No Girls Allowed!: Crumb and the Comix Counterculture

Fascinating!

Comment by Christian WIkane — January 24, 2007 @ 8:50 am

I still think there’s got to be a way of working through the evil stuff that’s in a lot of us, and somehow making it harmless. The right enjoys offering terrible punishments, the left, to me, seems to want repression too, and pretending things are happy and pretty, at least in their camp.

I don’t know if there’s a way to stop it from leading to disaster, but I’m on the “let it all hang out” side. If we’re all genuinely empowered, then maybe we can deal with it.

Comment by Jack Ruttan from Montreal. Canada — January 24, 2007 @ 9:43 am

“Scenes became more graphic and violent, and more poorly drawn, as young artists assumed that all you needed to gain success was the misogynist attitude Crumb had made stylish...”

While I feel that any artist, including someone as demented as Crumb, should produce exactly the art that he or she feels compelled to create, it is an unfortunate side effect that legions of uninspired clones will see only the surface aspects, and flood the shelves with poor imitations. The same thing happened in response to Alan Moore’s dark, subtle superhero deconstructions in the 80s, which led to ten years of ugly, Crumbesque, masturbatory, furrowed-brow, gritted-teeth superhero equivelants to rape comics.

Comment by Monte Williams — January 24, 2007 @ 10:58 am

Wow! Nice axe to the head of our beloved Crumb. You left nothing but crumbs! The masses of folks scarred by his work must now rejoice.
Really, most funny books until recently were consumed by young boys. To belittle Crumb’s output with such a blunt finish shows a lack of good television in your life. Do you really believe that most of the current sensitive and thoughtful “underground” comics being produced these days would have existed if it weren’t for his impetus in the 60s? The form may well have dried up altogether if not for him. So what if there were some vile rip-offs that lacked his drafting abilities? That movement died out and was eventually replaced by a fairly eclectic contemporary comic scene. Baby steps, wot? Crumb is a cult figure, not a cult leader. There aren’t any little boys and girls in the heartland who tremble in fear of his name or ANY other comic artist. They’re too busy palm-piloting and arranging their first cyber orgy to give a doodee.
No, after the boomers have faded, there will only remain a few geek enclaves that cling to their printed anythings. Picking on Crumb at this late date doesn’t even make sense.

Comment by Chief Crooked Pen from Marvin's Indian Reservation — January 24, 2007 @ 2:52 pm

Great job, Claire! 

Everyone was struggling with those issues.

I well remember coming across a copy of issue number one of Women’s Lib Comics back in 1970 or 1971.  There was a picture of Little Lulu in front of the boy’s club house; she was carrying a sign saying “Fuck This Shit!” And the guy who handed me the comic in front of the Berkeley Co-op on Shattuck gave it to me for free ... for free ... he handed them out to everyone for free ... he was some kind of comic book dealer once and he said this was his way of doing pennance for having helped to perpetuate the bad stuff in the other comics. 

Love,
Barbara

Comment by b flaska — January 24, 2007 @ 3:33 pm

Thank you for an excellent and perceptive article, Claire! It’s a keeper which I may quote from in future essays (with your permission, and crediting you, of course) Impossible not to notice that of the five comments, the only one that appreciated and agreed with you is a woman—has anything really changed in 30 years?  BTW,Barbara, the name of that comic was “It Ain’t Me, babe,” and I was the editor.

Comment by Trina Robbins from San Francisco, California — January 25, 2007 @ 10:58 am

“Impossible not to notice that of the five
comments, the only one that appreciated and agreed with you is a woman...”

Do you really think so, Trina?

It seems to me that only one of the bunch really *disagrees* with Claire. For my part, I agree with her view of Crumb just as I agreed with your refreshing dissenting voice in a collection of reflections on Crumb I read a few years ago (I can’t remember the title at the moment, but I admired your willingness to speak your mind in a collection of fawning tributes… in the CRUMB film, too.)

Christian’s response was but one word, but it sure seemed appreciative: “Fascinating!”

Jack didn’t seem to disagree with Claire so much as ask for an idea of what might be done about the situation, which is where I stand, too; I wouldn’t think of minimizing Crumb’s misogyny (I think it’s amusing that he’s practically the only man willing to admit that he’s this way), but I’m just curious what Claire or you or anyone else would suggest be done about it. Should he not have been allowed to produce his work? (And I’m not being sarcastic or anything, I’m seriously curious as to where we should go with the issue.)

Specifically, Jack wrote “I still think there’s got to be a way of working through the evil stuff that’s in a lot of us, and somehow making it harmless.”

That to me doesn’t seem to be a disagreement so much as a “While you’re right about his work...”

Chief Crooked Pen did indeed quite strongly disagree. :)

I wrote that Crumb should still be allowed to produce his work, which isn’t technically a disagreement since Claire never came right out and suggested otherwise, but still, I guess you can add me to the disagreed/didn’t appreciate camp.

I loved the piece, and don’t feel that the menfolk are as a whole disagreeing with Claire.

...though I concede that perhaps my male-centricism is blinding me. Wouldn’t be the first time. :)

Comment by Monte Williams — January 25, 2007 @ 11:54 am

I really appreciated this piece, the only thing I would vehemently question is the section where you claim the “commercial” world scorned Crumb. How so? He turned down the opportunity to illustrate a Rolling Stones record cover. In fact he only did the Big Brother cover because Janice and he were friends. Even later in life, when things had calmed down, he turned down the chance to play with his band on Saturday Night Live. He’s had all SORTS of opportunities to break into a more commercial realm and he’s mostly turned them down.

Oh, and Trina’s comment is hilarious! Because the true way to reach equality between sexes is to assume that people feel the way they do because of what gender they are. Brilliant! Now I see why so many artists wanted to collaborate with her back in the day!

Comment by Grant from Pullman, Washington — January 25, 2007 @ 1:24 pm

RE: Monte Williams’ post: Of course Crumb (and everyone, no matter how sexist, racist, homophobic) has the right to produce and publish their work, that’s what our first ammendment is all about—but might I suggest a good therapist?

Comment by Trina Robbins from San Francisco, California — January 25, 2007 @ 1:41 pm

A good therapist? Give me a break. For the best artists (and authors), their work IS their therapy. Should Burroughs have put down the pen and called a therapist? Bret Easton Ellis? Celine? How about Pollack? Give me a break.

Comment by Grant from Pullman, Washington — January 25, 2007 @ 1:55 pm

That writer gal really got my man’s goat! He let me read the piece on that disturbed fool, Mr. Crumb. I can’t say that I disagreed with the piece and told him so to his face. It turned purple, then deep green and here I am at the motel, waiting on my daughter to bring me some smokes and some pork skins. I guess some things never change. Chief probably didn’t mean it, anyways. He gets so hammered sometimes that he sees aloe plants climbing up his britches. Hell, he might have even thought she was writing about leftover food for all I know. I apologize to all you fellow ladies out there and would like to say that this Crumb person sounds like a real prick. Maybe he oughta move to France or something!

Comment by Mary Crooked Nose from Marvin's Indian Motel — January 25, 2007 @ 4:04 pm

“It Ain’t Me, Babe!” That’s right, that’s what it was called. That was a great one! BTW, Trina, a few years later I finally tossed what few Crumb comix I had into my fireplace.  I didn’t want to perpetuate that stuff, either.

Comment by bflaska — January 25, 2007 @ 7:31 pm

Let me first say that this is the best written, most coherent essay that’s run on this site for quite some time.  Yet even as I do agree with the charges of violent misogyny brought against Crumb here, I don’t find it fair to blame him for the missed opportunities of the underground comix scene from that era. 

Instead, the blame should be placed on the bad taste of his copycat followers, as well as that of the comix-reading public who so voraciously devoured his output.  It’s not Crumb’s fault that his brand of cruelty became so fashionable, nor is it his fault that female artists didn’t draw more women readers into the fold, especially since the article goes on about how cheap it was for people to print their own comix.

Everyone has to forge her own path in the world, and the failure to do so isn’t Crumb’s fault, as vile as he may be.

Comment by Dixie Snodgrass from San Francisco — January 25, 2007 @ 7:34 pm

Crumb et al. require no one to defend them against charges of chauvinism and misogyny. In any case, I’m not sure, frankly, that an effective defense could be mounted, given that misogyny and male sexual license were part of the subcultural bravado that helped kickstart the undergrond.

However, I believe there are three logical fallacies, or weaknesses, in the essay’s argument, as well as two oversimplifications (or instances of willed forgetting).

The logical weaknesses, IMO:

1. The essay blends criticisms of the work with anecdotal criticism of the artists. In other words, ad hominem attacks. These attacks have a whiff of righteous self-approval, cheaply bought, though I don’t doubt that the male-dominated countercultural was lopsided and at times vicious in its sexist attitudes.

2. Some of the ad hominem stuff perhaps relies overmuch on the point of view of Trina Robbins, who has been circulating much the same view of Crumb for a long time, in the face of counter-arguments from cartoonists both male and female. Trina’s vision of the possibilities for underground comix was evidently quite different from that of Crumb et al., and there’s a great divide, aesthetically and ideologically, between her views and “theirs,” a divide that ought not to be reduced simply to, “She was feminist, they were anti-feminist.”

3. The following passage contains a kind of logical slippage: “Scenes became more graphic and violent, and more poorly drawn, as young artists assumed that all you needed to gain success was the misogynist attitude Crumb had made stylish.” Two things are wrong with this, IMO: one, that Crumb is to be held responsible for the various, often feeble imitations of his work; and, two, that misogyny was a cause of, or at least an encouragement to, the flood of truly awful, retrograde comix that followed, and perhaps even a cause of the market’s ultimate decline. I think this line of reasoning is tendentious and misleading, collapsing as it does a moral judgment into an aesthetic one.

In addition, there are two oversimplifications, or distortions, in the argument:

1. The “arrested adolescence” charge against Crumb does not hold, IMO, against the best of his later work, which is considerable. Claims made for Crumb as a graphic satirist must consider the whole arc of his career, including later works that fulfill but also deepen and complicate what was in his early stuff. It’s a cheap shot to pillory the late 60s/early 70s Crumb and to imply that he developed no further.

2. The essay’s argument does not deal with the fact (attested to by women cartoonists from Phoebe Gloeckner to Roz Chast) that Crumb’s work had a salutary impact because it opened up whole new possibilities for comics, including comics by women. Those possibilities included women’s true-to-life and feminist comix. While Trina’s early and pivotal comix work was not influenced directly by Crumb, and she can justly claim to be a very early and seminal underground cartoonist, there were many, many others, among them former colleagues of hers, who found in Crumb a creative inspiration. And that influence continues cascading through the world of alternative comix today.

In sum, I believe the article oversimplifies.

Comment by Charles Hatfield — January 26, 2007 @ 12:00 am

I found many things to disagree with in Claire Litton’s depiction of underground comix as a movement that “started in the mid-‘60s as an exciting new venue for political discussion that was available to anyone with a photocopier and something to say” to “spread their messages,” but failed to offer “an open forum” or “an innovative forum for creative expression” and thus ultimately became “a squandered opportunity” because the misogynistic “young men of the movement” “balked” at allowing women to participate and filled their comix with “only hatred and sexism.”

I write in particular to take issue with the claim that “dozens of young male cartoonists” were inspired by Crumb to copy “not only his artistic style but his rampant misogyny,” and that young male artists “assumed that all you needed to gain success was the misogynist attitude Crumb had made stylish,” and with Monte Williams’ comment that “legions of uninspired clones” flooded the shelves “with poor imitations” and Dixie Snodgrass’s blaming Crumb’s “copycat followers” and Charles Hatfield’s characterization of “various, often feeble imitations of his work” and “the flood of truly awful, retrograde comix that followed.”

I was a young, male cartoonist, inspired by Crumb, Trina and other underground cartoonists in the late 1960s, and I remember things differently. For one thing, I remember that the single most frequent piece of advice that underground artists gave to younger kids like myself was to avoid imitation, and create something individual, new and authentic, and also that we generally did our best to follow that advice. Crumb in particular encouraged diverse experimentation. (He also freely admitted that his own work was “sick.”) Underground comix can not be likened to the mainstream companies with their “house styles.”

I am checking my memories by examining a copy of _Hee Hee_ (the working title was “Inferior Funnies” but that was too close to the mark), published in 1970 as a venue for younger, newer cartoonists attracted by the comix movement. Of the eleven cartoonists, eleven were male, including myself. Of the 32 pages (28 pages of guts plus a wraparound color cover), representations of women (or their body parts) appear on only three pages. Clearly, a sexist pattern of under-representation and sexual objectification appears, but I do not believe that these examples provide sufficient evidence to tag the young cartoonists as vehement misogynists.

Only one panel in _Hee Hee_ shows a clear Crumb influence, one I drew of my character trucking down the road. I’d be glad to send a low-resolution scan to anyone interested in analyzing this one-page story in relation to misogyny, as my piece deals primarily (but abstractly, and I think critically) with the issue of reducing women to body parts. (I’m .) Based on _Hee Hee_ (and plenty of other evidence), comix were more concerned with anxieties about the ongoing or impending destruction of the earth than with hating women.

I have an unusually complete collection of the crappiest comix that were published, and I see in them the work of novice incompetents rather than “copycats.”

To depict the underground comix scene as a tightly-guarded male domain oversimplifies a complicated social scene in which male and female cartoonists shared flats as housemates, partied together, became entangled in romantic relationships and long-lasting marriages, and (more importantly) shared publishers, distributors and retail outlets in common. Litton’s weak grasp of the social aspect of comix history becomes visible when she says that Trina’s boyfriend was Simon Deitch (rather than Simon’s brother Kim), and that Shary Flenniken’s drawing depicted R. Crumb insulting her (when she clearly represented Dan O’Neill, the founder of the Air Pirates comix collective that she fully participated in.) _Tits and Clits_ was not produced by the Wimmen’s Comix Collective, but by two women in Southern California who responded to sexism and misogyny in comix by creating their own comix in reply.

We do not currently have an adequate “open forum” for cartoonists to seriously address current political issues at length and to reach a community of active readers. (Examples could be multiplied endlessly. Consider the absence of comics about America’s plans to attack Iran with nuclear weapons.) The various reasons for this terrible hole in our culture deserve our attention. The idea that one man’s misogyny bears primary responsibility for this situation does not withstand careful scrutiny.

Comment by Leonard Rifas from Seattle, Washington, USA — January 26, 2007 @ 11:08 am

This article has sparked a thoughtful discussion over to the Comics Journal Message Board, that bastion of crankiness (http://www.tcj.com/messboard/viewtopic.php?t=1233&start=0&postdays=0&postorder=asc&highlight;=)
I hope Patrick Rosencranz (who is quoted liberally in the article, though his name is misspelled) doesn’t mind me borrowing his list of Litton’s misfacts:
* Trina’s boyfriend was Kim Deitch, not his brother Simon Deitch.
* Head shops stopped carrying underground comix under pressure from drug enforcement agents, not because of their sexy stories.
* The “Think with your brain, not your cunt” quote comes from Dan O’Neill, who is pictured, not Crumb, and it was good advice. The drawing also includes Trina Robbins saying “You could hardly call what you draw feminist literature.”
And Devlin Thompson points out that the Bill Griffith quote was not referring to underground comics in general, but part of an essay attacking the horror and fantasy-oriented school of artists then emerging...particularly Richard Corben.

Comment by M.C ampos from Seattle, WA — January 26, 2007 @ 11:23 am

Leonard wrote, “I… take issue with… Monte Williams’ comment that ‘legions of uninspired clones’ flooded the shelves ‘with poor imitations’...”

I should have made it clearer that I was referring pretty much exclusively to the 1990s superhero instance of this phenomenon, and should further let it be known that my knowledge of 60s underground “comix” doesn’t even qualify as spotty; taking Claire at her word that this was the case in the 60s, I meant only to note that it happened again in the 90s.

Sorry for any confusion or offense.

Meanwhile, no one has a good idea as to what to actually DO about Crumb’s work.  Personally, while he’s a self-confessed sick bastard, I think his work’s valuable and, as was noted above, probably serves him better than any traditional therapy ever could. It’s always better to release an issue rather than suppress it.

I guess the only recourse for those who disapprove is to spark debate, so huzzah, Claire.

Comment by Monte Williams — January 26, 2007 @ 11:39 am

Baf! I see that Leonard beat me to posting most of the misfacts in my previous post. Also, I misspaced my own name, undermining my own credibility.
Anyway, rereading the article this morning, I myself find:
* “Underground comix started in the mid-‘60s as an exciting new venue for political discussion that was available to anyone with a photocopier and something to say.” Photocopiers weren’t really widely available until the mid 60s, too late to affect UG culture one way or the other. Their wide availability sparked the minicomix boom of the 70s, but that’s another story. A lot of the first wave of UG artists were comics fanboys from the fandom of the 50s and early 60s, who drew because they liked to draw and not out of some idealogical axe grinding.
* “Zap! Comix, the magazine he started, became the standard bearer of quality and content for the underground comix world, and artists everywhere clamored to get in.” They might have, but the seven ZAP artists were the only ones who contributed to the magazine, until very recently. It was a closed shop.
* “Don Donahue (creator of Snatch and Jiz)..” Should be “publisher of”.
* “(Miller v. California, 413 U.S. 15, 1973)” I looked this one up; this was a ruling against a direct mailer of “adult” materials, and had nothing to do with comix at all. Though I suppose it could have been used to bust head shops that sold comix, except that most of the shops closed for the reasons cited above by Rosencranz.
* “..for underground comix, now littered with female blood, guts, and sexual parts, it was the beginning of the end.” This is the part that galls me most, because it implies that UGs after Crumb were one big murder-fest, which is absolutely ridiculous—I have to assume Litton hasn’t read many comix outside of the easily obtainable ZAPs, or she’d know that few other titles relied on mayhem. She does mention “Tits and Clits”, although attributing its founders badly, and also doesn’t mention that it was also busted for obscenity at one point, proving some point about gender equality—women could be as raunchy as men in their comix.
Litton also seems to think that UGs died out after the head shops did—but their artists moved with the times, from the pamphlets to the magazines ("Comix Book”, “Arcade”, “National Lampoon") to the arts comix ("RAW", “Weirdo") to the graphic novels ("Maus", “Boulevard of Broken Dreams”, etc.). Most of them are still around, still producing work.
As for Crumb’s influence, the comics scene today is a lot busier for it, and not just by boys who picked up a pen after reading ZAP. You can find hundreds of female cartoonists around today, from the high profile (Alison Bechdel, who has claimed to be directly inspired by Crumb’s work) to the up and coming (people like Vanessa Davis and Carrie McNinch and Lauren Weinstein, to pull three wildly divergent names out of the files) who inhabit the cultural clearing Crumb and the others hewed out for us.
I guess what gets me the most is the implication that the UG artists should have been all things to all people. This sort of complaint, you hear about most innovative art scenes—everybody from the Lost Generation to the Emo music scene is excoriated for not letting the girls play, but eventually a woman steps up and, rather than expect to be given her space, makes one for herself.

Comment by M. Campos from Seattle, WA — January 26, 2007 @ 1:53 pm

To call Crumb a misogynist is tantamount to calling Phoebe Gloeckner a mysandrist. And why no mention of Gloeckner who obviously brings a female perspective to the genre Crumb pioneered?

Maybe you are criticizing the message and not the aesthetic? Maybe Crumb should apologize for being a man and for his testicles producing testosterone?

Comment by RJ from LA — January 29, 2007 @ 1:35 pm

The more I think about this piece and the way it’s constructed, the more it seems to hint that “Trina Robbins and other women deserved more recognition and didn’t get it because they were women” and little else. I think the piece was VERY interesting in a lot of ways, just to focused on Trina and the importance of regognition rather than integrity.

Comment by Grant from Pullman, Washington — January 29, 2007 @ 4:05 pm

Interesting read, but one with an obvious ax to grind. Seeing Robbins’ posts on here, one can see why.

And, yes, I’m a man, baby. (in best Austin Powers voice) I agree much of Crumb’s work was mysoginistic, but to lay the blame for the failure of an entire field is pretty ridiculous. The article also leads me to believe the author is not overly familiar with Crumb’s work. I don’t think anyone that had seen much of it, from beginning to end, would think this way about Crumb. He’s a troubled man. He says so. He lays it out on the table? what’s the problem with that?

One question: If Crumb created a sort of DIY-aesthetic for comics, what kept Robbins and others from doing it their damn selves? It’s like the internet. You don’t have the right to complain about someone not letting you speak on their site or in their book, when you can do it yourself.

Comment by Planet B — January 29, 2007 @ 9:23 pm

I’m a woman and I think this article is extremely slanted. Aline Kominsky Crumb addressed the subject last night at the New York Public Library. Why not talk to some of the female cartoonists who felt ENCOURAGED by their male counterparts? I really think that the most talented women did not have trouble with acceptance. I am thinking of Shary Flenniken, MK Brown, Aline Kominsky-Crumb, Diane Noomin. And certainly in the WEIRDO years, Crumb (and later Pete Bagge) showcased plenty of female contributors. If you wanna talk percentages m/f, it won’t look so good, but there are LOTS of factors that contribute. And yes, I am inspired by Crumb’s work, but more by the mature Crumb that the slapstick 60s counterculture antics Crumb.

Comment by Anne D. Bernstein from Brooklyn — February 15, 2007 @ 12:27 pm

I’m posting to this thread really belatedly, but I just wanted to add a few comments.

I can’t believe what utter unmitigated BULLSHIT this article was. Its the same regurgitated crap that Trina Robbins has been slandering Robert Crumb with for years now, and its pretty clear that Robbins was Litton’s only source for the article. (And even there she manages to get her facts wrong – Robbins SO was KIM Deitch, not SIMON Deitch.)

The article is just plain wrong on two fundamental premises – that Crumb and his followers caused the “collapse” of underground comix in the mid-1970s and that he drove female artists out of underground comix entirely.

First, the idea that underground comics “collapsed” in the mid-70s is nothing but 70s-centric boomer narcissism. For God sake, Weirdo, anyone? RAW? The 1980s were a Renaissance for underground comics (by then called “alternative comics"), in no small part due to the efforts of Robert and Aline Crumb, as well as Art Spiegelman. The ‘80s alternative comics scene was absolutely crucial in paving the way for a large part of the contemporary comics scene (other than xmen and manga).

Second, Crumb did not drive women out of underground comics, and in fact, inspired many. Yeah, Trina Robbins and Sharon Rudahl didn’t like the post-Crumb underground scene too much, but look at the woman artists who worked with Robert Crumb, came in to comics through Weirdo, or were otherwise inspired at least in part by Crumb – Aline Kominsky-Crumb (of course), Diane Noomin, Dori Seda, Phoebe Gloeckner, Mary Fleener, Krystine Kryttre, Julie Doucet, Dame Darcy, and many others – the list is extensive.

And this is not to mention the incredibly petty and divisive role that Trina Robbins played (and continues to play) in the women’s comics scene – Aline Crumb and Diane Noomin were basically driven out of the Wimmin’s Comix collective – yeah it was a “collective” decision, but Robbins and Rudahl were very much behind it. I’m glad that Aline Crumb has finally published something giving her side of the story, since Trina Robbins has been the sole voice on women’s comics history for way too long now, and has done her best to write Aline Crumb and Diane Noomin out of it.

There was lots of discussion here on Crumb’s attitudes on race and gender, but I can’t believe how crappy the level of discussion on Crumb and gender is. There is plenty of intelligent analysis or even criticism that could be made concerning Crumb’s treatment of gender issues, but I certainly haven’t seen it here. For fuck’s sake, feminist thought has grown and diversified A LOT since the mid-1970s – much of feminism these days is not reflexively anti-porn, anti-BDSM, or even particularly anti-male sexuality, yet feminist criticism of Robert Crumb is still stuck in this dated “porn is the theory/rape is the practice” radical feminist mode carried over from the 1970s. Isn’t it possible to come up with a feminist analysis of Crumb’s work that isn’t just another rehash YET AGAIN of Trina Robbins simplistic victim-feminist rhetoric?

I suppose a lot of people will just write this off as the words of another male Robert Crumb fan who hold the old man above criticism. No two ways about it, Crumb is one of my all-time favorite comics artists, but I don’t hold anybody’s work above criticism. I do think such criticism should rise above simplistic accusations of unmitigated racism and misogyny, with no positive redeeming qualities to his work.

However, I think this criticism cuts both ways. I think Trina Robbins has been placed above criticism for far too long, personally. The reason she never became a major comics artist is not because of machinations by some evil boy’s club, but because her work just isn’t that good! Her girly adventure story/Wonder Woman stuff is utterly banal, IMO. Unfortunately, since she’s managed to ensconce herself in the role of women’s comics historian, she’s become kind of a power in the comics milieu, and too many people have basically sucked up to her rather than called her on her bullshit.

OK, end of rant – I only just read this article for the first time today and felt the need to vent.

Comment by Iamcuriousblue from San Francisco, CA — May 18, 2007 @ 12:46 am

In reply to iamcuriousblue, call me a “70s-centric boomer narcissist” if you like, but the underground comix movement _did_ collapse in 1974. Citing later titles that carried on the spirit of that movement does not negate that fact, any more than the existence of “Silver Age” comics negates the fact that the American mainstream comic book industry collapsed in 1954.

Yes, some great women cartoonists took inspiration from Crumb, but the overstated argument that Crumb “drove female artists out of underground comix entirely” can not be taken seriously, and distracts from a real issue.

I agree that neither Crumb nor Trina should be “placed above criticism.” I disagree that by doing more than any other writer to ensure that the contributions of women cartoonists be recognized and remembered, Trina has “ensconced” herself in an unchallengeable position. (Incidentally, her book _The Great Women Cartoonists_ includes all but one of the great women cartoonists you mentioned, though the exception does seem very regrettable.) Calling her work “crap” and “bullshit” sounds exactly like the abuse that she has put up with for many years rather than any kind of fresh or useful criticism incorporating contemporary strands of porn-friendly feminist theory.

Comment by Leonard Rifas from Seattle — May 18, 2007 @ 11:40 am

I agree with iamcuriosblue. Trina did--and continues to do--important research that documents the history of women in comics. That does not automatically make her personal comics deeply complex masterpieces or all her comments automatically accurate. And if someone critiques her work and finds it less-than-brilliant, that does not constitute abuse. She gets to be the go-to expert on women in comics, but she can still be wrong about things. And she is just plain wrong when she speaks for all the female cartoonists of that time, when there are women who were there who were original and talented and felt encouraged by the guys in the underground scene. However, I do agree there was a collapse of the underground head shop MARKET--whether it was Crumb’s fault or not is a valid topic of discussion. I think not. The underground/alternative scene was pretty active for a small group of talented artists throughout the 70s and 80s, but publications like ARCADE didn’t do much to pay the rent. It took decades for the alt scene to build and become the reasonably visible cultural stew it is today.

Comment by Anne D Bernstein from Brooklyn — May 19, 2007 @ 9:06 am

First, when I disparage Trina Robbins comics work, that’s not just abuse based on my dislike of other things she’s saying, its my honest opinion. I find her work completely banal, but, of course, I’m coming from a standpoint of loving underground/alternative comics and disliking traditional xmen and adventure comics, which is the form that Robbins seems to have withdrawn into after having such an intense break with the underground milieu. As with most mediocre comics artists, I’d rather just treat her work with silence rather than trash it, but considering how she’s made a point of trashing comics artists who are far more talented and interesting than her for the last 30 years, I think the point needs to be made.

Her work as a historian is more valuable, but seriously flawed by her personal grudges, which affect who’s given more or less weight in her version of comics history. And no mention of Aline Crumb in her comics histories? That’s not just an oversight, that’s just plain petty, and I’m surprised she hasn’t been called on it more often.

As for what might have happened to the underground comics scene in the mid-70s, its just sheer generational blindness to treat the underground/alternative comics scene like it ended in 1975, rather than acknowledge the vital scene that existed from the 1980s onward. As somebody who got into alternative comics through Weirdo and Anarchy during the 1980s, I’m definitely not going to let that slide.

And if you acknowledge the post-1980s scene, you have to acknowledge a large number of important female artists, none of whom seem to have been scared off by the big bad Crumb.

Comment by Iamcuriousblue from San Francisco — May 20, 2007 @ 1:34 am

I insisted that underground comix collapsed in the 1970s and Iamcurious blue is “definitely not going to let that slide.” Usually I’m on the other side of this argument, arguing that the “post-classical period of underground comix,” that is, the period after the scene collapsed, deserves greater attention. Like other comics historians, I have my biases, and I’m especially interested in that post-collapse period since that’s when I did most of my cartooning.

Like you, I loved _Weirdo_ and _Anarchy_. I was surprised and grateful that _Anarchy Comics_ included a plug for my work, and that Harvey Pekar devoted one of his columns in _Weirdo_ to recommending my comics. In the first edition of the _Encyclopedia of the American Left_ I praised _Anarchy Comics_ above all other titles.

Also like you, I acknowledge the great women cartoonists who took inspiration from Crumb. When _Dirty Laundry_ came out in 1974, I sent Aline Kominsky a fan letter, and have remained a fan (though not a correspondent) ever since.

Regarding my complaint against “abuse” being hurled at Trina Robbins, I think it should already be clear that I agree “if someone critiques her work and finds it less-than-brilliant, that does not constitute abuse.” On the other hand, calling it “crap” and “bullshit” does count as abuse, even if (and who would deny it?) that is the writer’s “honest opinion.”

Comment by Leonard Rifas from Seattle — May 20, 2007 @ 10:29 am

Leonard Rifas from Seattle, Washington please send me an e-mail at , I’ve got a question for you about the Inferior Funnies title you mentioned.
Thanks,

Comment by Guy from So Cal — June 1, 2007 @ 12:48 am

Way of the mark in my opinion. Slightly bitter tales of how the boys repressed the female underground. Yeah right. Of course the feminists will love this deconstruction of Crumb. But most normal folks who read Crumb have a sense of humour and irony!

Comment by Derek Seymour from Wellington — June 6, 2007 @ 7:06 pm

Hi Claire,

I recently reviewed the current art show at the Frye Art Museum, “R. Crumb’s Underground.” I wanted to give the show a fair assessment and did my best with what I knew and what I felt was fair. After reading your article, I decided to tweak my article just a bit so as not to appear to be defending Crumb, which I don’t, but to understanding his ultimate place in art history. I include a link to your writing at The Comic Book Bin: http://www.comicbookbin.com/robert_crumb_001.html

As a creator of comics myself, I draw and write them, I don’t particularly look to Crumb for guidance. Ultimately, whatever he had to say during the early years of comix, if he really believes all of it, would have been far more powerful had there been, as you say, a level playing field of male and female cartoonists.

Comment by Henry Chamberlain from Seattle, WA — March 19, 2008 @ 1:13 pm