A. David Lewis Talks Shakespeare and Comics

Listen to this podcast that explores connections between comics and Willy D. Shakes. Ol' Shaggstaff himself! I'm talkin' 'bout Shakespeare.

I LOVE IT when folks discuss comics and Shakespeare because sometimes  elitists hold Billy Shaggy up as the apex while shitting on the concepts of comics in the classroom, visual literacies or multimodal literacies. While, of course, the reality is that Shakespeare is, perhaps, the most visual of our canonical figures. His work can be read but is best understood by reading and viewing it. Ahem... like with comics.

I'm gonna talk about this a little bit at my speaking gig at the Denver Comic and Literacy Convention in June. This online conversation over at "The Mousetrap" makes me so eager!

Plus, this is a good source to share with you after yesterday's sharing of the English Journal article on reading comics and Bill Shacklestick.

Artifacts from Jack Kirby's Design for Shakespeare Play

Click here to read an article about a California college, Julius Caesar, and the King of Comics! A blast from the groovy past!

"Comic Book Literacy" Brings the Links

If you're not facebook friends with the folks hocking the documentary Comic Book Literacy, you're missing out on tons of interesting links. It's like they have all day to comb the web to look for evidence to support their claims yet never bothered to give me a ring on the telly. ;)

Anyway, here's a link to an article from the North Bay Nugget detailing how Lynda Marshall uses comics to help teach canonical works like those from Shakespeare in here high school English classes at Widdifield Secondary School.

An excerpt from the article:

Students were sent on their Christmas break with the graphic novel version of Hamlet (which resembles a big comic book), as well as the original play.

"I told them to just read the graphic novel and we'd review the original play in class," Marshall said. "When they came back, they had read both. For the first time every student in the class understood the play, cover to cover."

There was also a big comics-and-literacy shindig at North Texas that featured a lot of good speakers. Apparently UNT gets it. Still, it might have been nice to get a call, but the UT system is different from the UNT system, so I can understand the homegrown pride.

But the student newspaper at UT-Arlington is getting in on the action. Here's a link to an article from The Shorthorn that covers the documentary that Texas-based Todd Kent is showing across the state currently. Here's another English teacher, this time at the college-level, talkin' graphica:

English assistant professor Carolyn Guertin uses comics in class to help her students create digital narratives. She believes comics should be taught to children because they help them understand information by using a more visual approach to presenting it.

“Comic books are the fastest-growing form of storytelling,” she said. “I think it’s really a good approach to making [information] understandable, and they’re fun. You can never beat the fun factor in learning. It’s very important to making it accessible.”

Finally, here's a link to a Youtube video featuring a discussion of the documentary after it had been screened.

Macbeth in Several Panels

Thanks for drawing this to our attention, Heidi!

Kill Bill: Willy D. Shakes to Get Graphic Novel Treatment with a Twist!

Kill Shakespeare is coming! Here's a note from the authors:

“Kill Shakespeare” is going to start as a 12-issue comic-book series. IDW (the third largest comics publisher right now) is publishing the first issue in April. Then we plan to collect the series in two six-issue trades and one “Absolute” collection.

So what is “Kill Shakespeare”? Well think of a “Lord of the Rings” style action-adventure but with The Bard’s characters. In our story Shakespeare’s greatest heroes are pit against his most menacing villains in a race to save, or kill, Shakespeare himself. The short comics pitch is “The Justice League of Shakespeare”, but I prefer “League of Extraordinary Gentlemen” meets “Fables” with a dash of “Northlanders” tossed in.

In our story Hamlet is banished from Denmark and the Pirates attack his ship just as they do in the play, but in our world instead of ending up in Elsinore he ends up in another place – one where everyone he meets is a Shakespearean character. There he meets Richard III who makes him a bargain: if the Dane will seek out a reclusive Wizard and take the source of his power, Richard will return Hamlet’s Father from the dead.

The name of this reclusive Wizard? William Shakespeare.

On his journey Hamlet meets Falstaff, Juliet (who has survived her ordeal with Romeo) and Othello (also alive, but Desdemona is dead). They tell him Shakespeare isn’t a Wizard, but the Creator and that Hamlet is fated to meet and save Shakespeare – not kill him (in effect triggering a literary “Second coming”). They tell him that Richard is an oppressive “King” and that Hamlet is their land’s best hope to depose the King and his evil associates – Lady Macbeth and Iago.

Kill a Wizard and save his Father? Or save a God and rescue a land….? (and dare we mention Juliet and Hamlet’s growing love and what happens when Romeo shows up????)

Sounds fun, eh? Publisher's Weekly thinks so too. Of course, the yummy irony is that a project with a murderous title might actually help bring the Bard to life for students.

Graphic Novel Reporter Updates!

My well-respected colleague Michael Bitz is profiled in an article you won't want to miss! Also, what's this about Shakespeare's heroes fighting Shakespeare's villains?