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What It Is

by Lynda Barry
What It Is

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  • Synopses & Reviews

ISBN13: 9781897299357
ISBN10: 1897299354



All Product Details

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Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments

What It Is demonstrates a tried-and-true creative method that is playful, powerful, and accessible to anyone with an inquisitive wish to write or remember. Bursting with full-color drawings, comics, and collages, autobiographical sections and gentle creative guidance, each page is an invigorating example of exactly what it is: "The ordinary is extraordinary." Lynda Barry explores the depths of the inner and outer realms of creation and imagination, where play can be serious, monsters have purpose, and not knowing is an answer unto itself.

How do objects summon memories? What do real images feel like? These types of questions permeate the pages of What It Is, with words attracting pictures and conjuring places through a pen that first and foremost keeps on moving. Her insight and sincerity will tackle the most persistent of inhibitions, calling back every kid who quit drawing to again feel alive at the experiential level. Comprised of completely new material, this is her first Drawn &  Quarterly book.

Review

"The collages in legendary cartoonist Lynda Barry’s What It Is are a bathysphere-like odyssey through the depths of her funky subconscious." Vanity Fair

Review

"What It Is is equal parts cartoon memoir, collage album, scrapbook, and Zen roadmap. Written and drawn in a chaotic but riveting style, it offers itself as a guide to creative self-ignition." The Boston Globe

Review

"Barry is not just a storyteller, shes an evangelist who urges people to pick up a pen—or a brush...and look at their own lives with fresh, forgiving eyes." San Francisco Chronicle

Review

"Deliciously drawn (with fragments of collage worked into each page), insightful and bubbling with delight in the process of artistic creation. A+." Salon

Review

"Barry is, underneath the wonky handwriting and the quirky, naïve drawings, a great memoirist...Like [Tobias] Wolff and [Dave] Eggers, she finds a tone that accommodates self-criticism and self-irony without tipping over into self-loathing...but what she is particularly good at is resonance." The New York Times

About the Author

Cartoonist, novelist, and playwright Lynda Barry is the creator behind the syndicated strip Ernie Pook's Comeek, featuring the incomparable Marlys and Freddy. Her books include One Hundred Demons and The Good Times Are Killing Me.

5 2

What Our Readers Are Saying

Share your thoughts on this title!
Average customer rating 5 (2 comments)

`
julehlers , September 04, 2011
This book is different from most of Lynda Barry's others--in addition to her usual paneled comics (which are great as always), there are elaborate collages on many pages. The collages are definitely fascinating but also a lot to take in, which made reading this kind of slow going at first. Don't give up, though--the book pays off in spades. Recommended for all Lynda Barry fans and for would-be writers.

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`
Jessica Weissman , May 14, 2008 (view all comments by Jessica Weissman)
Lynda Barry shares her creative process with you in a book full of great drawings and insights. This is the same stuff she teaches at courses around the country, and it works. Memory and images make fiction, right? And you can start in ten minutes. What It Is is great.

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Product Details

ISBN:
9781897299357
Binding:
Hardcover
Publication date:
05/13/2008
Publisher:
DRAWN & QUARTERLY PUBLICATIONS
Pages:
208
Height:
.98IN
Width:
8.52IN
Thickness:
1.00
Number of Units:
1
Illustration:
Yes
Copyright Year:
2008
Author:
Lynda Barry
Subject:
Comic books, strips, etc.
Subject:
Imagination
Subject:
Creation (literary, artistic, etc.)
Subject:
Graphic Novels-Literary

Ships free on qualified orders.
Add to Cart
$24.95
New Hardcover
Ships in 1 to 3 days
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1Hawthorne
20Local Warehouse

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