See "The St. Louis Refugee Ship Blues: Art Spiegelman recounts a sad story 70 years later" for Spiegelman's full-page look at editorial cartoons on the St. Louis, a ship full of Jewish refugees from the Nazis that wasn't allowed to dock in the US. It's an excellent piece of cartoon journalism with a hat-tip to Herblock included. A piece like this shows what newspapers could still be for people.

Sara Duke tips us off that, for a course on Jewish literature, Spiegelman and Chabon will be at GWU this spring. "While on campus, several authors will give readings open to the entire GW community. Ulinich will read on March 5; Chabon, who will be introduced by GW's Wang Visiting Professor in Contemporary English Edward P. Jones, will present on March 23; and Spiegelman will read on April 2."

GWU's PR deptartment says, "The event is open and free to the public. It will be held at 8pm in the Jack Morton Auditorium, which is located on the main level of the Media and Public Affairs Building. The address is 805 21st St. NW."

My friend Rusty Witek, who's written a book or two about Art Spiegelman sent me an email yesterday with the subject line "If you ever"

. . .find yourself writing anything—anything at all—on Art Spiegelman’s best-known work, do NOT title it “Of Mice and [Something].” Please.

So, just to be sure, I asked him if he meant something like this:

OF 'MAUS' AND MAN: Two decades after his Holocaust memoir gained him a Pulitzer Prize and comics cultural acceptance, Art Spiegelman still struggles and strives to break the medium wide open, By Kiel Phegley, 2/3/2009.

To which he responded:

Very much so. And like this:

Of Maus and More

Of Mice and Memory

Of Maus and Memory

Of Mice and Vermin

Of Mice and Mimesis

Of Maus and Men

Of Mice and Menschen (this one also worked in “Comics Come of Age” in the title.)

Of Men and Mice

Of Mice and Supermen

Of Mice and Jews

These are almost all from peer-reviewed journals—don’t even think about the reviews and feature articles.

So yeah, like that.

That makes “The Maus That Roared” seem charmingly inventive. And after a certain point it means one of two disturbing things: either they aren’t reading the critical literature on Maus before submitting their own stuff, or they know it and use the title anyway. And either way an editor lets them do it.

You've been warned.

The Washington Examiner ran a brief review of Art Spiegelman's Breakdowns on page 35 - it's not online.

The NY Times reviewed two comics creator's works - Jules Feiffer's Explainers and the Hernandez Brothers' Love and Rockets.

The Wash Post has a minor Gaiman review.

Sara Duke reports that Spiegelman will be at Politics and Prose on November 7th, presumably discussing his reissue of Breakdowns.

Two of my favorite cartoonists have illustrated interviews in the Books A Million chains' magazine, Book Page. You can pick up a copy in the store in Old Town Alexandria most likely, but you can also see them online. Spiegelman's reworking of Breakdowns isn't something I've seen yet, but will definitely get. Bruce McCall, seen most often in the New Yorker these days, has migrated to doing children's books like a lot of other cartoonists.

My buddy Rusty Witek could help me out with my Pekar book because he was doing his Art Spiegelman: Conversations which appeared last fall. Here's a review of it: "Books about Comics #2: Spiegelman and Spandex," by Peter Sanderson, PW Comics Week May 13, 2008. I don't think Rusty's the one in the spandex though...