The Graphic Canon, Vol. 1: From Gilgamesh to Dangerous Liaisons, Kick Russ

Volume 1 takes us on a visual tour from the earliest literature through the end of the 1700s. Along the way, were treated to eye-popping renditions of the human races greatest epics: Gilgamesh, The Iliad, The Odyssey (in watercolors by Gareth Hinds), The Aeneid, Beowulf, and The Arabian Nights, plus later epics The Divine Comedy and The Canterbury Tales (both by legendary illustrator and graphic designer Seymour Chwast), Paradise Lost, and Le Morte DArthur. Two of ancient Greeces greatest plays are adapted--the tragedy Medea by Euripides and Tania Schrags uninhibited rendering of the very bawdy comedy Lysistrata by Aristophanes (the text of which is still censored in many textbooks). Also included is Robert Crumbs rarely-seen adaptation of James Boswells London Journal, filled with philosophical debate and lowbrow debauchery.

Religious literature is well-covered and well-illustrated, with the Books of Daniel and Esther from the Old Testament, Rick Gearys awe-inspiring new rendition of the Book of Revelation from the New Testament, the Tao te Ching, Rumis Sufi poetry, Hinduisms Mahabharata, and the Mayan holy book Popol Vuh, illustrated by Roberta Gregory. The Eastern canon gets its due, with The Tale of Genji (the worlds first novel, done in full-page illustrations reminiscent of Aubrey Beardsley), three poems from Chinas golden age of literature lovingly drawn by pioneering underground comics artist Sharon Rudahl, the Tibetan Book of the Dead, a Japanese Noh play, and other works from Asia.

Two of Shakespeares greatest plays (King Lear and A Midsummer Nights Dream) and two of his sonnets are here, as are Platos Symposium, Gullivers Travels, Candide, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, Renaissance poetry of love and desire, and Don Quixote visualized by the legendary Will Eisner.

Some unexpected twists in this volume include a Native American folktale, an Incan play, Sapphos poetic fragments, bawdy essays by Benjamin Franklin, the love letters of Abelard and Heloise, and the decadent French classic Dangerous Liaisons, as illustrated by Molly
Crabapple.