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Comics Draw Attention To Literature

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By RONNIE BLAIR

The Tampa Tribune

Published: March 30, 2008

LAND O' LAKES - David Alexander sometimes took a literary shortcut in the 1950s when he faced the dreary chore of reading a classic novel for a school assignment.

Instead of slogging through hundreds of pages of dull type, Alexander snatched up the Classics Illustrated version, which gave all the finer points of the story in comic book form.

"Don't tell my teachers," an unrepentant Alexander said, five decades removed from his academic misdemeanor.

From 1941 to 1971, Classics Illustrated allowed sneaky schoolchildren to breeze through "Moby Dick," "The Hunchback of Notre Dame," "A Tale of Two Cities," "White Fang," "All Quiet on the Western Front" and more than 160 other great works of literature.

Classics Illustrated, the brainchild of Russian immigrant Albert Kanter, was a brilliant mixing of literary sensibilities with the inviting format of a comic book, the preferred reading material for many young people of the era.

"I thought they were quite good as far as giving you the feel of the real book," said Alexander, a Tampa comic books dealer. "At least from the point of view of a 12- or 14-year-old, they did a good job."

The books are making a comeback.

Jack Lake Productions in Canada is reprinting the original Classics Illustrated volumes. Among the company's first efforts are "The Three Musketeers" by Alexandre Dumas and "The War of the Worlds" by H.G. Wells.

Jaak Jarve, president of Jack Lake Productions, read Classics Illustrated comics while growing up on a farm in the 1960s.

Five years ago, his company began reprinting Classics Illustrated Junior, a variant of Classics Illustrated that the original publisher aimed at a younger readership. The Junior titles included "Pinocchio," "Johnny Appleseed" and "The Ugly Duckling."

The original artwork for Classics Illustrated Junior no longer existed, so each panel had to be redrawn by hand, Jarve said. With the original Classics Illustrated, that's not a problem, and the art can be scanned for publication, he said.

Jarve said he is finding that interest in Classics Illustrated is international, with many Greeks among the first to put in orders. Information about reproductions can be found at jacklakeproductions.com.

Customers include grandparents on a nostalgia kick who buy the comics for themselves and their grandchildren. Some schools and home schooling groups also order the Jack Lake reprints, he said.

"Now that schools have admitted comics do help kids with learning, they are finding any type of literature helps children read," Jarve said.

That has not always been the prevailing view. Comic books, even Classics Illustrated, were once sneered at by some adults as wasted time. During the heyday for Classics Illustrated, some parents wouldn't let children read them, insisting the youngsters stick to the books, he said.

That view may have developed from a misunderstanding about the books' purpose, Jarve said. Kanter didn't create them as a stand-in for the real thing.

"They were meant as an introduction to the classics, not as an end-all," Jarve said.

The comic books usually included a suggestion that the reader hustle to the library and check out the real book. Most titles also included a short biography of the author behind the classic.

At The Creation

Kanter developed the idea of Classics Illustrated after the company he worked for, Elliott Publishing Co., began issuing repackaged pairs of remaindered comic books, according to a Classics Illustrated history on the Jack Lake Productions Web site.

Kanter decided to use the popular medium to introduce young people to great literature, and in 1941, he launched his new line, calling it Classic Comics. Issue No. 1 was "The Three Musketeers."

In 1947, Kanter changed the name from Classic Comics to Classics Illustrated. Eventually, in addition to the Classics Illustrated Junior series that ran from 1953 to 1971, Kanter published two other offshoots: Classics Illustrated Special Issues and The World Around Us.

Classics Illustrated was different from other comic books in a key way that later proved troublesome for comic book collectors. Specific issues of other comic book series, such as World's Finest or the Flash, would appear for a month, then disappear to be replaced by the next issue in the series. Classics Illustrated titles were reprinted numerous times, so children in 1948, 1958 or 1968 all could find new copies of "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" or "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court" at the corner drugstore.

The result for collectors of the original series, though, is a convoluted system for pricing in the Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide as devotees try to differentiate a 1940s "Huckleberry Finn" edition from a 1960s reprint.

"There are such a wide range of values because so many were reprinted," said Alexander, who is one of the advisers for the price guide. "The hard-core collectors want the first editions. Some people collect all the editions. There were, I think, 169 originals, and with the number of reprints and different covers, there are over 1,000 to 1,500 to collect if they tried to collect everything."

Fan Publications

Alexander, who does most of his business by Internet, offers a number of the vintage Classics Illustrated editions for sale at cultureandthrills.com.

As the series went out of print after 1971, a fan base emerged and a couple of publications devoted to Classics Illustrated appeared. The Classics Collectors Club published a newsletter in the 1970s. Later, another fan publication, Classics Journal, came out.

In his youth, Alexander had his favorites. He recalled a particular fondness for Classics Illustrated No. 21, which was called "Famous Mysteries" and featured three stories: "The Sign of the Four," featuring Sherlock Holmes; "The Murders in the Rue Morgue," by Edgar Allan Poe; and "The Flayed Hand," by Guy De Maupassant.

For three decades, Classics Illustrated continued to add new titles and revise art and covers for old ones as the company introduced young people to "How I Found Livingstone," by Henry M. Stanley; "From the Earth to the Moon," by Jules Verne; "Gulliver's Travels," by Jonathan Swift; and other familiar titles.

By 1971, competing with Spider-Man and Batman for young readers' attention and for space on the comic book rack became too difficult, and Classics Illustrated quietly faded away.

Reporter Ronnie Blair can be reached at (813) 948-4218 or rblair@tampatrib.com.

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