Thankfully, this perception has changed. Recently, I have spoken about comics at an official University of Texas event, the Texas Book Festival, and Writers League of Texas Agents Conference. All three events enjoyed enthusiastic and larger-than-expected audiences. During that same period, The New York Times added a graphic novel listing to their prestigious bestseller rankings. That same newspaper and most other book outlets, both print and online, now routinely review comics. Major traditionally prose-only publishers currently produce lines of graphic novels. Most libraries and bookstores feature extensive graphic novel selections.

What caused this attitude shift? For starters Scott McCloud and his marvelous Understanding Comics. Although McCloud created the award-winning series Zot!, his fame remained primarily within the comic book field. Until he introduced the idea that propelled him into the mainstream limelight. In Understanding Comics, McCloud deconstructed the often misunderstood and esoteric universe of graphic storytelling. He explored the medium's long history and its context within contemporary art and literature. Using a non-confrontational and non-threatening manner, McCloud related the entire 216 page book using only sequential art. The genius of relying on comics to explain comics successfully engendered a greater acceptance of the maligned media and created a generation of fans.

From the moment of it's 1993 publication, Understanding Comics created a buzz¹ with McCloud's contemporaries and comic book fans, but little interest outside that narrow slice of pop culture aficionados. All of McCloud's talent and insight might be for naught if not for Gary "Doonesbury" Trudeau's February 13, 1994 The New York Times book review "Comics, Stripped," which declared "Mr. McCloud's study ends up winning the very respectability that has always been denied his subject." When The New York Times offers proclamations like that, the literary establishment tends to notice. The word was out and most major newspapers covered the phenomenal book.

To be fair, several comics established bookstores and even literary inroads before 1994. DC scored a financial success in 1991 with The Sandman: The Doll's House, the first collection of Neil Gaiman's popular series. Maus, Art Spiegleman's Pulitzer Prize-winning anthropomorphic account of his father's experiences in Auschwitz, was long a bookstore staple and a critical darling. The first volume (1991) of Larry Gonick's The Cartoon History of the Universe proved very successful. But these were the exceptions and most stores struggled with graphic novel sales. Only a small segment of the booksellers read or even respected them.

Then manga exploded into the American consciousness.

To be continued in thirty days...

¹ Understanding Comics (along with other factors) influenced the decision to start Mojo Press in late 1993. Publisher Ben Ostrander and I believed there was a burgeoning graphic novel market in the mainstream bookstores. We were off by about a decade.