Comics,
Comix & Graphic Novels
A History of Comic Art
by Roger Sabin
(Phaidon, 1996)
Coprehensive, well written, and extensively illustrated, this British volume is the comics history book the medium deserves. Unlike many other attempts at comics overviews, Sabin's account doesn't begin and end with American superhero comics. He looks at the most artistically accomplished comics and their creators from around the world, from the the earliest roots of the form to modern alternative comix and manga. (Though I do wish '20s woodcut artist Franz Masereel would get some credit as an artist who presaged the graphic novel.) What really separates this book from the pack of comics tomes is the fact that Sabin has good taste in comic illustration and goes beyond the usual suspects to include underground or lesser-known artists. (C.T.)