Tom Spurgeon Interviews Brannon Costello About Howard Chaykin

Click here to read an in-depth interview with my friend and colleague from way back, Brannon Costello, who will soon publish a University Press of Mississippi Conversations series covering the comics legend Howard Chaykin. Brannon also mentions a book he's editing that should be out soon and that I'm actually even more excited about owning, reading, and using. That one is a collection of essay on comics and the American South. It's gonna be a big year for Brannon, and that thrills me to no end! :)

p.s. Brannon, if you're reading this, thanks for the shout-out! :)

The Captain America to my Bucky Publishes *Howard Chakin: Conversations*

One of the most satisfying aspects of being in academia is seeing your friends and colleagues do well. Brannon Costello, who edited Howard Chaykin: Conversations (UP Mississippi), is one fellow I can call both friend and colleague.

I worked with Brannon in a teaching capacity when we were both students at the University of Tennessee, where he was earning his Ph.D. and I was working on a MA. I was his teaching assistant for a semester, and our love of comics was something we shared often. I soon came to see myself as the Bucky to his Captain America, especially since Steve Rogers was Brannon's favorite character.

I can remember Brannon talking about patriotic comics with and Mark Bernard, a fellow MA-er, and me back in the early aughts and mentioning his admiration for Chaykin, specifically. The three of us were even putting together an edited collection on patriot-themed comics at one time, but it never got off the ground. We did, however, take an historic road trip from Knoxville,TN, to Jacksonville, FL, to present scholarship on Captain America, and it was during those hours that we really got to know each other's deeper ideas on comics, culture, and more.

Looking back, now that all three of us have Ph.D's and are gainfully employed and publishing in our areas of passion, I see that that travel time was very productive. Good thing we stopped for breakfast so early in the morning so we had some brain food! ;)

Still, knowing these seeds exist and seeing folks follow through on them and have success in doing so is highly gratifying. As gratifying as seeing one's students do well, I think.

I don't know what I'm more excited about, though, this collection or the collection on comics and the South on which Dr. Costello is also working.

Looks like we'll just have to check out both!