music and tales
In 1912 author Edgar Rice Burroughs introduced what would be one of the most well known literary characters in the world, second only behind Sherlock Holmes: Tarzan of the apes. The allure is obvious. An infant (from a well bred, high class […]
The very first actual comic strip was printed in 1837 in Switzerland by artist Rudolph Töpffer. It was clearly a series of drawing telling a sequential paneled storyline and was the only thing of its kind until 1895 when Richard Outcault began drawing The Yellow […]
My post yesterday on Little Nemo In Slumberland got me thinking about early comics and hence, the very first ones. While the first official “comic”, that is, sequential graphic storyline as we know it is The Adventures of Obadiah Oldbuck” […]
It is one of the greatest comic (graphic story if you will) masterpieces of all time and is actually on display in the Louve and has been shown in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. (I personally would kill to have […]
Robert Darnton, Professor and director of the Harvard University Library has been delivering a number of “cabaret lectures” in which he discusses how in mid 18th century France, information and political opinion was spread throughout the street of Paris through pop songs. He […]
One old genre of theater i am absolutely fascinated with is the old Italian and French Commedia Dell’arte, where travelling theater troupes went town to town performing improvisational comedy plays before the crowds. Instead of the written comedies of the Greek and […]
I believe it’s time to do a multi-part series on the history of steampunk. (i may or may not do the entire thing consecutively.) First of all, barring the 1960s TV show Wild Wild West (we’ll get to it) the […]
Steampunk stories, actually the entire notion, rely completely upon reimagining history. The entire thing got started by reimagining Victoria era Britain (with a sci-fi twist), but it’s grown to include other countries and places, usually within a 100 to 200 year framework. […]