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5.0 out of 5 stars
A Must Own For Casual and Hardcore Fans Alike, January 5, 2010
This review is from: Celebrating Peanuts: 60 Years (Hardcover)
One review for the casual fan, one review for the hardcore fan.
CASUAL
Buy this immediately; case closed. If you plan on remaining a casual Peanuts fan it will be all that you need for the rest of your life, and if you become a hardcore Peanuts fan because of this remarkable collection's capacity to convince, it will hold up as a worthwhile and useful purchase even after you've expanded your collection.
HARDORE
You face a more complex situation. If you're already a Peanuts diehard, most likely you're working on or already own everything released so far in Fantagraphic's essential Complete Peanuts series. Since Celebrating Peanuts: 60 Years only draws from highlights, why do we need yet another expensive selective Peanuts edition, when eventually we will have them all in Fantagraphic's fine volumes? Is Celebrating Peanuts indicative of the more unfortunate, fringe-commercialized aspects of Peanuts, while The Complete Peanuts is where the true fans maintain their loyalties? I was asking myself this question when I first found out about this new collection, but it was so handsome and I'm such an impulsive buyer when it comes to Schulz that I sprung for it anyway, and far from feeling I may have wasted my money, far from feeling merely "relieved", I was doing a Snoopy dance at the quality of this set.
This collection performs a function that is different than but just as important as that of the Complete Peanuts series. The Complete Peanuts is great for diehards hungry to see how the strip developed in great detail. It's good for scholarly work and archival purposes, as well as utter immersion. Celebrating Peanuts, on the other hand, strikes me first and foremost as a concentrated, self-contained and not incomplete plea for wider recognition of Schulz the Man as not just the "most world's beloved cartoonist" but as one of the greatest artistic geniuses of the second half of the 20th century. There have been other high profile takes on Schulz the Man and pleas for recognition of his genius: the Schulz Museum in Santa Rosa, California is no doubt a must-stop for Peanuts fans, largely for seeing Schulz's originals in person, but the biographical sense we get of Schulz from a visit there is understandably antiseptic, harmless, and uncomplicatedly reverent. The second high profile take on Schulz is David Michaelis's biography from a few years back, Schulz and Peanuts. The book is a great read, informative, and essential for Peanuts nuts, but much of its accuracy is contested, and it gives us a rather stock portrait of Schulz as a suffering artist, which, though probably more true to life than the Mr. Rogers other sources would have us think of, is nevertheless incomplete, and does not capture the joy and happiness present in Schulz's life and work. Preoccupied with extramarital melodrama, the biography also fails to give us enough insight into Schulz the Artist, his methods, what made his art as important as it is, to really be a serious argument for Schulz the Genius [more than Michaelis's book itself, I suggest
The Comics Journal #290 (No. 290), for an exhaustive round-table discussion of Michaelis's biography featuring rebuttals from Peanuts experts as well as Schulz's son]. So when it comes to being the convincing accessible case for Schulz's genius, the family/museum's take is too antiseptic, Michaelis's take is too mournful and unartistic, and The Complete Peanuts, though they of course capture Schulz's genius with the most fullness, can be daunting and confusing for the uninitiated.
Celebrating Peanuts is the solution. It works as (1) an artistic and human biography, (2) an argument for greatness aimed at the uninitiated, and (3) a more friendly, concentrated excursion into Schulz's head (seen in new ways) that is more than appropriate for Fantagraphics fans, because even we sometimes only want the very best; Celebrating Peanuts nails down not only the most important and popular strips, tracking the formal/character developments along the way, but also reveals through its fine selection of the best obscure strips and storylines a very holistic image of Schulz's genius. Schulz as philosopher, gag man, and fine artist are all well represented here, reprinted in the finest quality (and often color) that we have yet seen. Take heed diehards, great as they are, The Complete Peanuts series does not do enough justice to Schulz's usually confident, sometimes shaky, but always elegant line work. But what really rockets this collection into greatness are the quotes from the man himself sprinkled lovingly and tellingly throughout the book. The close reader will notice in many of these quotes wisdom, insight, and roaring contradictory beliefs and emotions raging underneath a calm exterior, much like we see in the strips themselves. Hardcore fans may be familiar with some of these quotes, as many are drawn from
Charles M. Schulz: Conversations (Conversations With Comic Artists), but by thoughtfully placing them among his life's work, the publishers have given us an intense one-stop Charles M Schulz experience; the best you could ever ask for.
This is truly a package for the ages. It is my desert island object. Get it.
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