Nowadays every issue of a comic book is a temporarily embarrassed
graphic novel.
My definition of graphic novel: A book using original comics material
in narrative. The important word here is book, so length isn't a
criterion--"novel" encompasses collections (like
A Contract
with God,
by the way). A magazine isn't a book,
so
His Name Is Savage, for instance, doesn't meet
the definition. And if it isn't limited to original material,
the floodgates open for an appalling number of titles from comic strips
and comic books. Note that these three Pogo books are the
original-material ones among, otherwise, collections. I say "in
narrative" to omit single-page gags of the
"talking in pictures" sort, although fumetti would otherwise fit--for
instance, in the 70s, Richard J. Anobile's Fotonovels. (And so if we
were including magazines, Charlton's 1963 full-length
Black
Zoo would predate the 1968
His Name Is
Savage anyway.)
Mansion of Evil and
It Rhymes with Lust
are each dated just 1950, so which one is the first modern graphic
novel is a question--but it's one or the other.
I'm pushing the definition of "original" with
Passionella,
but one of
the four stores is original and the others have been revised and
redrawn for the book. I dithered over the six 1962 Tintin books form
Golden Press--they are new American translations--and decided not to
include them. Belmont's
High Camp Superheroes and
My
Son the Teenager I left off
too, as the new material in them was prepared for the comics and by
luck came out in the paperbacks first.
Can you think of any I'm missing through 1970? UPDATE--2 days later--The Monkees occurred to me when I happened to be thinking of the more usual TV tie-in comics and novels. FURTHER UPDATE: OtherEric in his comment contributed
The Pogo Poop Book.
1940s-60s American Graphic Novels
abbreviations: mass market paperbacks, hardcovers, trade paperbacks
| 1950 |
Mansion
of Evil |
Fawcett |
pb |
| |
It Rhymes with
Lust |
St. John |
digest |
| 1953 |
Uncle Pogo So-So Stories |
S&S |
hc, tp |
| 1954 |
The Pogo Stepmother Goose |
S&S |
tp |
| 1955 |
The Pogo Peek-a-Book |
S&S |
hc, tp |
| 1959 |
Passionella and Other
Stories |
McGraw-Hill |
tp |
| |
Harvey Kurtzman's Jungle
Book |
Ballantine |
pb |
| 1960 |
The Flintstones on the
Rocks |
Dell |
small tp |
| |
Huck and Yogi Jamboree |
Dell |
small tp |
| 1962 |
Don Martin Steps Out |
Signet |
pb |
| |
[and many more
MAD originals] |
|
|
| 1966 |
Christopher Lee's Treasury
of Terror |
Pyramid |
pb |
| |
Dracula |
Ballantine |
pb
|
| |
The Monkees |
Popular Library |
pb
|
| |
The Great Society Comic
Book |
Parallax |
small tp |
| |
Bobman and Teddy |
Parallax |
small tp |
| |
Kosher Comics |
Parallax |
small tp |
| |
The Pogo Poop Book |
S&S |
tp |
| 1967 |
The Man from M.O.T.H.E.R. |
Parallax |
smaller tp |
