num_pages: 512
description:  THE GRAPHIC CANON (Seven Stories Press) is a gorgeous one-of-a-kind trilogy that brings classic literatures of the world together with legendary graphic artists and illustrators. There are more than 130 illustrators represented and 190 literary works over three volumesmany newly commissioned some hard to findreinterpreted here for readers and collectors of all ages.Volume 1 takes us on a visual tour from the earliest literature through the end of the 1700s. Along the way we're treated to eye-popping renditions of the human race's greatest epics: Gilgamesh The Iliad The Odyssey (in watercolors by Gareth Hinds) The Aeneid Beowulf and The Arabian Nights plus later epics The Divine Comedy and The Canterbury Tales (both by legendary illustrator and graphic designer Seymour Chwast) Paradise Lost and Le Morte D'Arthur. Two of ancient Greece's greatest plays are adaptedthe tragedy Medea by Euripides and Tania Schrags uninhibited rendering of the very bawdy comedy Lysistrata by Aristophanes (the text of which is still censored in many textbooks). Also included is Robert Crumbs rarely-seen adaptation of James Boswells London Journal filled with philosophical debate and lowbrow debauchery.Religious literature is well-covered and well-illustrated with the Books of Daniel and Esther from the Old Testament Rick Gearys awe-inspiring new rendition of the Book of Revelation from the New Testament the Tao te Ching Rumis Sufi poetry Hinduisms Mahabharata and the Mayan holy book Popol Vuh illustrated by Roberta Gregory. The Eastern canon gets its due with The Tale of Genji (the worlds first novel done in full-page illustrations reminiscent of Aubrey Beardsley) three poems from Chinas golden age of literature lovingly drawn by pioneering underground comics artist Sharon Rudahl the Tibetan Book of the Dead a Japanese Noh play and other works from Asia.Two of Shakespeares greatest plays (King Lear and A Midsummer Nights Dream) and two of his sonnets are here as are Platos Symposium Gullivers Travels Candide A Vindication of the Rights of Woman Renaissance poetry of love and desire and Don Quixote visualized by the legendary Will Eisner.Some unexpected twists in this volume include a Native American folktale an Incan play Sapphos poetic fragments bawdy essays by Benjamin Franklin the love letters of Abelard and Heloise and the decadent French classic Dangerous Liaisons as illustrated by MollyCrabapple. Edited by Russ Kick The Graphic Canon is an extraordinary collection that will continue with Volume 2: Kubla Khan to the Bronte Sisters to The Picture of Dorian Gray in Summer 2012 and Volume 3: From Heart of Darkness to Hemingway to Infinite Jest in Fall 2012. A boxed set of all three volumes will also be published in Fall 2012.
language: English
title: The Graphic Canon, Vol. 1: From the Epic of Gilgamesh to Shakespeare to Dangerous Liaisons
publisher: Seven Stories Press