Synopses & Reviews
The Someday Funnies is the long-awaited collection of comic strips created in the early 1970s by world-famous artists and writers such as C. C. Beck, René Goscinny, Harvey Kurtzman, Jack Kirby, Moebius, Art Spiegelman, and Gahan Wilson. What started out as a special insert for
Rolling Stone took on a life—and mythology—of its own as writer/editor Michel Choquette traveled the world, commissioning this visual chronicle of the 1960s, only to find himself without a publishing partner or the financial support to continue. Forty years later, readers finally get to experience this legendary anthology as Choquette celebrates the birth, death, and resurrection of
The Someday Funnies—129 previously unpublished strips by 169 writers and artists.
Praise for The Someday Funnies:
“In 1970, National Lampoon contributor Choquette was asked by Jann Wenner to edit a special comics insert for Rolling Stone that would allow prominent cartoonists and writers to survey the 1960s. That collection, “The Someday Funnies,” transformed over the next few years into a never-published book featuring the work of 169 writers and artists, and then—when Wenner pulled the plug—into the great lost project of comics history, a “Pet Sounds” of mainstream, underground, and European sensibilities existing only in Choquettes Montreal storage space. Thirty-one years later, its finally seeing print and its a doozy, featuring work from luminaries like Art Spiegelman, Joost Swarte, Jack Kirby, and Will Eisner. There are also comics written by Harlan Ellison and William S. Burroughs, and illustrations from such unlikely suspects as Tom Wolfe and Federico Fellini. What sticks with a reader now is the way the 60s had already begun to curdle in the memory even for those who had just lived them; more than one of these comics posits wild-eyed alternate histories of the 60s, including the books kicker, a great Captain Marvel strip that ties the decades woes to Billy Batsons mid-century silence. Though the collection is, by its nature, a mixed bag, its a priceless time capsule of comics history, presented handsomely by Abrams in the large tabloid size Choquette always envisioned."
—Publishers Weekly, starred review
“[A] treasure trove of sixties cartooning finally hits print. . . . This graphic time capsule reveals that “the sixties” still define modern Americas contradictory heart.” —Village Voice
“Where else can you see previously unpublished works by great artists like Kirby, Bode, and Beck, who have since passed on to that great bull pen in the sky?” —Cleveland Plain Dealer
“As a portrait of the state of the medium of comics in the early 1970s in the U.S. and Europe, a yeasty blend of old and new that was poised to make a jump to the forefront of artistic endeavors in the twenty-first century, The Someday Funnies is a five-star publication all the way.” —Tom Flinn, ICV2.com
“Choquette was . . . reaching out beyond the insular underground comics circles, and filling in a bigger picture of where the worlds collective head was at as the temper of the times changed. . . . Because Choquette recruited globally, The Someday Funnies avoids the usual American baby-boomer mythology, in which the sixties were born in Greenwich Village, nurtured at Berkeley, and killed at Altamont. Instead, the book reports just as much on the youth revolution in Europe, from the perspective of people whod just lived through it.” —Onions A.V. Club
“Theres page after page after page of unique and exciting comics art in this incredible book. . . . Forty years after it was first organized, the legendary Someday Funnies has finally been published at long last. It [wa]s worth the wait. We never really knew what we were missing.” —Comics Bulletin
“The Someday Funnies is a wonderfully colorful, fascinating book with an incredible backstory.” —Oregonian
“Theres no mistaking its masterful value for any comics collector. One of the mediums great, whispered-of projects is finally a reality, and its a dream come true for everyone involved—especially its lucky readers.” —Omnivoracious
Synopsis
From its first issue in April, 1970, the National Lampoon blazed like a comet, defining comedy as we know it today. To create Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead, former Lampoon illustrator Rick Meyerowitz selected the funniest material from the magazine and sought out the survivors of its first electrifying decade to gather their most revealing and outrageous stories. The result is a mind-boggling tour through the early days of an institution whose alumni left their fingerprints all over popular culture: Animal House, Caddyshack, Saturday Night Live, Ghostbusters, SCTV, Spinal Tap, In Living Color, Ren & Stimpy, The Simpsonseven Sesame Street counts a few Lampooners among its ranks. Long before there was The Onion and Comedy Central news shows, there was the National Lampoon, setting the bar in comedy impossibly high!
Praise for Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead:
"The other night I started laughing so hard I had to leave the room . . . And then I realized that I hadn't laughed so hard in 35 years, since I was a teenager, reading National Lampoon." --The Wall Street Journal
"If you grew up with the Lampoon, this book is a trip down memory lane like no other; if not, it will demonstrate that the much maligned 70s could produce humor that has never been surpassed." --Vanity Fair
"Meyerowitz delivers more than he promises [in his introduction]. The alumni reminiscences he commissioned, taken together, paint a vivid picture of a tight-knit family of twentysomething humorists at the dawn of their careers."
-Newsweek
"Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead is a coffee-table book-big, colorful, and fun to flip through. But it also serves as an important reminder: Where would American humor be without the National Lampoon?"
-The New Yorker
"With page after page of exquisitely reproduced articles and illustrations, DSBD is a satiric cornucopia . . .You're gonna need a bigger stocking for this one!"
-NationalEnquirer.com
Synopsis
The Someday Funnies is the long-awaited collection of comic strips created in the early 1970s by world-famous artists and writers such as C. C. Beck, René Goscinny, Harvey Kurtzman, Jack Kirby, Moebius, Art Spiegelman, and Gahan Wilson. What started out as a special insert for
Rolling Stone took on a life—and mythology—of its own as writer/editor Michel Choquette traveled the world, commissioning this visual chronicle of the 1960s, only to find himself without a publishing partner or the financial support to continue. Forty years later, readers finally get to experience this legendary anthology as Choquette celebrates the birth, death, and resurrection of
The Someday Funnies—129 previously unpublished strips by 169 writers and artists.
Praise for The Someday Funnies:
“Its a priceless time capsule of comics history, presented handsomely by Abrams in the large tabloid size Choquette always envisioned.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review
“[A] treasure trove of sixties cartooning finally hits print. . . . This graphic time capsule reveals that “the sixties” still define modern Americas contradictory heart.” —Village Voice
“Where else can you see previously unpublished works by great artists like Kirby, Bode, and Beck, who have since passed on to that great bull pen in the sky?” —Cleveland Plain Dealer
About the Author
Rick Meyerowitz was a prolific contributor to the National Lampoon for 15 years, during which time he created the iconic Animal House movie poster. With Maira Kalman, he made the “New Yorkistan” cover of the New Yorker, the bestselling cover in that magazines history. He lives in New York City.