical truth, not something that we can ever learn through experiences.

All I said about Crumb was that he doesn’t appear to have an ownership stake in the material. That means he doesn’t have any rights. He cannot authorize the material’s use.

I also never said that because material is featured in one book it cannot be featured in another. Of course it can. However, when one publisher holds the publishing rights, other publishers are generally required to get that publisher’s permission before including the material in their projects.

That’s why I doubt that Last Gasp, Fantagraphics, and Taschen are all publishing Crumb work from Weirdo on a non-exclusive basis. I would expect that one of them has signed a license with Crumb for exclusive control of the publishing rights. The other two would be including portions of that material in their projects with the first publisher’s permission. I don’t know for sure in this instance, but that’s usually how these situations work.

I would not call The Complete Crumb Comics, Volume 12, and Bob ‘n’ Harv’s Comics “different book[s] of mostly different work.” Over a third of the page count in that Complete Crumb volume—50+ pages–is taken up with Pekar material. That’s a lot of overlap.

Anyhow, another great line in this insanely awesome book comes from jim woodring describing an artist’s work as looking “like Elfquest as rendered by a third-rate Hare Krishna painter.”

This is a oral history book of self-promoting statements describing a critical journal that self-promoted the books that it published, and still does including the self-promotional oral history book I just mentioned.

And you’re mad there is one negative comment and my own slightly satirical anonymous comment?

What would be the motivation of adding any positive encouragement to these people on top of what they’ve already provided themselves? They’ve constantly been telling us so: they won the comic culture wars. Their mailboxes are choked with unwanted submissions they throw into a brand-new green dumpster.

Sure,you can go the “hypocrite” route that robert martin went but that’s beside the point. I’m not interested in that point.

My point is that it’s obvious that fantagraphics has chosen to reinforce it’s image rather than waste their resources on new creators. That’s fine but new creators aren’t going to waste their resources taking this book at face value.

Sure, their image is appealing. I’m into it of course, we’ve all stared at it for years. But soon their won’t be much of a difference between the insider dirt in this book and “The Secret History” by Procopius.

So you see Sammy, you made a mistake. i don’t even listen to skrillex. I’m a 23 years old creator.

so yeah dumbass, maybe there is gold here. I worship myself, just like fantagraphics does. In that way I’m imitating them on a truer path than anyone in Kramers could ever dream of following

A clear thinking person is never really detached is he?
The people responsible for pro war propaganda such as this are the ones who are truly detached from reality. They are instead attached to Ideologies like capitalism and fascism.
Marvel and abc have teamed up to perpetuate the governments lies about its intentions in syria(and around the world) and reinforce them with fictional narratives like madaya, white hats, syria bana, syria danny, etc… this type of slick media campaign was used during the build up to the first Iraq war with the phony incubator baby killings. Same with the second Iraq war, lies about wmd, nukes, terrorism, etc… huge media campaign using fake news with no dissenting opinion.
The real reason why terrorists/mercenaries are invading iraq syria from neighboring countries is they’re financed by America in order to bring about a “Greater Israel” which would encompass the lands from the Euphrates to the Nile.
Greater Israel/securing middle east oil is the real reason for military adventurism. Its a big dollar all or nothing adventure for the oligarchs, and none of their paid editors and politicians in the media or government will talk about it. But in true Hagelian fashion they will provide media reactions and government solutions to the very problems they have created. Since they are funded by corporations who make lots of money from destroying things and rebuilding them, they use blanket terms like “when war starts people suffer” to prolong the problem by keeping the focus on helping the victims rather than stopping the violence that they cause.
Providing billions in weapons never stops the violence does it?
This series of pictures with words in the margins isn’t really a comic, there’s NO artistry or sequential narrative whatsoever in it. Its the most insidious kind of pro war propaganda, for kids and the cognitive dissonant. And the artists associated with this trash should be ashamed for contributing their god given gifts to the rich mans evil schemes.

Reading the Fanta oral history, the thing that is most striking about Groth is that he was rallying day and night as if his life depended on it, for something that didn’t even exist-there’s about five years between the start of the journal and his discovery of Love and Rockets. That’s some serious conviction that comics can be literature without actually having an example of what you mean. The other striking thing is, is that kim jumped on already moving train that Groth had built and was already steering with sheer force of will. I love Kim and think of him as Groth’s partner all the way(especially after he lovingly passive-aggressively squeezed Catron out), but Groth was a man on a mission.

sikrillexfan, please reach out to robert martin, and do a podcast together. I think there might be gold there. please post a link here when it’s done.

–a fan

Great book, Mr. Tisserand! Even if it was only a primer on antebellum and post-Civil War New Orleans, your book would be a bit of an eye-opener for one who got the usual US high school education in history! Thank you for your work in putting the puzzle of Herriman together!

As for the rest of the excerpts from this book, I must say it paints quite a portrait of Gary Groth’s conduct as an employer, his attitude towards employees, and the workplace environment he fostered. The Frank Young sections were particularly telling.

I hate to call Giordano a fanboy but jeez… It’s the typical superhero fan weakness for tightly rendered artwork over anything the slightest bit cartoony. Shows how suffucatingly narrow the industry was back then, both with readers and professionals.

But oh yeah, this reads like the book’s going to be a blast.

But, come to think of it:

*the third volume of Barnaby was a fizzer; those strips where Johnson lets the assistants take over are laaaame

*no volume of Pogo this year

* Comics and Cola, and Hooded Utilitarian both closed

*IDW’s (otherwise fine) translations of Pratt continue to have the absolute worst covers

Pleasantest surprise, for me, was that Unbeatable Squirrel Girl actually is good, even though everyone says it is

I very much look forward to reading your interview with the late Mr. Kyle as I’ve always been curious and eager to read about the people who looked beyond the more mainstream comics. I used to enjoy Funnyworld quite a bit, as well, but thought it was a little too Disney-centric for my tastes, however Mr. Barrier did occasionally cover Undergrounds and other weird bits of cartoon history that made it essential, back in it’s heyday!!!

Within about 10 seconds of finishing it, I started my review for this site. It’s the kind of book you HAVE to write about.

Fantagraphics has been myopic. While congratulating itself for being an early advocate of comics as art and linking itself to EC fandom through John Benson, it has ignored Spicer (who is still alive) and Kyle. They were post-EC and pre-TCJ and were fighting the battle for longer, more sophisticated stories before Gary Groth ever published a fanzine.

Volume 2:
http://www.tcj.com/secret-loves-a-short-history-of-two-panels-in-charles-burnss-the-hive/

Volume 1:
http://classic.tcj.com/review/ken-parille-reviews-x%E2%80%99ed-out-vol-1-by-charles-burns/

Volume 1 review notes:
http://blogflumer.blogspot.com/2010/10/xed-out-review-notes.html

Short mention of volume 3:
http://www.tcj.com/2014-comics-new-and-old-part-ii/

Have you forgotten Charles Hatfield’s book?

For reference, the comics so far are as follows:
8house #1: Arclight, Part 1
8house #2: Arclight, Part 2
8house #3: Kiem
8house #4: Yorris, Part 1
8house #5: Yorris, Part2
Arclight #3 (the 8house title is dropped)

Mirror #1-5
From Under Mountains #1-6 (the creators say this has some connection to 8house)