The Beats: A Graphic History, those who were mad to live have come back to life through artwork as vibrant as the Beat movement itself. Told by the comic legend Harvey Pekar, his frequent artistic collaborator Ed Piskor, and a range of artists and writers, including the feminist comic creator Trina Robbins and the Mad magazine artist Peter Kuper, The Beats takes us on a wild tour of a generation that, in the face of mainstream American conformity and conservatism, became known for its determined uprootedness, aggressive addictions, and startling creativity and experimentation. What began among a small circle of friends in New York and San Francisco during the late 1940s and early 1950s laid the groundwork for a literary explosion, and this striking anthology captures the storied era in all its incarnations—from the Benzedrine-fueled antics of Kerouac, Ginsberg, and Burroughs to the painting sessions of Jay DeFeo’s disheveled studio, from the jazz hipsters to the beatnik chicks, from Chicago’s College of Complexes to San Francisco’s famed City Lights bookstore. Snapshots of lesser-known poets and writers sit alongside frank and compelling looks at the Beats’ most recognizable faces. What emerges is a brilliant collage of—and tribute to—a generation, in a form and style that is as original as its subject.
Authors
Harvey Lawrence Pekar was an American underground comic book writer best known for his autobiographical American Splendor series. In 2003, the series inspired a critically acclaimed film adaptation of the same name.
Trina Robbins is an American comics artist and writer. She was an early and influential participant in the underground comix movement, and one of the few female artists in underground comix when she started. Her first comics were printed in the East Village Other. She later joined the staff of a feminist underground newspaper It Ain't Me, Babe, with whom she produced the first all-woman comic book titled It Ain't Me Babe. She became increasingly involved in creating outlets for and promoting female comics artists, through projects such as the comics anthology Wimmen's Comix. She was also the penciller on Wonder Woman for a time in the '80s. Trina has worked on an adaptation of Sax Rohmer's Dope for Eclipse Comics and GoGirl with artist Anne Timmons for Image Comics. Trina designed Vampirella's costume for Forrest Ackerman and Jim Warren. In addition to her comics work, Robbins is an author of non-fiction books, including several with an emphasis on the history of women in cartooning. She is the first of the three "Ladies of the Canyon" in Joni Mitchell's classic song from the album of the same name. Trina Robbins won a Special Achievement Award from the San Diego Comic Con in 1989 for her work on Strip AIDS U.S.A., a benefit book that she co-edited with Bill Sienkiewicz and Robert Triptow.
