Comics College reveals Essential Reading of Comic Book Masters

One of my favorite regular columns is the monthly Comics College by Chris Mautner at Robot 6, hosted by Comic Book Resources. Each entry is a great introductory overview of what’s best to read from the great comic book masters and why they are so good, making this a fantastic source for newcomers or people who’ve always wanted to expand their reading. It also covers their lesser known work and stuff that maybe should be avoided.

The great part of the column is that it is looking at masters from all over the art form of comics. It’s not just superhero creators, or just alternative comics creators. It’s both those, as well as manga, newspaper strips, underground comics, euro-comics, comics journalism and more.

This month’s subject is the Norwegian cartoonist simply known as Jason. This prolific creator tells funny genre mash-ups with a deadpan economy of dialogue and understated emotion with characters struggling over love and guilt. Next month, George Herriman will be featured. His classic comic strip Krazy Kat is among the most highly regarded in the history of comics.

The Comics College column debuted in August 2009 and has covered the following comics masters past and present (click on the link to be taken to the column):

1. Los Bros. Hernandez (Love and Rockets)
2. Jack Kirby (The Fantastic Four, Jack Kirby’s Fourth World)
3. Osamu Tezuka (Astro Boy, Phoenix)
4. R. Crumb (Zap Comix, Book of Genesis)
5. Neil Gaiman (Sandman, Mr. Punch)
6. Chris Ware (Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on Earth, Acme Novelty Library)
7. Lewis Trondheim (Dungeon, Little Nothings)
8. Harvey Kurtzman (Mad Magazine, Frontline Combat)
9. art spiegelman (Maus, In the Shadow of No Towers)
10. Eddie Campbell (Alec: The Years Have Pants, The Fate of the Artist)
11. Harvey Pekar (American Splendor, Our Cancer Year)
12. Kim Deitch (The Boulevard of Broken Dreams, Shadowland)
13. Kevin Huizenga (Ganges, Curses)
14. Hergé (Tintin)
15. Charles M. Schulz (Peanuts)
16. John Stanley (Little Lulu, Melvin Monster)
17. Seth (George Sprott: 1894-1975, Wimbledon Green, It’s A Good Life If You Don’t Weaken)
18. Frank Miller (The Dark Knight Returns, Sin City)
19. Joe Sacco (Safe Area Gorazde, Palestine)
20. Jason (I Killed Adolf Hitler, Hey Wait…)
21. George Herriman (Krazy Kat)
22. Jack Cole (Plastic Man, Betsy and Me)
23. Adrian Tomine (Summer Blonde, Scenes from an Impending Marriage)
24. Grant Morrison (All-Star Superman, We3)
25. Jessica Abel (La Perdida, Artbabe)
26. Gabrielle Bell (Cecil and Jordan in New York, Lucky)
27. Scott McCloud (Understanding Comics, Zot!)
28. Charles Burns (Black Hole, Big Baby, X’ed Out)
29. Jacques Tardi (It Was the War of the Trenches, West Coast Blues)
30. Phoebe Gloeckner (A Child’s Life, The Diary of a Teenage Girl)
31. Marjane Satrapi (Persepolis, Chicken with Plums)
32. David B (Epileptic, Babel)

UPDATE: I’ll keep updating the list as new entries get posted.