Market Day [Hardcover]

James Sturm (Author)

Book Description

Release date: March 30, 2010

A TIMELESS MEDITATION ON ART AND COMMERCE SEEN THROUGH THE LIFE OF AN EARLY-TWENTIETH-CENTURY JEWISH RUG MAKER

Mendleman’s life goes through an upheaval when he discovers that he can no longer earn a living for his growing family doing the work that defines him—making well-crafted rugs by hand. A proud artisan, he takes his donkey-drawn cart to the market only to be turned away when the distinctive shop he once sold to now stocks only cheaply manufactured merchandise. As the realities of the marketplace sink in, Mendleman unravels. James Sturm draws a quiet, reflective, and beautiful portrait of eastern Europe in the early 1900s–bringing to life the hustle and bustle of an Old World marketplace on the brink of industrialization. Market Day is an ageless tale of how economic and social forces can affect a single life.

An award-winning cartoonist of the books Golem’s Mighty Swing, James Sturm’s America, Satchel Paige: Striking Out Jim Crow, and Adventures in Cartooning, Sturm is a true visionary, having cofounded the Seattle alternative weekly The Stranger and the Center for Cartoon Studies, the country’s premier cartooning school.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. Cartoonist and educator Sturm turns in a tightly woven graphic novella about a shtetl craftsman whose life and livelihood shatter against the rising industrial behemoth of the early 20th century. Mendleman is a nervous rug weaver with a child on the way. His devotion to his craft brings him to the brink of art, but when he suddenly loses his major client to modernization, he finds himself, effectively, patronless. Suddenly a castaway amid economic forces that render his virtues meaningless, he collapses as his previously unnamable anxieties find specific and destructive form. Sturm's tale comprises a day's cycle, and the magnitude of Mendleman's radical descent must sometimes be stated or inferred. But most of the book's important details are effectively portrayed as part of the quotidian warp and woof of life's patterns and relationships. Sturm has infused his reliably disciplined storytelling style with slow pacing and spare graphics, but some bravura sequences give the story impact. Although the details of rural Eastern European Jewish life at the turn of the century ring true, the book is less rooted in a specifically explicated setting than some of Sturm's previous historical fictions, allowing Mendleman's dilemma to function as a broader metaphor for the perpetual struggle between independent creativity and impersonal market forces. (Apr.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From School Library Journal

Gr 10 Up–Mendleman is a Jewish rug maker in early-20th-century Eastern Europe. His wife is pregnant with their first child and due any minute, but he must go to the market to make money for his family to survive. He attempts to sell his wares to no avail. The shop he frequented in the past has changed owners and no longer carries quality items like his. Mendleman presses on and attempts to sell his rugs at the emporium, where they are willing to pay a fraction of what he used to make, and his pieces are thrown onto a heap of other rugs for sale. Mendleman feels he has no choice and completes the sale. This catalyzes an existential crisis for him. His work used to give him so much pride, but he is forced to surrender for money. With expressive and moody imagery, Sturm's story is at once original and universal. The struggle to maintain one's identity after losing a job is a tough one, and the author does an excellent job conveying it. With some obscene language, nudity, and brief mention of sex, this graphic novel is for mature readers.–Melissa Houlroyd, formerly at Brighton Memorial Library, Rochester, NYα(c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 96 pages
• Publisher: Drawn and Quarterly (March 30, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1897299974
• ISBN-13: 978-1897299975
• Product Dimensions: 6.5 x 0.7 x 9.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #130,166 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #25 in Books > Comics & Graphic Novels > Publishers > Drawn and Quarterly

More About the Author

Mr. James Sturm is a cartoonist. He lives in White River Junction, Vermont with his wife, two daughters, a chunky little dog named Chi Chi, and two rabbits.

Besides making comics, James works at The Center for Cartoon Studies, a school for cartoonists.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars a haunting book May 2, 2010

By booklover

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

"Market Day" is a beautifully-drawn, subdued portrait of a day in the life of Mendleman the rug maker, somewhere in Eastern Europe in the early 1900's.

The storyline, however, is universal and immediate. It captures the current maelstrom of our world today, and the hard choices we are forced to make. There is a timeless urgency to the day's events for our hero, Mendleman, and those of us who have suffered in the last economic decline understand the dilemmas confronting our protagonist all too well.

This is a wonderful book. Mendleman's day at the market will haunt me.....as there are no easy answers for any of us.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Sold! December 17, 2012

By Melanie Gilbert VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

The story of Mendleman, a rug maker in a turn-of-the-century Eastern European village, is woven with exquisite care by graphic novelist James Sturm.

Using a sepia-infused palette that pays homage to the photographs of Roman Vishniac and Alter Kayczne, and the postcard collection of Gerard Silvain, Sturm takes us on Mendleman's journey to the marketplace where he sells his finely-loomed masterpieces - "my rugs are always 16 ends per inch! ALWAYS!"

At Market Day, Mendleman encounters old friends and a reliable old world: a Mezuza maker, a gravestone carver, a fortune teller, a knife grinder. They are comforting touchstones in a world built on a tradition of honor, duty and diligence.

But when Mendleman must sell his rugs to a new vendor far below their previous value with his old connection, his sense of order violently unravels. The world view that used to inspire his creations now looks bleak and cheap. He gets drunk and vows to sell his loom.

Mendleman's crisis of artistic confidence comes at the same moment as a personal one: he's about to become a new father. These colliding forces are literally ripping apart the fabric of Mendleman's life warp by weft.

Sturm takes the simple story of a rug maker and turns it into a mediation on the sacred and the profane, art and commerce, and devotion and duty. The book ends obliquely, yet with blue color, signifying that perhaps Mendleman will find life and art in a changing world.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A Perfect Picture June 12, 2010

By Chris Reich

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

This book is a brilliant picture of exactly where the American economy is now and how lives are being affected.

More words will detract from the meaning. This is book you can read in an hour that will affect you forever. Hopefully.

Chris Reich
[...]

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Market Day is Haunting and Beautiful June 8, 2010

By Ruth Biloon

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

Market Day is the story of a poor rug maker and peddler in the early years of the 20th century in Eastern Europe, told and drawn with great feeling and restraint. It shows a grey world, and Sturm portrays it (in shades of grey, black and white), and the life and people that would soon disappear, with such empathy, one can feel the weight of the rugs and the growing hopelessness as the poor man trudges from one possibility to the other, only to have them all evaporate. The illustrations are lovingly drawn, the landscape nostalgic, the faces of the characters so individual and full of life that they seem all too real and their loss all the more tragic.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Moody and Evocative May 13, 2010

By Cary B. Barad

Format:Hardcover

A moody and evocative graphic novel that recaptures the old world Jewish ghetto experience in a poignant way. It also has something of an offbeat flavor that is very original and enjoyable, without being contaminated by the visual and narrative detail that sometimes clutters and overwhelms the graphic novel genre. In sum--a quick and thoughtful reading experience. Interestingly, this tale ends in an open-ended fashion, which means that a sequel may be in the works.

5.0 out of 5 stars Sometimes The Old Ways Are Best November 25, 2010

By Richard C. Geschke VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

Set in the early 20th century, James Sturm gives us a glimpse of life in Jewish Eastern Europe where the old ways of life are succumbing to the new pace of the faster lifestyle of the industrial revolution
This graphic novel centers itself on one day in the life of Mendelman who is a highly skilled maker of fine quality rugs. Sturm shows one significant day in going to the market when Mendelman sees the old ways of doing business evaporating into the new and cheaper ways which have come to pass with the industrial onset of mass marketing and poorer quality.
In modern terms this highly thought out graphic novel shows what would be called today as downsizing. Sturm's story telling is thought provoking and fast paced. His drawing depicts the surroundings and pictures the Jewish way of life much as seen in the movie "Fiddler on the Roof". The scenes are beautifully graphic and haunting.
The conclusion of the story is complex and thought provoking. Such is the beauty of the story and conclusion which will make one want to re-read and pick up the missing thoughts and intentions of such a strong work from Sturm's hand. This work is very deserving of the maximum 5 Star rating.

4.0 out of 5 stars Rugged October 14, 2010

By Noel TOP 1000 REVIEWER

Format:Hardcover

A rug maker in early 20th century Eastern Europe prepares to go to market to sell his rugs. He sits up at night worrying about money. He is soon to be a father and he needs to sell his rugs. When he goes to the market he finds his usual buyer has retired and sold his business to a young man who doesn't care for craftsmanship and wants to pay as little as possible. As he wanders the towns looking for a place to make some money, he thinks about his old buyer, the man who encouraged him in his rug making and who left without a word.

James Sturm's book is a quiet subtle story of the withering of an old society and the emergence of a new one, the one that will become the twentieth century and all but put out of work the skilled craftsmen and make way for mass produced goods.

Sturm's artwork is brilliant. From simple panels of the man, hunched over, walking along a country path in darkness, to rug designs of crowd scenes, to full double page layouts of a landscape or a rural scene, Sturm can draw them all beautifully and powerfully. It's similar in style to Seth whose own melancholic tales mirrors Sturm's.

"Market Day"'s story while perhaps not being as appealing to some, has it's merits. The main character is fully realised and the story is well written and drawn. It speaks of hope and renewal in the face of defeat and is ultimately a positive ending.

I really enjoyed the book and fully recommend it to fans of indie comics. It's a great read from a brilliant artist.