Customer Reviews

The World of Jack T. Chick

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

An amazing resource to the odd world of Chick collecting. Mr. Fowler has crafted an exhausting, almost overwhelming guide to all of Chick's works and articles about him. Everything is cross-referenced to the point of where the reader is nearly overwhelmed with information. Minute details of publishing histories and changes to individual tracts are documented down to the smallest letter. The book (presented in a distinctive computer printout style, possibly due to its origins as a self-published work) is packed with charts of pricing info and catalog numbers. But even casual Chick fans will enjoy the "History of the World" segment, which ties all of Jack's wild theories into a cohesive narrative, and a segment devoted entirely to fun trivia (there's a list of every instance of the term "haw" for instance). Each tract and comic is described, and info is given on various parodies and rip-offs. This is a must for all Chick fans (both "saved" and otherwise)!

I grew up in an evangelical Christian home, so I remember reading my fair share of Chick tracts as a kid, but it wasn't until later in life that I discovered just how disturbing these tracts, as well as their rabidly anti-Catholic comic counterparts were. Mostly I remembered that each one had more violence, demons and grim reapers than any of the mainstream comics or rock albums my parents worked so hard to keep from me. Further research of these tracts and their enigmatic creator Jack Chick led me to Robert Fowler's World of Chick.

This exhaustively researched, painstakingly detailed tome gathers a wealth of information on the personal history and published works of Jack Chick, cataloguing individual tracts and comics, as well as any subsequent revisions, and presents a history of the universe, as interpreted from Chick's works. It's insightful, funny, and is an invaluable resource for anyone fascinated by Chick and his unique brand of whackmobile fundamentalism with a super-sized side of paranoia! Or at least it would be if it weren't so godawfully hard on the eyes.

To be blunt, the interior of the book looks like the product of an aging typewriter and photocopier. I realize it was a self-published project, but given the availability of software like Microsoft Word, there's really no excuse for producing something this hard on the eyes. The total lack of graphics and artwork (it includes reproductions of the back covers, but no front covers or interior artwork - at all - was also disappointing. A well placed picture would have broken up some of the tedious text pages, and presenting the cover and a few interior panels of each tract discussed in the book would have been a great asset. Compared to Daniel Raeburn's illustration-rich analysis of all things Chick in his indy comic The Imp, this book comes across as woefully inferior.

This was obviously a labor of love for the author, and I'm in awe of the amount of research that went into this book, but ultimately the poor presentation proved too difficult to look past, so the best I can rate The World of Chick is 3 stars. I loved the content, but reading it ended up feeling way too much like work. Hopefully future revisions will be better presented.

This is a phenomenal reference guide to the bizarre world of Jack T. Chick. Anything you could ever want to know about Chick, his writings, and his critics is collected in one volume. Here his evangelical comix are coded, sorted, analyzed, reviewed, and placed in context within the Chick canon. The obvious dedication and love put into this book is incredible. Equally obvious is the enjoyment, fascination, and obsessiveness of the author.

The only way this book could be improved would be to spruce up the table of contents (page numbers would be helpful), make the section headings more obvious, and provide a key for the code (maybe it's there and I just haven't found it). But those are pretty minor flaws in an overall great work.

I am a fan of JTC's comics and was amazed at the encyclopedic extent to which this book goes into his work. The referencing system is complex and takes getting used to, but it permits a great deal of rich data to be catalogued and accounted for concisely. Indispensible for the JTC fan.

This *book* is much better than the internet sites that cover some of the same material. Robert Fowler's "The World of Chick?" is a work of devotion and love for a uniquely American genre that deserves to be catalogued by scholars of Americana.

For those who collect Chick Tracts and ancillary Chick art works this reference is indispensable.

Just so you know, this book does not have an illustration of the cover page any actual Chick leaflet. When this says "self-published" it's not kidding. The book is a wide paperbook style but the pages are laid out two columns each and look as if a regular format book was coverted to be a trendy cartoon portfolio size. The font and style make it look like it was written on an old Commodore VIC-20.

With that being said, the book is filled with information. It is, in effect, a catalog of Chick tracts and it is the most thorough one I am aware of as of this writing. It is just rather annoying that you are having the content DESCRIBED to you rather than SHOWN to you. In the back there is a collection of back covers of the tracts, to which I have to say "HUH?!" You can print the backs but not the fronts of leaflets?

As widely-distributed as these things are you would think there would be a better book on them.

In reading the reviews of "The World of Chick?" most reviewers don't seem to understand that Chick DOES represent a fairly mainline belief structure in the U.S.

Jack Chick is just reflecting standard theology (fundamentalist theology) in his tracts, and by and large, Christian fundamentalists in the U.S. buy all this stuff without flinching. In fact, the whole "Bible Belt" generally believe the following examples -- all of them straight from Chick's tracts: A) Religions that don't accept salvation through grace alone are not "Christian" / save (thus, Mormoms and Catholics are going to hell), B) Salvation -- even at the last minute -- is enough to get into heaven, and C) God doesn't judge on the basis of skin color at all -- but instead, on the basis of one's own belief in a righteous god and a saving Christ on the cross.

I should know, I was raised as one of these fundamentalists. And you know, they're not bad people. Just people who are firmly convinced that they've found the secrets of the universe in the Bible, and that the world needs to learn these secrets as well in order to be saved from a certain doom. (Which, of course, is exactly what Jack Chick's tracts so effectively communicate!)

Jack T. Chick is a very strange and well-meaning but offensive man who for the past 50 years has been distributing "religious" tracts in the form of small comic books about how everyone is damned to go to Hell unless they have the exact same beliefs and lifestyle he has. According to him, not even Catholics who supposedly believe in Jesus are safe from the Lake of Fire since in his opinion Catholicism is a false religion with the Pope conspiring to damn as much of the population as possible. Ironically, I believe many (perhaps the majority) of Chick's biggest fans are those he numbers among "the damned", namely people who are only interested in his works solely as humourous kitsch or sources of insight into a strange paranoid mind, not to mention those who collected his works because for a while they were the most violent and sexually exploitative comics around (not to mention some of the best drawn and written). But Chick doesn't care: in his mind, he has done his duty to attempt "saving" others by distributing his rants.

Fowler has, in this book, created the ultimate reference to Chick's works. Included are guides to identifying and purchasing different printings of Chick tracts and comics, synopses of every tract Chick ever published, even outlines of the slight variations between different versions of each tract (e.g. changes in dialogue made to reflect changes in culture or Chick's increasingly open hostility to Catholics). Also included is a paranoid History of the World According to Jack Chick pieced together from all of his tracts (including how the Catholic church supposedly created Islam as a means of destroying the Jews), interesting quotations, a list and synopses of parodies (by Dan Clowes, etc) and articles and books written about Chick, a biography of the secretive Chick pieced together from various sources, a history of his publishing company, etc. And, although Fowler is rightfully critical of Chick and his perverse world view, he is balanced, noting, for example, that Chick also has his good moments, e.g., his enlightened attitude towards racial minorities.

Also included in the edition I own was an envelope containing 5 actual Chick tracts, including one that is horrifyingly homophobic, one that is both extremely violent and moving (illustrating both how exploitative his comics actually are and the very real concern he could show for the world's victims), and a couple outlining his strange philosophy of salvation (i.e., it doesn't matter how much good or bad you do during your life: as long as you "accept Jesus as your saviour" during the last nanosecond of your life (so long as it is not through a "false religion" like Catholicism or Mormonism) you will be accepted into Heaven instead of cast into the Lake of Fire). Also included is the Zulu version of one of the last two tracts mentioned above illustrating how some foreign editions are tailored towards the culture they are targeting as well as Chick's enlightened attitude towards minorities (e.g., portraying angels as black). But be warned: apparently the availability of these bonus tracts is on a first come first serve basis and you won't receive any of the 5 when the publisher runs out of its own supply (however, they can be obtained cheaply directly from Chick's company).

This book is highly recommended to any Chick fan, new or old, who doesn't take his work seriously (I'd be sad to find anyone who does). Those who already own Dan Raeburn's issue of The Imp focusing on Chick should also get this book, which is more accurate and detailed and focuses more on the works instead of on speculatively analyzing Chick's psyche.

I came here trying to see if Chick Publications offered their tracts here. I just wanted to say why purchase this book when the information you are looking for is provided "free" on Chick Publications website. It has Mr Chicks bio and all the tracts and comics for viewing...again... for free.

It is necessary that all serious collectors of Chick Tracts buy this book. Everything you need to know (and much more) concerning the history and printing of Mr. Chick's tracts is here. Read the editorial review and the other customer reviews for more information on this book.

That said, it is even more necessary (a matter of life and death) for collectors (and anyone else who reads a Chick Tract) to realize and act on the FACT that Mr. Chick's "views" are absolute truths and that there is no salvation possible for anyone who does not accept Jesus Christ as his (or her) personal savior. There is no other name by which you may be saved but that of Jesus Christ through faith (NOT through good works).

It is love alone which compels so-called fundamentalists like Mr. Chick to speak as he does; love for sinners and lost souls. One reviewer refers to Mr. Fowler's dedication and love in preparing this book. I thank God for Mr. Chick's dedication and love in preparing his tracts so that souls may be saved.

Laugh at me, be angry with me, call me a bigot and much worse. Good people,I write this review not for myself but for you.