Freistil Black

I am honored to have the first chapter of my book included in Freistil, the prestigious bi-annual of European commercial illustration published by Verlag Hermann Schmidt Mainz, 2009. "Freistil reveals the breath and the evolution of the culture of illustration. Here, you will discover talents, aspects and technical finesses, not to mention the trend of a culture that develops rapidly and is distinguished by the daring to take clear, individual standpoints." [Backcover]

First Place Winner--New York Book Show

Wordless Books: The Original Graphic Novels was awarded First Place Book in the Special Trade/ Adult Graphic Novel category in the 23rd Annual New York Book Show sponsored by the Bookbinders' Guild of New York. Mark Evanier's Kirby, King of Comics was the Second Place winner and Chip Kidd, Geoff Spear, and Saul Ferris's Bat-Manga! The Secret History of Batman in Japan won Third Place in the category. This festive event was held on March 24, 2009 in the Grand Ballroom at the Manhattan Center.

I was so honored to learn that my book was chosen a winner in this show. To learn on the night of the show that it was awarded the First Place Book in the Adult Graphic Novel category among so many other fine books was even more exciting. This award reflects the creativity with my publisher, Harry N. Abrams, and Robert McKee, book designer; Anet Sirna-Bruder, Production Coordinator; Michelle Ishay, Art Director; and Charlie Kochman, my editior. This award shows that the early wordless books and woodcut novels that I have studied for many years are finally being respected for a strong social message and admired for their visual impact.

Judges' Comments
"Three part 'torn' binding is very unusual and interesting. Typography is beautiful and appropriate. Layout and composition is very elegant. Tints are very even. Paper choices are excellent. Shows a great respect for the graphic novel genre."


The books have been selected from more than 900 entries from book publishers and printers, large and small, throughout North America, Europe, and Asia.

"For many of us," stated Eric I. Schwartz, President of The Bookbinders' Guild of New York, "including myself, the New York Book Show is the highest point of our seasonal calendar. Each year the New York Book Show is a demonstration of the care and creativity of the producers of great books, from the type on the page ,to the paper they are printed on, to the ideas they represent. It is an affirmation of the vitality of a technology first invented in the 1450s and a celebration of the multifarious permutations of the book within the community that has the greatest stake in its continued success."

Pease Public Library Program

I presented a slide show on the early wordless books, woodcut novels, contemporary wordless comics, and picture books on Tuesday, March 17, 2009 at 7 p.m. at Pease Public Library, Plymouth, New Hampshire. It was a very well attended event with a reception and book signing, hosted by Katherine Hillier--Library director, staff, and volunteers.

French Edition

A French edition of Wordless Books (Roman Graphique. Des Origines aux Annees) was published by Editions de La Martiniere.

September in New York City

I had the privilege to be part of two comic book related events this past September in New York City.

Howl! Festival
The first event I attended was a panel discussion called "Inside Out: Self and Society in Comic Art: Trends in Autobiography, journalism and social critique in graphic novels.”with moderator Calvin Reid (Publisher's Weekly Comics Week); artists Jillian Tamaki (Skim), Josh Neufeld (A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge) and James Romberger (Seven Miles a Second); and editor at DC/Vertigo, Pornsak Pichetshote. It was held at St.Mark's Church in the Bowery, New York and was one of the panel discussions held as part of the annual Howl Festival. Sept. 10, 2008. Edward Carey from Comics Culture was present and has loaded the complete transcript of our discussion in two parts called Inside Out: Self and Society in Comic Art.

Calvin Reid, Josh Newfeld, David Berona, and James Romberger

Columbia University Book History Colloquium
The second event I participated in was a presentation and discussion held on Sept. 25 with David Hajdu, Columbia University and Mike Kelly, New York University entitled “Reading Pictures, Burning Comics: New Perspectives on the History of Graphic Narrative.” This was one of the scheduled events for the Fall 2008 Columbia University Book History Colloquium held at Butler Library, Columbia University.

The publication of my book, Wordless Books (2008) and Hajdu’s Ten-cent Plague (2008) inspired this panel discussion that was organized by Gerald Cloud, Librarian for Reference and Research at Butler Rare Book & Manuscript Library. Moderator, comics scholar, and rare book curator Mike Kelly lead this discussion with myself and Hajdu on current scholarship, historical perspectives, and a consideration of the place wordless books, graphic novels, and comics hold in both contemporary culture and the History of the Book.

After our presentations and a lively discussion there was a book signing and we later continued our conversation at a restaurant, joined by my wife, Rose O’Brien and Charlie Kochman, Executive Editor of Abrams ComicArts.

Rose O'Brien, David Berona, David Hajdu, Gerald Cloud, Mike Kelly, Charlie Kochman

Home Town Event, July 24-25, 2008

I was looking forward to returning to my hometown of Enon, Ohio and Springfield, where I went to school. In addition to visiting family and friends this past week, I made plans for two books signings, while I was in the area. Much of the work for these events was accomplished through the untiring efforts of Rick Benning at Ambience Events, who not only organized the fantastic event on Friday but also put me in contact with Andrew McGinn, a writer at the Springfield News and Sun who wrote an article about my work "Central alum writes the book on wordless books."

Book Signing and Presentation at Ambience

Rick also put me in contact with Mary Alice, the owner of the Dark Star Bookshop in Yellow Springs, where I arranged a book signing on Thursday. I had the opportunity to meet some old friends and talk with a number of interesting people who stopped in the bookstore to hear more about my book.

Rick Benning, David McDargh, and Rose O'Brien

The main event, though, was held the following night at Ambience Events which was hosted by David McDargh and Rick Benning . Rick had blown up some of the woodcuts from my book and displayed them around the showroom. It was absolutely breathtaking to see these prints enlarged in the expansive room. The event was catered and offered an assortment of scrumptious dishes and appetizers to the numerous people who attended. I gave a twenty minute presentation on wordless books and graphic novels before signing copies of my book and talking with everyone present.

It was so great to see my brother, sisters, nephews and nieces; friends from high school; neighbors and friends from Enon and Springfield; as well as a number of interested people who showed up after reading McGinn's newspaper article. This was a really festive and memorable evening I will never forget!

Reading Pictures: The Language of Wordless Books, LES Panel Discussion ALA, 2008

Poster by Eric Drooker

As part of the Literature in English (LES) section, sponsored in part with the ARTS section of the Association of Colleges and Research Libraries, I was pleased to be part of a presentation and panel discussion that was organized by Juliet Kerico, from Southern Illinois University--Edwardsville and Chair of LES (Literature in English Section) Conference Planning Committee. The panelists were Dr. Charles Hatfield (UCalifornia-Northridge), Eric Drooker, Perry Willett (Michigan), and myself (Plymouth State University, New Hampshire). There were over 150 attendees at the panel discussion held at the American Libraries Association annual conference in Anaheim on June 28, 2008. This was an introduction to the history of adult wordless books from the early twentieth century to the contemporary wordless graphic novels. Elements of visual storytelling were examined as well as various controversial social issues associated with adult wordless books. Guidelines for using wordless books in Higher Education was also discussed.

Charles Hatfield, Eric Drooker, Perry Willett , myself, and Juliet Kerico.

Perry Willett began with his presentation and his own obsession with wordless books that started 30 years ago and his experiences in researching them in various libraries. He talked about Frans Masereel, the father of the woodcut novel, and discussed the importance of these wordless books and why they might matter to people in the audience even if they don’t care about graphic novels. Perry discussed how popular these books were in their time, and how quickly and ruthlessly culture moves on and obliterates what came before, and that librarians need to consider this as they make collection development decisions. He explained that his experience with these books and as the Managing Editor for the Victorian Women Writers Project taught him how our collection development decisions form the basis by which people will be able to re-evaluate contemporary art, literature and cultural expressions later on. This incredibly great beginning set the focus for the rest of the panel.

Next on the panel, I covered the artists from Lynd Ward to the present. These included many artists from my book, Wordless Books: The Original Graphic Novels, like Ward, Otto Nuckel, Helen Bochorakov-Dittrichova, Szegedi Szuts, William Gropper, Giacomo Patri and Laurence Hyde, as well as artists I cover in my next book, who inlcludes Werner Gothein, Si Lewen, Felix Gluck, Palle Nielsen, Ken Currie, Eric Drooker, Peter Kuper, Erez Yakin, Thomas Ott, Peter Kalberkamp, Anna Sommer, Olivier Deprez, Hendrik Dorgathen, Jason, Shaun Tan, and Sara Varon.

Eric Drooker presented a slide show from one of the chapters in his American Awarding winning wordless book, Flood! a Novel in Pictures. It was a stunning show with sounds of rain showers and music that brilliantly coincided with the images from his book that were projected on a large screen. The room was darken to provide a theater-like atmosphere. I heard later from some attendees that it brought tears to their eyes in some of the more emotional parts of his book. The similarities of silent films and wordless books became very evident in this demonstration. Eric is an artist with strong political views and a life-affirming suspicion of authority and technology and shares the ideas of the early wordless book artists like Frans Masereel and Lynd Ward. His confidence in himself, both as an artist and a politically active human being, was clear in his presentation and during his participation in the audience questions.




Charles Hatfield used the wordless strip called "Champion," by the French artist, Zou, from the monumental survey of wordless comics called Comix 2000, in his presentation that provided an overview of how he teaches visual communication to his students. What was fascinating to me as well as the audience during the discussion period was how Charles described his students "reading" this comic and their various interpretations. Charles is so aware of comics as a means of communication, which he thoroughly covers in his book Alternative Comics: An Emerging Literature, that his insights invited more questions about the importance of us, as individuals, in learning how to best interpret the icons, symbols, and visual images that we are daily confronted with in our contemporary culture.

What followed was a dynamic panel discussion with probing questions from the audience that prompted a lively discussion with the panelists. In many of the evaluations, the attendees commented that this was one of the best panel presentations they had ever attended at an ALA conference. The four of us had dinner the night before and were joined by Charles' wife; Michelle; Zofia Losinska, chair LES; Jen Stephens, LES planning committee member; and Juliet. This dinner and relaxed atmosphere brought us all closer together and certainly attributed to the personal mood on the panel. We covered ideas about the history of printing; the use of woodcuts; the reason for the focus on social injustices; reason for using older technologies like slide projectors; and even the best way to read a picture book. I couldn't help but relate the event that when I was a child, my father read to me and my brother before we were old enough to read. However, when we had a wordless picture book, my father always asked me to read him the book, allowing me to use my own imagination and to understand that there is something very personal about "reading" pictures. I also enjoyed discovering in an interview from one of Lynd Ward's daughters, Nanda Ward, that when she asked her father what one of his wordless books was about he always replied with the same answer to her question: "It means exactly what you want it to mean." Read Charles' blog on this event.