Customer Reviews

The Sweeter Side of R. Crumb

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I purchased this for a friend who is an R. Crumb lover and who has converted me. Of course, I read it before delivering it. This book is as all R. Crumb books are--excellent, funny, endearing, and insightful. There is something in there for everyone. I'm a cat lover and his drawing of his cat was just super. All in all, worth every penny.

I dig this book mostly because a significant amount of the drawings are semi-autobiogrphical;
And anice portion of it seems to come from the past 10 years or so.

This is no fancy huge anthology.
There is no story.

Just a collection of his work that is slightly less vulgar;
with a lot of drawings of his wife's butt.

Maybe my expectations were too high. Maybe I should have known that a greatest hits compilation is never as good as the original pressing. After all that, it was R. Crumb. He is a genius, but a rehash of some of his old drawings showing a "a gentler, kinder Crumb" does nothing to assuage my mistake of not having purchased the full story of Angel McSpade or some old Zap comics.

The Crumb fiction/art factory continues on. With his recent success, the Book of Genesis, attention has been focused on this bizarre talent.

The Sweeter Side of R Crumb is just that. Away with his 'reputation', this book illuminates a side that few see. The pages are filled with diverse images from musical legends to landscapes, to self portraits. The beauty of the images lies not in their execution necessarily, but rather the stories behind them. Some commentary describes the significance of the art, while other images do not need any editorial, letting the art or the dialogue carry it.

On a personal note, I appreciate many of the musicians represented, and Shemp Howard of course. Who would have thought!

This may merely be a guise to get readers to buy Crumb, but I appreciate the art behind the man who has become known for something altogether different.

Tim Lasiuta

Anyone who is familiar with R.Cuumb's art is in for a surprise with this collection of his drawings.
In this book we are treated to a lot of portraits of his family as well as others.We are also familiar with his drawings of,who must be his greatest love and favorite subject,Aline,and we are not disappointed with what is included here.
But for a real change of pace,we get wonderful landscape drawings from Southern France.Then, there are the still life drawings "Broken Teapot"and "Pizzeria".Crumb also shows his understanding and compassion of the terrible injustice in his "Failure in Sudan".Music fans will be surprised with portraits of several artists including Country Music greats,"Uncle Dave Macon" and "Charlie Poole".And how about the illustration for a tale from the late 1300's in England.One of my favorites in the collection is an untitled drawing of a Woodcutter surrounded by a very concerned group of "Little Folk" trying to decide what is the meaning of all the "pitchfork' shaped trees in the enchanted forest.This drawing begs the question,"Is there a story or legend that Crumb ie working on here?"
And just to show us that Crumb is facing the ravishes of time that is the lot of all of us,we get a self portrait from August 26,'05.
A wonderful,but different addition for your Crumb collection.

First, I must confess I am a HUGE fan of R. Crumb. There are few things of his I DON'T love. (Okay, I'm still holding out and not buying the story where he pushes his wife's face into vomit. Even a die-hard fan has her limits.)

Next confession: I was not interested in this book at all for a long while due to it's title, which seemed to say "Emasculated Crumb Artwork." I felt it would be the rose without the thorns, the storm without the thunder.

I was wrong. Even though this is not as sexy as most of his books, it is GREAT. I just adore the strips he has about his daughter Sophie, and there are many interesting things to read and look at in this book.

Apparently Crumb's wife and her friend, the publisher, were trying to market Crumb to women with this book. Personally I think that is a dumb idea. I'm a woman and I love (almost) all of his stuff. However, I DO like this book as something I can show to little kids without worrying that there might be something in there that would be too graphic sexually for their age. I love his artwork and I want to show it to people all the time. Now I have a book I can show kids -- GREAT...!

It's more classic Crumb -- without anything X-rated and with a very silly title. But lucky you can buy it cheaply used until everyone figures out that this is an excellent book.