introducing comics and ideology - www.personal.psu.edu.pdfVIP

From McAllister, M.P., Sewell, Jr., E. H., Gordon, I. (2001). Comics and Ideology . NY: Peter Lang. ©2001 Peter Lang. Chapter 1 Introducing Comics and Ideology Matthew P. McAllister, Edward H. Sewell, Jr., and Ian Gordon All comics are political. —Alan Moore, comic book writer (quoted in Sabin, 1993, p. 89). In 1895 the Yellow Kid, one of the first regularly appearing comic characters, premiered in Joseph Pulitzer’s newspaper, The New York World. The Kid, an impish, bald child in a yellow nightshirt created by Richard Felton Outcault, lived in a mythical urban environment called Hogan’s Alley , the early title of the comic. Although this strip is often discussed by comic art historians because of the influence it had on later strips, including the promotion and merchandising of popular comics characters and the establishment of the importance of comic strips to the U.S. newspaper industry (Gordon, 1998; Witek, 1999), a modern look at the Yellow Kid is striking not because of how similar it was to later strips, but rather how different it was. Compared with the middle-class orientation of many modern comic strips, the setting of the Yellow Kid’s adventures was dirty, cluttered, and characterized by in-your-face urban poverty. The Yellow Kid and his friends were poor, and many seemed to live on the streets. Their environment was a slum, their clothes were simple, and there was often a look of poverty even in their facial expressions. Although Outcault took heat from his contemporaries who felt that his work celebrated life in the slums (De Haven, 1995), later