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I originally wrote almost exactly a decade ago in the wake of Harvey Pekar's death. The sentiment is still valid, but some of the specifics are dated enough now that I did change them so they don't seem totally out of place here in 2020.


Harvey Pekar
One thing that strikes me about Harvey Pekar is that, despite an inordinate amount of critical success, he just wasn't all that popular and didn't make all that much money. Despite doing what he loved and doing it very well, that didn't translate into real financial rewards. Not that I think he was necessarily looking for that per se, but certainly towards the end of his life, it was the extra income from that covered living expenses that ran beyond his pension and retirement.

And that's something to consider carefully. I love comics. I would love to get paid to research and write about about whatever comic book related stuff strikes me. But I know that's not commercially viable. Heck, there are plenty of things I write here that I think are really great, but they don't even get linked to. Maybe it's utter crap but I suspect it has more to do with my just covering topics that don't interest anyone. So I keep a day job that I'm reasonably good at, and brings in enough money to pay all my bills.

When I had first graduated college, I could look out and see older people who were a lot more successful than I was with regard to job prospects and income and whatnot. And that was okay because, well, they were more experienced and had been out there longer. I'm old enough now that see people my age or younger climbing the corporate ziggurat lickety-split, and I can see that I'm not going to get to that level of "success." Which is still okay, because that's not really what I want to do with my life.

See, the thing is that every person has to have their own priorities and goals. While mine do include living more comfortably (financially speaking) than someone like Pekar, I also want to live for myself before my career or my bank account. So I go into the office and do good work -- derived more from personal pride than corporate ambitions -- but I also make sure than I'm working to live, not living to work. I want to come home in the evening and kill some time reading a biography of Gardner Fox or researching old Denny O'Neil comics or banging out another (ultimately) fruitless blog post.

I heard years ago that one of the keys to a life well lived is to take your two deepest passions, make your second-favorite your job and make the other your hobby. If you make your deepest passion your job, you'll get caught up in the bullshit that inevitably crops up and you won't be able to see it in the same untainted light. If you reserve that for your second-favorite passion, you can always keep whatever it is that really excites you alive and fresh and energizing.

That's why I've never aggressively pursued a career in comics. That's why I haven't worked very hard in trying to monetize my writing about comics. I've explained to a few people recently that much of my writing is just the means to an end. I'm looking to understand different aspects of comics better, and writing about them forces me to organize my thoughts in a cohesive manner. Writing it down forces me to create a narrative about what I'm learning and thus makes it easier for me to remember. I'm not averse to getting paid to write about comics -- that's where my Webcomics book comes from after all -- but it's never really been a primary goal.

I think Pekar did something similar. I don't think anyone would claim he was that deeply passionate about being a file clerk; that was just how he paid the bills. Even comics were a secondary passion for him, following behind jazz. Robert Crumb is the same way. Both of them have expressed annoyance and frustration and dismay when talking about comics, but they never seemed to be that way about jazz. They could put on an old jazz album, and be completely absorbed by the music.

They key is recognizing which is a hobby and which is going to make you a living. I don't claim to have all the answers, and whatever answers I might have are just what works for me. But I like to think I've got my act relatively together. I'm happy with who I am and what I'm doing. And I can sit down and read a good comic book, and just enjoy the fact that I'm enjoying a good comic. I don't have "how do I turn this in money for groceries" floating in the back of my head the whole time. I don't have "DEADLINE!!!" screaming at me from within the pages of Fantastic Four. I could drop off the comicdom's radar entirely, and just sit at home quietly reading Questionable Content by myself with no outside interaction at all, and I'd still be able to cover all my bills just fine, thankyouverymuch. F.I.J.A.G.H.
I grew up with Ed Emberley books where he taught kids how to draw using simple shapes and lines. The instructional steps could be considered comics, but they were all relatively short. To my knowledge, even the most complex ones were no more than a single page. What I only learned of recently, though, was that Emberley actually wrote a bona fide graphic novel in 1975! It features his familiar style of art, but with panels and word balloons and all the aesthetics that you would normally associate with a graphic novel. Plus, it's got some trippy optical illusions! I have no idea how my dad missed this back in the day!

Anyway, here's The Wizard of Op (now long out of print)...
Eight-Lane Runaways
Eight-Lane Runaways is the newest book from Fantagraphics by Hnry McCausland. It's about...

It's about...

OK, so you know how Winsor McCay wrote Little Nemo in Slumberland and you can say it was about this kid who falls asleep and explores Slumberland? And how that is completely and totally inadequate in describing what actually goes on? Eight-Lane Runaways is kind of like that. Imagine if McCay wrote about a footrace, and it had the same sense of surreality that Nemo had. Ostensibly there's some kind of race going on, but that's mostly just an excuse for the characters to move forward. These runners keep running, and encountering different characters and situations and it kind of defies narrative sense. That is, everything does go from one scene to the next smoothly enough, but a lot of doesn't seem to fit in any overarching narrative.

That's not a criticism, mind you. The encounters are interesting and fascinating in and of themselves. As highlighted on the back of the book, there are "sentient ponchos, algebra dogs, a juice institute, kite flying to the moon..." And that's just characters that have a direct impact on the story. Throughout the backgrounds are hundreds of little events and scenes that -- while not as packed as Where's Waldo -- are infinitely more interesting, often bordering on the surreal. The world McCausland has created (would we call this world McCausLand as well?) has an internal logic like Slumberland or Wonderland, but it doesn't exactly line up with what we see happening in the real world. As such, much of the joy in reading Eight-Lane Runaways is just in exploring. Who is that little guy with the "3" on his hat poking out of that weird, square tube in the ground? Are those two people on opposite sides of the page playing ping pong with each other? What are the rules of what appears to be a pie-throwing game?

The book is very whimsical and can race by if you let it, but it's also easy to stop and get lost in the background. And with either approach you take, you're still bound to find something both delightful and unexpected.
Ken Eppstein of Nix Comics recently ran a survey of comic artists to look at their identity as artists and their relationship with nonprofit organizations (like CBLDF and Hero Initiative). He posted the results almost two weeks ago but I haven't heard much chatter about it, so I thought I'd try to bring up some points here. Particularly in light of Eppstein's survey of non-artists, which I'll also get to in a bit.

First off, Eppstein does note that his results are somewhat skewed by virtue of how he got respondents in the first place. Namely, the vast majority of them came from his personal contacts. He had one question that asked if they identified as member of a frequently/historically marginalized group and, with over 57% answering "no", that implies that most of his respondents were able-bodied, cis hetero, white men. (Eppstein also acknowledges this is a failure of outreach on his part.) And while this demographic may be more reflective of "mainstream" comics (i.e. Marvel and DC) it certainly does not encompass comics writ large.

That caveat out of the way, there are some numbers that I find particularly interesting. Of the 240 respondents, over half included "full time job" as one of their sources of income and another fifth included "part time job." "Freelance art" was called out as a separate category response, suggesting that those first two categories do not include making comics for most people. However, half of respondents did also say their day job was "comics related" but this could obviously include working in comic shops, in the marketing department of a publisher, on the line at a printing company, etc. But it seems like we're looking at roughly three-quarters of these artists that seem to be unable to make a living solely through making comics. The average was a little shy of three separate sources of income per respondent.

weekly Hours Chart
This is supported by a question on the number of hours worked on comics per week. While the pandemic has skewed the numbers a bit, as much of this survey was conducted while Diamond was shut down entirely, both the average and the median number of hours devoted to making comics per week topped out around 20. Basically the equivalent of a part-time job. Which either means that artists can't afford the time to put a "typical" 40-hour work week towards comics, or they can't afford the financial hit from the opportunity cost of not working another part- or full-time job. Either way, they're basically making the decision to limit the amount of time they work on comics because they simply can't afford to devote more time to them.

Honestly, I have trouble reading much of substance out of the responses on the questions bout nonprofit organizations. Eppstein calls out, "one respondent commented that all of the services, functions and values were framed as positives and wondered why they wouldn’t select all in every category" and I have to agree. It looks like over half liked seven or more of the ten values presented. There were no questions about assigning priorities, which I think may have helped to parse the data better.

I mentioned the non-artist survey earlier, too. These questions were more of a "Family Feud" type where non-artists were asked to guess how they thought artists would respond. Overall, non-artists guessed a little got a little more than third accurately. The very best score, however, came in at still under two-thirds accurate. Considering that, here again, Eppstein's respondents largely came from his social circle, it would suggest that these people did have more than a typical knowledge and/or familiarity with the comics industry. This is backed up by only five respondents identifying themselves as "not a fan" of comics.

It strikes me that there is a pretty massive gap between what comic artists actually do and how comics fit into their lives versus how they're perceived by others. I mean, I like to think I know a fair amount about comics. I'm friends with Eisner winners, I've chatted with Marvel Editors-in-Chief, I've had lunch with nationally syndicated cartoonists... And I scored less than fifty percent. Eppstein does claim a respondent trying to answer these accurately is "actually a fairly difficult task" but it does point to how people might rely on stereotypes and broad assumptions in lieu of any real (even anecdotal) data. He also promises a longer essay on how these stereotypes can cause problems in making positive social changes in the industry. Particularly in light of the recent spate of sexual misconduct issues that have been in the news the past few weeks, I am definitely looking forward to that! (Read Asher Elbein's excellent Daily Beast article for how the economic exploitation inherent in the comics industry encourages this sexual misconduct!)

One of the issues we have in the United States more generally is simply an unwillingness to openly discuss our finances. Even the friends I have who are most open about their finances still tend to shy away from specific numbers when it comes to their income. The two creators I've heard really talk about it at all have been Dorothy Gambrell and Ryan Estrada, and I don't think I've seen anything concrete (with regard to finances) from either of them in several years. It's an almost completely taboo subject. Does simply opening up that conversation a first step towards changing the whole financial model of comics? I don't know. But it seems to me that even these unprecedented times, it's unlikely that we'll start really opening up about how much comic creators get paid.
Here are this week's links to what I've had published recently...

FreakSugar: Interview: Sean Kleefeld on his New Book Webcomics

Kleefeld on Comics: Not Exactly a Review of Professor Marston & the Wonder Women

Kleefeld on Comics: A Links Post

Patreon: Webcomics Textbook: Resources, Part 8  

Kleefeld on Comics: Reading Webcomics: Full Circle 😠

Kleefeld on Comics: Love Ain't

Patreon: Webcomics Textbook: Resources, Part 9  

Kleefeld on Comics: My Life At Transylvania Polygnostic Redux
I originally posted this over a decade ago, referring to documents that were themselves close to a decade old. I'm disappointed that A) Phil and Kaja Foglio don't still support this (I'm sure it got untenable as the Girl Genius fanbase grew) and B) I can't find any other comic creators doing this type of thing. I still think it was a brilliant marketing strategy!


I stumbled across these two pages, documenting some of my time at Transylvania Polygnostic University, and thought I'd share...
If you're not able to discern as much from the contents of the first letter, this was during the time when Girl Genius was only a printed pamphlet comic and hadn't been migrated to an online one. Sadly, the TPU website is no longer online; I never heard exactly what happened but I suspect it had something to do with the increased funding that had been given to the Department of Death-Ray Physics.
Love Is... was created in the 1960s by cartoonist Kim Casali. The one panel cartoons usually featured two nude children expressing love in a quaint, innocent manner. It's basically a romantic riff on Charles Schulz's earlier Happiness Is a Warm Puppy. The series even started as books before getting a syndication deal in the 1970s. Casali stopped working on the strip in 1975 due to her husband's illness, and it was continued by Bill Asprey under her name. Asprey continues the strip to this day.

But this is what ran in the LA Times on Tuesday...
Love is...
While it's unusual for the couple to be clothed, it's not unheard of. The overt political statement, however, is highly unusual and led a number of people to question whether or not the strip was real or it had been altered by an unscrupulous third party.

The official Love Is... website doesn't host the daily cartoons, but the syndicate does. And they're showing...
Love Is...
... the exact same comic.

The strip has always had something of a right-leaning direction, with it's saccharine sentimentality and heavy doses of nostalgia for an era that never existed. But the use of "fake news" -- a favorite phrase of the political right used accusingly at everything they dislike -- seems to swing to an extreme. While arguably, the phrase itself doesn't necessarily point to a political opinion and can be applied to news of any political bent, it's not really a phrase that is used by the political left, even when talking about false reports from right-leaning "news" outlets (i.e Fox).

So my initial thought is that, for whatever reason, Asprey has decided to show his political viewpoint in the comic. Which is totally his right, don't misunderstand! But it seems unusual to make such a bold statement in an otherwise innocuous comics that he's been drawing for 45 years now. But when I looked up his own site to see if he said anything about this particular strip or his politics more broadly, I didn't find anything speaking to either of those, but I did note that A) he replicates the same strip there, meaning that it wasn't tampered with by the syndicate and B) his autobiography proudly notes that he's also drawn for Playboy. Which seems a bit at odds with the general theme of Love Is...

So honestly, I'm at something of a loss as to where this came from. But it is does indeed to appear authentic, despite not really fitting with the tone the strip has had for the past half century.