Pulp Fiction

Julien — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 17:34:47 +0000

The inimitable Chris Sims has used panels from Archie comics to illustrate Pulp’s magnum opus, “Common People.”

Please enjoy “Archie In . . . A Different Class!”

Controversial Cartoons

Julien — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 02:06:21 +0000

I’ve been reading Susan Jacoby’s Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism. It’s a gratifying book to read when you live, as I do, in a state where politicians routinely try to outdo each other with public displays of piety, for it shows that the idea entertained by religious conservatives that the U.S. was a nation of God-fearing Christians until the 1960s came along is pure, uncut buncombe. It’s also a bit depressing to read, as it seems clear that current politicians with the religious views of Thomas Jefferson or Abraham Lincoln (who never joined a church) might not be able to be elected.

In addition to writing about Thomas Paine, Robert Ingersoll, and Susan B. Anthony, Jacoby mentions a Missouri-based freethinking cartoonist named Watson Heston, whose “Bible Comically Illustrated” sold 10,000 copies in 1900 and probably sent the Baptists of his day into paroxysms of wounded outrage (though Jacoby doesn’t mention any Baptists carrying “Behead Those Who Insult Christianity” placards). The drawings are somewhat crude, but there’s an appealing absurdist sense of humor behind them.

You can see a few of his illustrations here, and can order a CD-ROM of his work, along with other freethinker writings on the Bible here.

The Newsstand Sophisticate » Comics

Pulp Fiction

Controversial Cartoons