The Cartoon History of the Universe II, Volumes 8-13: From the Springtime of China to the Fall of Rome (Pt.2) [Paperback]

Larry Gonick (Author)

Book Description

Release date: September 18, 1994

Here's a new installment of the phenomenal  bestseller that Publishers Weekly  selected as one of the twelve graphic books of all  time. Spanning ages and continents from Ancient  India to Rome and China in A.D. 600, Volume II is  hip, funny, and full of info.

B & W  illustrations.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Continuing right where the first book left off, The Cartoon History of the Universe II once again combines Gonick's superb cartooning with the lessons of history. Find out what Lynn Johnston, creator of For Better of Worse, calls "a gift to those of us who love to laugh and who love to learn." Part II contains volumes 8 to 13, from the Springtime of China to the Fall of Rome (and India, too!).

From Publishers Weekly

Gonick has done it again with a diffuse but deep excavation into early civilizations from ancient China to the Germanic tribes. In some ways, Gonick asks a lot of American readership's occidental training by detailing every dynastic hotshot from the Orient. This also being a fertile time for the development of religious cults, Gonick spends much time on Christ (whom he insists on calling "Jeshua ben Joseph"), Confucius, (not, one might note, Lao Tsu or K'ung fu-tsze), Buddha and the like. Gonick's main focus is not to outline the contributions that allowed their teachings to survive the centuries, but rather to humanize them, and some come across as fanatical seekers simply looking for a following, a good meal, a wicked battle, a girlfriend or a shower. The artist's style is versatile and engaging, and his asides, puns and parenthetical references do much to keep the reader's attention throughout this tome, but that cannot entirely make up for the fact that some of this history is just plain dry. However, aficionados of cartoon blood, backstabbing, sex and history will love this volume, and might find a place for it near their encyclopedias.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: Doubleday; 1st edition (September 18, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385420935
• ISBN-13: 978-0385420938
• Product Dimensions: 10.9 x 8.5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (47 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #30,554 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #23 in Books > History > Historical Study & Educational Resources > Reference
  • #95 in Books > Comics & Graphic Novels > Comic Strips

More About the Author

Larry Gonick has been creating comics that explain history, science, and other big subjects for more than thirty years, ever since Blood from a Stone: A Cartoon Guide to Tax Reform appeared in 1977. He has been a Knight Science Journalism Fellow at MIT and is staff cartoonist for Muse magazine.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Religion, politics, sex and humour January 22, 2004

By Conrad Leviston

Format:Paperback

As with Larry Gonick's other guides he manages to pull off the trick of being both amusing and edifying. He also has the artistic flare for painting history in broad yet revealing brush strokes.
The second instalment of his history of the Universe covers ancient India, China's early years and Rome from its mythical founding to its very real collapse.
Gonick is not afraid to offend. His depictions of Jesus, Krisna, Buddha and Confucius are all less than entirely flattering. While he is not the sort to be disrespectful through ignorance, Gonick will not fail to pick out the more obvious weaknesses of any institution or historical figure he comes across. He even takes a swipe at one of Afrocentrisms unjustified claims. Although in the end he pays due recognition to the achievements of each of these figures it is possibly best to avoid this book if you are the sort to yell "Blasphemy!".
Anybody else who has a sense of humour and an interest in history should get their hands on this book immediately.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars my favorite of the series February 5, 2007

By Tim Lieder VINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback

Every book in this series is both funny and intelligent. Much of the dumb humor comes from getting the facts straight. Even small details like Galba jumping into his boyfriend's arms after learning that he has been declared emporer is from Tacitus.

This is my favorite by virtue of being about Ancient Rome, its rise as a Republic, the height of Empire and its collapse into the dark ages. The fact that he doesn't flinch from the more scandalous details (such as Tiberius' proclivities towards little boys) or skimp over some of the more interesting controversies of the time (Josephus comes off as a wily con artist) makes it that much more entertaining. And I also would have never read The Fall and Decline of the Roman Empire had it not been for this book. And trust me, Edward Gibbons rocks.

Besides, the Western History, Gonick also spends a great deal of time with Indian and Chinese history. One of the major crimes of our education system is the fact that this is all probably very basic material, but the best source for it is probably in a cartoon book. Still, it's a great cartoon book and you can't fault the cartoon book for the deficiencies in other educational venues.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars The bloody history of early China and early Europe July 16, 2004

By Charles Ashbacher HALL OF FAMETOP 500 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback

Even though this is a collection of cartoons and the text in the dialog balloons is generally meant to be frivolous, it is possible to learn a lot of history from the book. Unlike so many history books that concentrate on Western Europe and derivatives, this one deals extensively with India and China. Volume 8 deals with the early history of India and how the great religions that we associate with India arose. From it, you also learn the origins of the great early works of Indian civilization such as Bhagavad Gita.
The origins of the ancient Chinese civilization are covered in volumes 9 and 10. Most of the points deal with the battles for supremacy and feature court intrigue, deception and a lot of killing. We tend to think of massive deaths in war as being a modern invention, but that is a misconception. Well before the year 0, the army of Chin was ambushed and massacred, over 200,000 men were killed in one day.
Chapter 11 begins with the last days of Alexander the Great. It correctly points out that while Alexander was married to a Persian, that union was largely political. The great love of Alexander's life was Hephaestion, his male grand vizier. When Hephaestion died, Alexander grieved over the body for two days. The next sections chronicle the origin and rise of Rome as a great power. Once again, it is largely a tale of murder, intrigue and war. As the power of Rome grew, it was no longer possible to maintain the republican form of government. At first the supreme position was called the consulship, where the holder was powerful, but not yet a dictator. All this changed when Julius Caesar marched off to conquer Gaul and then returned to march on Rome. This began several decades of near constant warfare in the Empire, some of which was civil....
The numbers of people that were killed in these wars are amazing to consider. Some history books estimate that Julius Caesar killed over a million while in Gaul. Descriptions of Western history describe the carnage of World Wars I and II as unprecedented in human history. In fact, the concept of total war with deaths numbered in the hundreds of thousands or millions is an old theme of history. The wars that took place between the Europeans in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries were comparatively limited in consequence.
After a few pages, the discerning reader will understand that the text in the captions is generally designed to impart the history while the balloon dialog is reserved for the humor. I enjoyed this book immensely, learning many things about Chinese history. I also learned some additional details about western history. If there is a theme to the history presented here, it is how many people were killed in acts of the powerful fighting for control. We tend to think of the twentieth century as being the bloodiest on record. That is probably not the case. Given the carnage that occurred in China and the Mediterranean even before the birth of Christ, there might be centuries before the A. D. label that were bloodier. That fact is disturbing, whether learned by text or by cartoon. Read more ›

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars The universe in comics... finally... January 24, 2007

By ewomack TOP 1000 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback

Comics have no limits. Anything can get depicted with words and pictures. And, after Larry Gonick completes his "Cartoon History of the Universe" series, most everything will be. Over the past three decades Gonick has stretched modern comics from the purely fictional into the scientific and historic. He has cartoonified esoteric subjects that would bore most medieval scriveners. Snoozers like statistics, genetics, physics, chemistry (and the one exception, that great unmentionable - blush, blush - puritans look away quick!) come alive like golems to terrorize despisers of knowledge. These collections make learning palatable even for those with Beavis and Butthead mentalities. As such, that unobtainable indefatigable unreachable, almost paradoxical, oxymoron of oxymorons, the "educational comic," seems close to fruition and perfection. Somewhere an educator just gagged. Above all, as if turning the comics industry on its head wasn't enough, Gonick has undertaken his magnum opus: a multivolume chronological multicultural history of our known universe in cartoon form. Overachiever detector! Bzzzt! Bzzzzt!

Book I, volumes 1-7, of this pen and paper masterwork started with a BIG BANG and wormed its way to Alexander the Great's voluminous conquests. Book II, volumes 8 - 13, picks up where it left off, but not before taking a dizzying tour through India and China. Volume eight covers India from Harappa to the Bhagavad-Gita (with its eerie page length depiction of Krishna's "revelation" to Arjuna) and Ashoka with the origins of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism tossed into the cultural salad. Gonick also manages a stunning two page summary of the Mahabharata, the 74,000 verse Hindu epic creation poem. Only comics could pull this off. Volumes 9 and 10 grapple with the infinity of Chinese history.... Court intrigues, gory wars, philosophers such as Sun Wu, Lao Tzu, Confucius, Chuang-Tzu, and a breakneck tour through the Hsia, Shang, and Zhou dynasties make for entertaining and brain bursting reading. Knowledge overload. Be sure to cool the brain often. These sections provide an efficient gloss of Chinese history up to 9 A.D. Then to Rome for volumes 11 - 13. Via a detour through the short life of Alexander the Great, King Romulus (after rudely impaling Remus on a sword) founded the city that still bears his name. That's what killing your brother gets you, apparently. Great morality tale there, indeed. Later, after love-starved Romans hauled off the Sabine women, one of Tarquin the Proud's cronies raped Lucretia ("Don't blame me! I never heard this word before..."). Out of honor she stabbed herself and Junius Brutus led the charge to overthrow the corrupt kings and initiated the Roman Republic. All was sort of fine until the Gauls invaded, (depicted here with various characters from Asterix), the Ides of March, and Caesar Octavianus took full power. The Roman Empire began. Book II ends with the fall of the Western Roman empire. Lots more happens in between, of course, but world history often defies even cursory summary.

One interesting interlude involves Jesus or, as the book calls him, "Jeshua Ben Joseph" ("Jesus" doesn't come along until the Greeks name Jeshua "Christ" or "Messiah"). Gonick makes brief mention of the Gospels of Mary Magdalene and even depicts the unmentionable. (Oooh! NOW you want to read it, don't you? Slobber! Drool!) Gonick takes a unique look at this pivotal point in history. His ultimate viewpoint emanates from the asides.

"The Cartoon History of The Universe" won't transform anyone into a historian. Information overload sags the brain quick and often. Chinese history in particular will seem like a blur. So much happens. Regardless, this series has the power, unlike most text-based histories, to suck any skeptic into the bizarre narrative that makes up human history. If nothing else, readers will get a good overview of just how varied, strange, violent, provocative, and sometimes cruel our past is. We're goofy creatures. No series has made this point better, or more humorously, or with better cartoons, than this one. Read more ›