When our friends at the the Library of America asked me if I wanted to take a look at their latest release, Lynd Ward: Six Novels in Woodcuts (two volumes, $70), I had to confess I didn't know the name.
But when the books arrived, I recognized the work — as you likely do too. But I was unaware of Ward's status as perhaps this country's first “graphic novelist” (Ward called his work “novels in woodcuts” which seems a more accurate and graceful designation).
Ward was a Depression-era artist, and his wordless novels evoke both 1930s WPA murals and German expressionists like Jakob Steinhardt. They're stunning. It's hard to believe they were out of print for decades.
If I'm not quite qualified to write about Ward's work — if someone would put the Spectrum Weekly archives online I'd link to a story I wrote about comics in 1989 right now — the editor of the volume Art Spiegelman is, and you can read a portion of his introductory essay in the online version of the Paris Review.
When our friends at the the Library of America asked me if I wanted to take a look at their latest release, Lynd Ward: Six Novels in Woodcuts (two volumes, $70), I had to confess I didn't know the name.
But when the books arrived, I recognized the work — as you likely do too. But I was unaware of Ward's status as perhaps this country's first “graphic novelist” (Ward called his work “novels in woodcuts” which seems a more accurate and graceful designation).
Ward was a Depression-era artist, and his wordless novels evoke both 1930s WPA murals and German expressionists like Jakob Steinhardt. They're stunning. It's hard to believe they were out of print for decades.
If I'm not quite qualified to write about Ward's work — if someone would put the Spectrum Weekly archives online I'd link to a story I wrote about comics in 1989 right now — the editor of the volume Art Spiegelman is, and you can read a portion of his introductory essay in the online version of the Paris Review.
