Customer Reviews

Pogo: The Complete Daily & Sunday Comic Strips, Vol. 1: Through the Wild Blue Wonder (v. 1)

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The first words in the Editor's Notes of Fantagraphic new Pogo compilation Through the Wild Blue Wonder are the same words uttered under the breath of Pogo fans for almost ten years: "It's about time." The first of what is intended to be a twelve part series has finally arrived. Kim Thompson and Walt Kelly's daughter Carolyn Kelly have taken the time to give Pogofiles the quality product that that the work deserves. For the first time both the daily and Sunday strips have found a home together.

The first thing a reader will notice after the beautiful dust cover (drawn and colored by Carolyn Kelly) is that the binding of this book is superior to similar collections, most notably the catastrophe that was done to Calvin and Hobbs. This is a book that should weather more than an occasional journey back into the Okefenokee Swamp. Opening the book to the first few pages and the reader finds original drawings that are sketched first with blue pencil and then inked. Walt Kelly used the blue pencil for the early sketching of his strips because the color did not show when the strip was reproduced.

The table of contents lovingly breaks the content down into weeks and explains the action in a way that specific strips can be quickly found. I had to smile when I saw the first week's description began with: "Pogo and Churchy go fishing." There was never a predicament throughout the run of the strip that could not be solved with a return to the Suwanee River, the only river that runs through the actual Okefenokee, for either a casual float or a communal fish fry. What is surprising here is the lack of political satire. The first year of Pogo in syndication was for the most part politically noncommittal. Kelly first dabbles into political satire in March 1950, almost a year into the syndicated run. Even this, as R. C. Harvey points out in a section named "Swamp Talk," was more puns and vaudeville than hard-hitting political satire. Kelly, like other cartoon artists at the time, avoided any topic that might be deemed controversial. Editors who disagreed could pull a strip they did not agree with resulting in the artist loosing money. The strip would not become overtly political until Kelly retained the copyright on his strips that he had primarily loaned to Post Hall syndicate. This will occur in the second volume in 1952.

The strips are separated into three categories. The daily and Sunday syndicated strips come first and are appropriately divided into different chapters. Kelly wrote the two for different audiences. Kelly believed that adults were the primary audience for the daily strips. This is where you will later find most of the political references. The Sunday strips were strictly for the kids.The only complaint that I might have concerning this volume is that the colors in this section may be too sharp.

The strips speak for themselves. Doonesbury artist and writer Garry Trudeau, certainly no stranger to cultural and political comic strips, said Walt Kelly was a triple threat: Pogo was beautifully drawn, exquisitely written and enormously popular-- a true cartoonists' cartoonist. Pogo began as a comic book character. Kelly donated Pogo in strip form to the newspaper where he was working as an art director. The third strip section is comprised of the entire run of that occurred in the New York Star. The only remotely political strips that occurred during the original Star run was an announcement of a Truman victory in 1948, and then a couple weeks later a reference of people having to eat crow. Since the Star was the only major newspaper in New York to support the Truman candidacy, this strip may have been less political satire than a poke at the other newspapers. Nevertheless, these three strips were the only strips in the entire Star run that specifically dealt with national politics. The campaign for sheriff may have been a parallel campaign to the 1948 presidential campaign, but it mostly wordplay and slapstick humor.

No epic Pogo journey could ever be complete without the help of Walt Kelly's friends and fans. In this first volume, American journalist and author Jimmy Breslin write the Forward. Mr. Breslin was a long time friend of Kelly's since the time their favorite bar, affectionately referred to as Bleek's after the longtime proprietor, was located in the back of the New York Herald Tribune building. Many a night was spent drinking until the building shook when the morning edition hit the presses.

Long time biographer and fan Steve Thompson, the hero of anyone who ever studied Pogo for academic reasons, wrote the introduction. He wrote, with the help of Kelly's third wife Selby Daley, what at this point may be the longest biographical study of Kelly, Pogo Files for Pogophiles. Mr. Thompson was the editor of the now elusive Fort Mudge Most, the Kelly fan magazine devoted to digging up ancient Kelly treasures. I recently tried to get copies through interlibrary loan, but I was told that the few libraries that had the issues would not loan them out. This is a shame because if this Fantagraphic Pogo collection is as successful as I believe it will be, more students may find their way to Kelly's work.

R.C. Harvey's "Swamp Talk" gives annotated historical references of the strips from the beginning, an epic job in of itself. Pogo was more than a political satire. Kelly was in a league of one when it came to social commentary in the comic strips. By the time Kelly decided to add hard-core political satire to Pogo in 1952, Al Capp was marrying off his title character Li'l Abner to Daisy May. He told Life that social commentary was suicide in a comic strip and he would not do it until the time was right to bring it back. He changed his strip to more of a traditional marriage strip. This left the hole that would be filled by Pogo. Harvey has his job cut out for him starting in the next volume if he is to continue to trace the social commentary and inside jokes of Walt Kelly. Harvey and Thompson are like sponges in the way they have compiled information concerning Kelly's work. Anything they write is worth reading for the ardent Pogo fan.

It should also be noted that R.C. Harvey also wrote the introductions to Fantagraphic's previous run of Pogo compilations. This set stopped abruptly at volume 11 with the February 12, 1954 return of "Molester" Mole MacAroney. For ten years, we have waited for this saga to continue. Indeed, this new set is a far superior product. May all the volumes be as beautifully crafted as the one I have in my hand.

How wonderful to finally have a finished copy of this in my hands! A few years ago I leafed through a display copy which Fantagraphics had on display at a show, but after a number of starts and stops on the path to publication, it is fantastic to finally have this gorgeous piece in-hand. This is a terrific document to Pogo and the work of groundbreaking cartoonist, humorist, and satirist Walt Kelly. It comes highly recommended and will be a wonderful addition to your collection.

I also recommend grabbing a copy of the incredible Songs of the Pogo CD by Walt Kelly with Norman Monath which was gloriously remastered and reissued a couple of years ago. It will give you something to tap your toes to while you read the book.

I GO POGO!

Aaaaaaah. A great sigh of relief after the long wait for this edition. And now we understand the delay. The production quality is exceptional (paper, binding, print quality, etc.), the dust jacket frameable, and the format (size) allows for reproduction of the strips in their originally published size. The Sunday full-color strips are reproduced from Kelly's original art! The binding in particular is superbly flexible in anticipation of much *much* use.

The editors have provided nice (brief) annotation of each strip, so that the immediate cultural context of Kelly's strips is accessible to those -- today and in the future -- who did not have the exquisite experience of opening each day's newspaper to a fresh Pogo strip that *slammed* the pretense of American life as we were living it.

As a fussy editor I am *so* impressed with this volume. And for a very reasonable price. Thank you Fantagraphics. Remember -- while "ars longa est," vita is too short. Please don't make us wait forever for volume II.

I still go Pogo.

We have been blessed with many great books of classic comic strip reprints in the last several years thanks to the folks at IDW and Fantagraphics and this one certainly ranks near the top of the list. I particularly appreciate the fact that these books have reprinted the strips in a size that actually allows my aging eyes to read them with ease--particularly important with Pogo since Walt Kelley was an absolute master with words. This strip has it all--captivating characters, laugh out loud humor, warmth, distinctive art--even lettering that enhances the strip. There is absolutely no question I will purchase all 12 volumes of this series. If you have never had the pleasure of exploring the swamp with Pogo and friends you are in for an incredible treat--and if you are a long-time fan as I am you will be quickly be charmed and delighted once again. A simply outstanding book!

For those of us who still possess our torn and tattered paperbacks - torn and tattered because we read and lovingly reread each book as did my children, paperbacks bought with limp dollar bills collected from paper routes, baby sitting, and allowance and then carried to the local book store on the day each new Pogo book appeared on the shelves, this is a moment of pure joy -- "Weehawken!" I have already cleared the space on my bookshelves for this far more durable and archival set. My only quandary now is what to do with all those yellowed original books that are literally falling apart.

At last! I read Pogo as a kid, adolescent and college student in the newspapers and collections. I'm glad to revisit them, and it's great that a new generation (or more) can know the incredible talent of Walt Kelly. And the book is of excellent quality at an amazingly reasonable price. No one who buys it should regret it.

Finally, a tribute to the greatest man in cartoon history. I've waited years for this and will continue to collect each future issue.

This first volume of Pogo meets the standard of excellence Fantagraphics has set with their Popeye and Peanuts collections. Nice paper, sturdily bound, beautiful dust jacket with a nice wraparound image. Worth the wait!

We had almost given up hope that this book would ever come out, but it finally did and it is beautiful! It is a tremebdous hit in our house with both the 37 year old dad and the 9 , 7, and 4 year old kids. Our only worry is that the 3 year old may tear some pages out. One word of caution, if you read this book very long, you may start to talk like them.

I enjoyed Pogo as a teenager for Walt Kelly's artistic style, wordplay, and silly sense of humor. The fun is as fresh as ever in this collection of his earliest two-years'-worth of published works, to be followed by another eleven volumes covering his remaining 22 years. Kelly must have been a fun fellow to be around with his ability to turn innocent human interactions into extended zany tangles of misunderstandings, slapstick, puns, and occasional gunplay. I have missed this kind of good clean thoughtful humor.

The strips are a bit larger than my paper printed and are nicely reproduced in this oversized horizontal book format. The dailies are three per page in black and white, while each Sunday gets its own full-color page. The table of contents summarizes each week's storyline, followed by Jimmy Breslin's forward and an extended introduction that puts it all in context. Walt would have been proud.

Thanks to the loving work of daughter Carolyn and her co-editor, this is a beautiful book and a promising start to a new major collection of distinctly American art and wit by a true master of his craft. What a joy it is to know that if I ever need a good chuckle or inspiration for drawing, it is on the nightstand.