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This Paper Consists of Two Sections. TODAY’S FORECAST. Flat and gray sky over flat and SECTION ONE — News, Conjecture, Hyper- gray concrete. Life-threatening heat bole, Authorial Intention. and showers turning later to deadly COLORED INSERT — Reason for Purchase. cold and snow, with continued blowing, drifting newspapers. Our Circulation: Six Copies Daily. THE IMP. Cooler by the lake. Fitting the “alternative” cartoonist Chicago’s trusted source for VOLUME I.–NO. 3. for tights, cape, and mask since 1997. SUNDAY, JULY 4, 1999— TWENTY PAGES & “ FUNNIES.” encomia, scholia, and balderdash. PRICE FOUR DOLLARS. THE SMARTEST CARTOONIST ON EARTH. AND HIS STORY OF PUBLISHED sheepishly ONCE PER ANNUM by: BLIZZARD OF PRINT ALMOST INVENTS REAL SUPERHERO. DANIEL K. RAEBURN, EDITOR. “THE SMARTEST KID ON EARTH.” 1454 WEST SUMMERDALE STREET, CHICAGO, ILL. 60640 BURIES CARTOONIST ALIVE. DEITY WATCHES TELEVISION, STEALS Reportage herein is copyright ©1999 Dan Raeburn and 380-Page Comic Book artwork is copyright Chris Ware and Fantagraphics Books, Enables Readers to Travel AUTOMOBILE, URINATES ON DUMPSTER. except where noted otherwise. Printed in Canada. in Fourth Dimension, “WARE REVIEW” GENRE HITS MIDWEST. ~ AS ALWAYS, OBTAIN CONSENT BEFORE REPRODUCING.~ Hear Silent Music, and A “God” Made in Our Own Image. CONTRIBUTING ARTISTS. Read Ghostly Language. Cartoonist Paralyzed, Mortified. Archer Prewitt . “MR. WARE.” Ivan Brunetti . “THE LAST GREAT CARTOONIST.” WITNESSES REPORT SEEING CHICAGO. — A comic book critic Jessica Abel . UNTITLED COMIC STRIP. U.S. CIVIL WAR, 1893 WORLD’S writing about The Acme Novelty Library Terry LaBan . “THE CHRIS WARE EXPERIENCE.” once remarked, “Man, what can you Daniel Clowes . “FRANKLIN CHRISTENSON WARE.” FAIR, SUPER-MAN, AND THE BIRTH OF THE MODERN WORLD. say about this comic that hasn’t already CONTRIBUTING WRITER. been said?” Rev. Daniel Kelly . FIRST CHURCH OF BUSINESS YET—“NOTHING” HAPPENS. Tons. Since that remark five years ACHIEVEMENT, CHICAGO. ķ ĸ The beleagured subject of the investigation. ago a veritable blizzard of printed SPIRITUAL GUIDANCE. A Hoax, Cry Critics. paeans to Mr. Ware continues unabated, Bharathi Jayaram, M.S. PERSONAL AFFIRMATIONS. this latest IMP being only one, solitary William Siegel, M.S. WEATHER REPORTS. body and looming behind spectacles, it Ben & Kirsten A Hoax, Cries Author. flake among the multitude swirling Southworth, M.A., M.S. ANDERSONVILLE GLEE CLUB. is a head that can only be described as owlish. from official and ivory towers. Now VENDORS & WHOLESALERS. OUR EXCLUSIVE INVESTIGATION. that the flakes have piled neck-high in “Hey Dan,” Chris chirped. He THE BEGUILING. 601 Markham St., Toronto, Ont. Chicago it is easy to see their mutual CHICAGO. — If The Acme Novelty M6G 2L7, CANADA. poured coffee, shooed the cats slinking BIG BRAIN. 81 S. Tenth St., Minneapolis, Minn. 55403. Find a writer whom is indubitably an drift. Conventions have crystallized in Library has a mascot, the Super-Man is BIZARRO-WUXTRY. 225 College Ave., Athens, Geo. 30601. American in every pulse-beat, who has around my ankles, and saw his affable writing about Chris, forming a new it. An increasingly obese, balding, BOOK BEAT. 2601 Greenfield, Oak Park, Mich. 48237. something new and peculiarly American wife, Marnie, off on errands. I sat on BRIES. Kaamenstraat 41, B-2000 Antwerpen, BELGIUM. to say and says it in an unmistakably genre entirely devoted to writing about masked man, Super-Man hovers in CHICAGO COMICS. 3244 N. Clark St., Chicago, Ill. 60657. the davenport with my sheaves of ques- CODY’S BOOKS. 2454 Telegraph Ave., Berkeley, Calif. 94704. American way, and nine times out of ten him and his wares (a lame pun which each issue’s introductory frame, COMICS DUNGEON. 1622 1/2 N. 45th St., Seattle, WA 98103. you will find that he has some sort of con- tions and made myself comfortable. bestowing laurels and upholding the DISINFOTAINMENT. P.O. Box 664, London E3 4QR, nection with the gigantic and inordinate reoccurs, of course, with predictable UNITED KINGDOM. Anyone familiar with Chris’s work orb of Truth. He floats throughout the DREAM HAVEN. 912 W. Lake St., Minneapolis, Minn. abattoir by Lake Michigan—that he was frequency.) 55408. bred there or passed through there in the would also feel at home in the real-life The reviews all share one pattern: margins of the book in one-shot strips, FANTAGRAPHICS BOOKS. 7563 Lake City Way Northeast, days when he was young and tender. Novelty Library. Like Chris’s comic Seattle, Wash. 98115. Order through catalog. this comic is the “hottest” comic and dashing and restoring people’s hopes. FM INTERNATIONAL. 913 Stewart St., Madison, Wisc. —H.L. Mencken. book, his home is a dense, elaborate 53713. Our prompt WHOLESALER. the “coldest” comic, the most “depress- He appears as both a bum and a FRINGEWARE. 2716 Guadalupe St., Austin, Texas. 78705. amalgamation of massive, solid, pol- celebrity, your murderer and your sav- GREEN NOISE. 537 Willamette St., Eugene, Oregon 97401. ing” comic and the most “hilarious” GALERIE LAMBIEK. Kerkstraat 78, 1017 GN Amsterdam, ished stuff, all well-crafted and orna- comic; its author is the most “cynical” iour. Chris Ware says that his Super- THE NETHERLANDS. Man is “all things at once.” LAST GASP ECO-FUNNIES. 777 Florida St., San Francisco, mented. A piano and at least two vic- and the most “sincere.” Most of all, to Calif. 94110. Our prompt WHOLESALER. See note below. That is as good a definition of “God” LEFT BANK BOOKS. 92 Pike St., Seattle, Wash. 98101. trolas were squared away amid knick- put it in lingo that will no doubt make MADIZINE. P.O. Box 8284, Madison, Wisc. 53708-8284. knacks, gewgaws, and whatnots tucked as any. Super-Man is real because He is MAG DADDY. 2235 2nd Ave., Seattle, Wash. 98121. Chris Ware flinch, he is the most. MELTDOWN COMICS & COLLECTIBLES. 7529 Sunset Blvd, into curio cabinets and cubbyholes, The foremost convention of this more human than many humans. At Los Angeles, Calif. 90046. THE MILLION-YEAR PICNIC. 99 Mt. Auburn St., Cam- which were filled with banjos, magic writing-about-Ware genre is to crown times He shoplifts, burns churches, and bridge, Mass. 02138-4945. NAKED EYE. 533 Haight St., San Francisco, Calif. 94117. lanterns, stereopticons, edison rolls, him with a superlative—a word defined brains innocent bystanders before jack- PISTIL BOOKS & NEWS. 1013 E. Pike St., Seattle, Wash. 98122. sheet music, books, handmade toys in by The American Heritage Dictionary as ing their car. In one strip He sinks so QUIMBY’S “QVEER” STORE. 1854 W. North Ave., low as to make Hollywood movies. But Chicago, Ill. 60622. hand colored boxes, yellowing comic “the highest degree, or acme.” A babel- READING FRENZY. 921 SW Oak St., Portland, Ore. 97205. strips, antique postcards, and of course at other times He gives his loot to the SEE HEAR. 59 E. 7th St., New York, New York, 10003. CHICAGO.— On a gray day at the end Chris’s cat and mice sculptures that BLIZZARD continued on page 2. homeless, rescues a nose-diving air- Note: You may also buy wholesale (50% off the cover price) directly of 1998 I rode the elevated train to from the eager Mr. Raeburn. sing and dance when you turn their plane, strums His banjo and contem- Chris Ware’s house. The el roared tiny brass crank. plates a sunrise. He is our “inner child,” above rows of wet, bleating cars and INVENTS ROBOTS as capable of kindness as of torturing us rumbled across the only river man WITH FEELINGS. for His sport, and for this reason I do forced to run backward. As we clat- not worship Him but I do believe in tered past a shit-brown jumble of shat- ROBOTS MADE IN OUR OWN IMAGE. Him. tered warehouses, housing projects, Are They More Human Chris told Moxie magazine that rusted water towers, and pork-repro- Than Humans? when he was a boy, he believed he cessing plants, my thoughts rose high would grow up to be the first real and distant as the black skyscrapers superhero. “I was sure that all I had to that fringe Lake Michigan’s long, Chris unwrapped a 78 r.p.m. record do was either study really hard or watery eye. I was already composing my from the day’s mail—“An old banjo involve myself in some sort of indus- opening paragraph for this story, one I tune I bid on,” he said sheepishly—and trial accident, and then I would acquire hoped would capture the appalling slid it away in a record closet lined superhero powers,” he said. “I firmly panorama of the town built on a swamp edge-to-edge with manila sleeves. I thought that something like that was and named for the swamp’s stinking, spotted a honeycomb of cassette tapes, going to happen to me.” wild fruit: the Chakawga onion. each spine bearing an intricate, hand- REAL SUPERHERO continued on page 16. lettered logo. (“Did you see his tapes?” one cartoonist later asked me in a near- whisper. “Those labels alone made me realize that I have wasted my entire life.”) Comics: A Matter Of CHICAGO.—At one point in the vast, Life And Death? illimitable cosmos of the writing- The oddest thought popped into my about-Ware genre, an interviewer head as I gawked at Chris’s stuff: asked Chris why Jimmy Corrigan I alighted from the train above I would never kill myself if I lived in this dreamed that he was a robot. Chris Damen Avenue and plopped my way apartment. Beethoven rose and fell shrugged; it seemed like an obvious way through oily puddles toward Hoyne from a stereo and mingled with the to depict somebody who called his Street, home of Mr.