Ranganathan & Comics

As part of our salute to National Library Week, I've written up a little essay about Ranganathan's Five Laws of Library Science and how they might apply to comics:

In 1931 S. R. Ranganathan, the Indian librarian who is considered to be one of the fathers of modern library science, developed his Five Laws of Library Science. Those laws are:

1. Books are for use.
2. Every reader his or her book.
3. Every book its reader.
4. Save the time of the reader.
5. The Library is a growing organism.

With some reworking, these laws can be applied to comics as well:

1. Comics are for use

The purpose of a comic is to be read. That seems self evident, but so many people who consume comics are locked into a collector mentality. There is nothing worse for the soul of comics than for a comic to be locked away inside hermetically sealed plastic and treated as an item. The collector mentallity is something that I myself am trying to shake: I'm loaning out more comics, donating graphic novels to the library, etc. If I have 25,000 comics, it does no good to anyone to leave them locked up in my closet--they need to be set free! (Like I said, I'm working on it...)

2. Every reader his or her comic
3. Every Comic its reader

These should be pretty self-explanatory. Remember, every comic is someone's favorite (even if it's just the creator's mother), and there is a comic to fit every taste. I know the medium is supposedly dominated by super-heroes, but flip through Previews and you'll see instances of comics on just about every subject, from westerns to romance to biography to fantasy to chick lit to horror etc. There are comics that can stand alongside 'literature' and comics that are the equivalent of dime novels. There are comics written for kids and comics written for adults (and comics written for adults who act like kids!) And just because you personally don't like a particular comic, that doesn't mean that no one should. There's variety, and variety is good.


4. Save the time of the comic reader

This one is the hardest to directly translate, but in practice it reflects the aim to provide service to the customer. This means service on all levels, from publisher to distributor to store. The easier it is for people to get comics, the more comics they'll have. Bookstores, 7-11s, online merchants, it's all good, provided the service is good. And everyone is responsible for the good of the comics medium; we are all stewards of comics, whether we be creators, redears or retailers. We may disagree as to what is 'good' for comics, or even what 'good' comics are, but we all want to see good comics succeed.


5. Comics are a growing organism

The field of comics is always growing and changing. There have been a lot of changes and challenges to comics in the past few years, from a shrinking number of stores to the manga 'invasion' to the gradual switchover from pamphlets to trade editions to the emergence of the Web. But change is part of everything, and comics will, in some form or another, always endure.

Quick GN Reviews

Dead End, vol. 1
by Shohei Manabe
A mysterious beautiful naked girl falls out of the sky and into Shirou's life. In most manga this would set the stage for wacky hijinks, but in Dead End it leads Shirou into a world of actual and existential horror. He soon find his neighbors in his apartment building brutally murdered, and learns that this life and memories have all been a lie. As he attempts to piece together his real life, Shirou finds himself on the run from mysterious pursuers and sinking into a dark world of violence and paranoia. Manabe has an interesting visual style that reminds me more of Paul Pope than typical manga. it's not always exactly clear what is going on in Dead End, but that may be by design and reflective of Shirou's own confusion. The violence can be graphic and brutal at times, although not in an over-the-top splatter movie way. An interesting read.
Rating: 3.5 (of 5)


The Dark Horse Book of Hauntings
edited by Scott Allie
P. Craig Russell, Mike Mignola, Paul Chadwick, and a host of other talented comics creators get together to present a collection of ghost stories. The quality of the offerings that Allie has assembled is quite high, with lush art on glossy paper ina sturdy hardcover volume. The best is saved for last, as Evan Dorkin & Jill Thompson tell a story of neighborhood pets attempting to exorcise a haunted doghouse. The only misstep in this collection is a text interview with a supposed 'séance medium,' ten pages of bullhockey that is easily skipped over. But the rest of the package makes for fine reading, and shows how good anthologies can be .
Rating: 4 (of 5)

New This Week: April 13, 2005

Based on the NCRL list for this week's comics shipping from Diamond, here are a few things to look for at the local comic shop tomorrow:

Pick of the Week? Well, it's probably Flight, vol. 2 from Image--the first volume was full of gorgeous artwork from a variety of artists. But that's pretty expensive at $25, so if you're looking for something a bit less costly, I'd go with Marvel's She-Hulk, vol. 2: Superhuman Law; the first volume was much fun, and I've heard good things about the stories collected in this second volume.


In other comics:

Dark Horse has the first issue of P. Craig Russell's Conan & The Jewels of Gwahlur.

DC has the penultimate issue of Adam Strange (#7), and new issues of Fables (#36), Gotham Central (#30), Green Arrow (#49), JSA (#72), Majestic (#4), and Tom Strong (#32).

El Capitan has a new issue of Stray Bullets (#37).

Image has the second issues of Beyond Avalon, Flaming Carrot Comics and Mora, plus a new issue of Noble Causes (#9).

Marvel has new issues of Black Panther (#3), Mary Jane: Homecoming (#2), New Thunderbolts (#7), Powers (#10), and Ultimates 2 (#5).


Small week, actually, so maybe you can afford that Flight, vol. 2 after all...

Crisis on Infinite Crises

I had been contemplating writing something about the whole DC Countdown and Infinite Crisis and whatnot, not because I have any desire to continue to beat a dead horse, but because there was something I thought was blindingly obvious about the whole thing that I hadn't seen anybody else comment on.

Then comes today's Basement Tapes from Matt Fraction & Joe Casey, and now I'm off the hook.

Sayeth Fraction:

...isn't all of this prelude, and isn't the titular Infinite Crisis itself a move towards DC hitting some kind of candy colored reset button to set the wayback machine a little bit? Isn't this whole exercise in bleak and brain matter a journey back to The Way We Were?

They say a lot of what I wanted to say, except that they say it with more (and undoubtedly better) words than I would have. And more profanity. And more blue text. But they make the most reasoned analysis that I've yet read, so go take a look.

Favorite Fictional Librarians

Continuing our series of posts relating to National Library Week, today we look at my favorite fictional librarians:

Batgirl/Oracle: Yes, young Barbara Gordon somehow found the time to squeeze in a masters degree in library science in between being a super-heroine and being a state congresswoman. A literal Super-Librarian! Whoever's decision it was to make her an information broker to the super-heroes had one of the best ideas in super-hero comics in the past 20 years.



Rupert Giles: Father-figure and confidant to the Scooby Gang on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, here was a seemingly mild-mannered high school librarian who got to sing, kick a little ass and even get the girl once or twice. Also the source of some great library-related humor on the show.



Bunny Watson: Katherine Hepburn's character in Desk Set, the best-ever romantic comedy about library automation. She and her colleagues in the network's research library proved that they could out-think any computer when it came to meeting their patrons' information needs.

Librarians in Comics

It's National Library Week, so all this week I'll be posting items relating to libraries and comics.

First up, a brief look at librarians who also do work in comics:

Jim Ottaviani writes comics about science, including Two-Fisted Science, Dignifying Science, Suspended in Language, and the forthcoming Bone Sharps, Cowboys, and Thunder Lizards. When he's not writing comics, Jim spends his time as the mastermind behind the Deep Blue institutional repository initiative at the University of Michigan Library.

Sara Ryan has written a couple of comic stories, including the Eisner-nominated "Me and Edith Head." She recently turned in the draft of the second young adult novel, and bides her professional time as a School Corps Librarian for the Multnomah County Library in Portland, Oregon.

The Pseudonymous Gene Ambaum, writer of the popular online comic strip Unshelved, is a real-life librarian in his real life.

And Maggie Thompson, editor of the long-running Comics Buyer's Guide, is a librarian by training, but at some point she got sidetracked into a career writing about comics.

Those are all the librarians I can think of; are there any I'm missing?

Quick GN Reviews

Runaways, vol. 3: The Good Die Young
by Brian K. Vaughan, Adrian Alphona & Craig Yeung
The first 'season' of Runaways comes to a close as the titular kids face off against their evil super-villain parents and try to uncover the traitor in their midst. Vaughan provides a good mixture of action and teen-angst, and the art works very well for the most part. The only real problem is with the coloring: in places it is too dark and muddy and the detail is lost; not really the fault of the colorist, as she was coloring for a book that was originally glossy paper and this digest is on a non-glossy stock that absorbs ink differently and doesn't show as much definition and contrast. Not much more to say, except that this series continues to be an enjoyable page-turner, and I'm really looking forward to the next collection.
Rating: 3.5 (of 5)


Amazing Agent Luna, vol. 1
by Nunzio DeFilippis, Christina Weir, & Carmela "Shiei" Doneza
Born in a laboratory and raised to be a super-spy, at just fifteen-years-old Luna is one of the top secret agents in the world. But she has never been socialized to the real world, so her handlers decide to send her to a regular high school as a student (while they pose as her parents!) No sooner does Luna start as the new girl at school (and all the problems that provides) than who should show up as another new student but Jonah, the son of Luna's evil arch-nemesis, Count Heinrich von Brucken! DeFilippis & Weir manage to pull of the nearly impossible, writing a manga-esque comic that feels right but is not a cheap rip-off, helped in no small part by the confident artwork of Shiei. I ended up liking this a lot more than I thought I would, and can't wait to read more.
Rating: 3.5 (of 5)


Owly: The Way Home & The Bittersweet Summer
by Andy Runton
At this point you've probably read many good things about Andy Runton's Owly, and I'm pleased to say that they're all true. This is a wonderful comic. Owly is a cartoon owl who likes to make friends and help his fellow woodland creatures. In the first story Owly helps a little worm find his way home after having been washed away in a storm. The second story find Owly befriending a couple of hummingbirds. The stories are more gentle really than exciting, but they're charmin and adorable, and I mean that in the best way possible. The stories are mostly wordless, and Runton shows an incredible economy of storytelling and a mastery of cartooning that lts him tell his stories effectively. Add Owly to your list of must-read books that celebrate the comics form.
Rating: 4.5 (of 5)