Tonight, A Night with The New Yorker!

One last reminder!

Ever wondered about all the art that doesn't quite make it into (or onto) The New Yorker? This Saturday, June 30, at 6pm, two excellent artists affiliated with that illustrious publication will join us in store to reveal both cover art and cartoons that were deemed too shocking, naughty, dark, or just plain dumb to be published. Barry Blitt and Matthew Diffee will be signing copies of two hilarious books that assemble these renegade cartoons and cover art pieces, The Best of the Rejection Collection: 293 cartoons that were too dumb, too dark, or too naughty for The New Yorker, and Blown Covers: New Yorker covers you were never meant to see.

For more on this event, check out this helpful post, written up by Julia!  Also please note that Anita Kunz will no longer be able to attend this event. Apologies to all of you who were excited to see her. We'll have a selection of her work available for purchase.

We hope to see you tonight!

  

Montreal's Cartoonfest! Librairie D+Q hosts New Yorker contributors Matt Diffee and Barry Blitt!

Maybe you already know about our totally rad event hosting Barry Blitt and Matt Diffee, New Yorker contributors extraordinaire. But did you know that they're here in large part thanks to a convention of editorial cartoonists happening this weekend? This weekend Montreal is hosting the ACEC (Association of Canadian Editorial Cartoonists)'s 2012 Convention, Cartoonfest. We've gotten ourselves all wrapped up in this awesome weekend. Below I only list a few of the events, but be sure to explore their site for more fun.

Tomorrow from 10 am to noon, there will be a feature chat at the McCord Museum with presentations by Jaleen Grove, Chris Oliveros, Pascal Girard, Wes Tyrell, and Michel Choquette. (Psst, the museum has an exhibit on editorial cartooning right now!)

Jaleen Grove is a historian of Canadian and American illustration. Her talk, "The Other Art History," focuses on the importance work from the past can have for later generations of artists. She'll also speak about the relationship between cartooning and illustration.

D+Q founder and publisher Chris Oliveros will be presenting about the history and future of Drawn & Quarterly. He'll be highlighting some of our most exciting recent and forthcoming titles. Then the delightful Pascal Girard will speak about his award-winning books and his work as a graphic storyteller.

Toronto cartoonist, illustrator, and designer Wes Tyrell will speak about his forthcoming graphic novel, Fidel and I, which will detail his experiences living in Cuba during the eighties and nineties. Michel Choquette will close off the event with a bilingual presentation on his book The Someday Funnies, a collection of comics which represent the zeitgeist of the 1960s, with work from such wide-ranging luminaries as Jack Kirby, Frank Zappa, and Federico Fellini.

THEN, at 6 pm, we are delighted to host a duo of New Yorker contributors at the Librairie D+Q. Check it!

New York-based artists Barry Blitt and Matthew Diffee will be giving presentations on their work and their experiences contributing to (and being rejected by) the New Yorker, as cover artists and cartoonists respectively. Unfortunately, Anita Kunz will no longer be attending or presenting at this event. We will have copies of her books available for sale.

The evening will be hosted by Terry Mosher (also known as Montreal Gazette editorial cartoonist Aislin). The talks will be followed by a signing session, with Blitt signing Blown Covers: New Yorker cover you were never meant to see and Diffee signing The Best of the Rejection Collection: 293 cartoons that were too dumb, too dark, or too naughty for the New Yorker. That's at 6 pm tomorrow night, Saturday June 30th, at the Librairie D+Q, 211 Bernard O.

Tonight! Launch for THREE Colosse/Export books!

The folks at Montreal-based Colosse have been making beautiful books in French since 2002. Now they're also making equally lovely books in English! Join us at the store on Thursday, June 28, at 7pm to celebrate the launch of three books in the Colosse/Export English-language collection: Pinkerton (Alexandre Fontaine Rousseau and François Samson Dunlop), In Situ (Sophie Yanow), and Melanies (David Turgeon).

For more details about the event, and these books + Colosse, read my summary here (with pictures!).

We hope to see you here this evening!

A Hologram for the King

At this point, I figure you are either paying attention to Dave Eggers or you've specifically chosen to NOT pay attention to him. That's fine, to each his own. Frankly, I'm always interested in anything he does because he has such a great restless intellectual spirit and that's one of my favorite characteristics of any great artist. Not content to be an influential graphic designer, enfant terrible experimental writer, non-fiction documentarian, script writer, etc, etc, this time Eggers' returns with a stripped-down, desert-sparse, quietly-funny Novel. A novel novel. Alan Clay is a middle-aged man in decline making a last ditch effort to save his financial well-being. As a result, he ends up consulting for an IT firm seeking a meeting with a Saudi King who may or may not materialize. Eggers' style is fluid and bracing--Clay reflects on his past while trying to make a future. We see Clay's ties to prosperity brought on by industrialization and his complicity in a society that seeks to maximize short-term profits at the expense of its own long-term prosperity. Of course, the secret to what makes this book work is Eggers' attention to detail and his sense of humor.

If we weren't already certain, A Hologram for the King is another major work by a major American writer.

In stock and at 20% off!

Kinfolk Volume Four

Newest issue of a the much-requested Kinfolk Magazine in stock and ready for your perusal and eventual purchase!

Stalking the Stalker: Geoff Dyer delves into Tarkovsky's mysterious film, illuminates dark corners

I'm largely unexcited by director commentary versions of films released specially on DVD bonus discs, or new BluRay versions, or what have you. I tend to think that whatever the director had to say in the film should be in the film, rather than voiced over it at a later date (often begrudgingly, I imagine - Joss Wheadon sings of this with great pathos). For the most part, I prefer to watch movies commentary-free, often even companion-free, so that I can (I like to think) sink more completely into the "cinematic experience", draw my own conclusions, etc. However, I am all for post-viewing internet-trawling for dissections of the plot, character analyses, symbolic hypotheses, "but what did it MEAN"-type posts and write-ups. What was up with the exploding humanoid in the first scene of Prometheus? Was the roaring gale in The Turin Horse just an especially heady wind, or was it actually the Coming of the Apocalypse? And the Room in Stalker: Is it real? Is it just LSD? Is it about the Gulags? Is it about knapsacks? Did anyone else think that the scene with the telephone was surprisingly and entirely hilarious?

Reading Geoff Dyer's Zona: A Book About A Film About A Journey To A Room is kind of like losing myself in an especially fruitful post-viewing internet hunt, but way better, and with a wealth of entertaining and informative digressions, involving both personal memories and connections to Stalker, and film/book-nerd-satisfying references and links to other films, books and artists. I rarely enjoy 3-page long footnotes with such glee. Dyer actually takes you through Tarkovsky's 1979 film, scene by scene (at times shot by shot), which sounds like it could be the most boring and useless exercise ever - but somehow it isn't. He deftly picks out complex questions, fleeting revelations, and lasting impressions from the great Russian director's magnificent and confusing work, and illuminates them in ways that, while perhaps not universal, are relatable and often delightfully funny.

Dyer sums up his attitude towards writing this sort of book thus:
"...if mankind was put on earth to create works of art, then other people were put on earth to comment on those works, to say what they think of them. Not to judge objectively or critically assess these works but to articulate their feelings about them with as much precision as possible, without seeking to disguise the vagaries of their nature, their lapses of taste and the contingency of their own experiences, even if those feelings are of confusion, uncertainty or - in this case - undiminished wonder." (p. 151)

This undiminished wonder comes through strongly, and has the added effect of making me want to see Stalker again (and probably again after that). Does anyone have a projector and a dark room?

Note: I'm not sure how the experience of reading Zona without having first seen Stalker would be. It might make you want to see the film? It might make you never want to see the film? It might make you want to go to sleep? The best thing to do in such a circumstance, undoubtedly, is to doubly entertain yourself by first watching Stalker and then reading this book! It can only do you good.

Joe Sacco x 2

The world of comics has been on a roll lately, releasing one exciting title after the other. In case my “to read” pile wasn’t stacked high enough, two more titles just got added to the list, courtesy of the great graphic journalist Joe Sacco.

First is JOURNALISM, a collection of Sacco’s freelance pieces that span the globe, with stories from Malta, India, Bosnia, and the Gaza strip. Also included are new works that are sure to gain some media attention, where the author investigates the war in Iraq and the grim reality of detainee torture. While Sacco’s stories aren’t for the faint of heart, the author’s refusal to shy away from injustice and violence is precisely what makes him one of the most important cartoonist and international correspondent of our time. 

 Am I seeing right... Joe Sacco in COLOUR?!?!

 
Next is Joe Sacco's DAYS OF DESTRUCTION, DAYS OF REVOLT, a work produced in collaboration with foreign correspondent and Pulitzer Prize winner Chris Hedges. The book focuses on the impact of big corporations on the American landscape, where the exploitation of individuals and the environment is falsely carried out in the name of profit and progress. This marks an interesting shift for Sacco, who usually concentrates on foreign affairs.

 

A New Book by Eileen Myles

Since her visit in 2010 for the launch of her novel Inferno, the staff here has been smitten by Eileen Myles. She is a captivating, smart and fearless voice, and writer Denis Cooper adds a bunch more adjectives to the list: "honest, jokey, paranoid, sentimental, mean, lyrical, tough, you name it."

Her new collection of poetry, Snowflake / different streets is a two-in-one-kind-of-a-deal: Snowflake collects new poems, while different streets collects "newer" poems.

Myles is not afraid of life, and her writing transmits just that, life and will on the road, in lonesome reflections, in bed, everywhere, basically. The poems in these two books are noticeably tall, from far they can look like shopping lists. I'm sure even her shopping lists deserve a book. Here's an excerpt:

Eileen

yes Ernie

why can you

have junk

food & I 

cannot. Why can 

you have a

giant plate

of pasta 

and I can 

no longer have 

my crunchy
treats Why 

am I served 

up a cold

fish plate. 

you're not 

so thin 

Eileen

I know.

We're always stocking as much of her books as possible, that includes Cool for You (I die for this cover), The Importance of Being Iceland, Not Me and the excellent anthology The New Fuck You, which she co-edited.

Mmmmm....CAKE

Check out the awesome loot of goodies that Jessica brought back from her recent trip to Chicago for the alternative comics festival CAKE! 

Let's begin with some great zines courtesy of Domino Books! On the left is Molly Colleen's DIFFICULT LOVES, and next to it is FACE MAN, by the super cool former D&Q intern Clara Bessijelle.

Yippy! We just got WEATHER, a new zine from one of my favorite cartoonists, Gabby Schulz (aka Ken Dahl). In the center is the beautifully hand bound LOLLYGAG, a great collection of doodles from over twenty artists, including Dan Zettwoch, Dylan Horrocks, Lille Carre, Tom Gauld, and Vanessa Davis. And back by popular demand is THICKNESS #1, the ultimate collection of adult comics featuring Katie Skelly, Jonny Negron, Zejian Shen, Derek Ballard, and True Chubbo.

Last but not least, a whole lotta Chuck Forsman, Melissa Mendes, and Dane Martin. Get your volumes of THE END OF THE FUCKING WORLD (# 1-7), LOU (# 1-4), and GAGGER today!

Staff Picks Mid-June 2012

Please allow me to introduce you to our brand spanking new bi-weekly feature on the Librairie D+Q blog: Staff picks! Each of us here at the Librairie will share with you books we are eager to devour or our favourite reads of the moment.

Let's waste no time:

Julien

Space Ducks: An Infinite Book Of Musical Greatness  

by Daniel Johnston 

We just received singer/songwriter/comic artist Daniel Johnston's latest book! Space Ducks: An Infinite Book Of Musical Greatness is this over-the-top-goofy, daring and visceral work of art about space ducks fighting demons all over the place. Johnston's style is crazy eye-popping as ever, and his narrative the perfect meeting point between a child's wild imagination and an adult's perspective on the dark things in life. 

Blue Nights

by Joan Didion

And now that it's out in paperback you have no excuse: read Joan Didion's Blue Nights! One of my favourite books of 2011, it is poignant, elegantly incisive and unapologetically real. It is so beautifully and precisely written, and the truths it brings to light are so sharp and infinite, you will weep.

Jason

 

How Should A Person Be?
by Sheila Heti

Lena Dunham, creator of the much-talked-about HBO series Girls recently named Heti's How Should A Person Be? as her 2012 summer-read. For those us anxiously awaiting season two of Dunham's show, a newly-arrived paperbook edition of Heti's 2010 similarly-themed and superb meta-novel will be just the thing we need to tide us over. (Also recommended: Middle Stories Heti's debut short story collection, also recently reprinted).

The Best American Noir of the Century
edited by James Ellroy and Otto Penzler

I've been thinking lately that this may very well be the only book I'll ever really need.

Stories from Charles Beaumont, Patricia Highsmith, Jim Thompson, Mickey Spillane, Chris Adrian, David Goodis, Harlan Ellison, Lawrence Block and helluva bunch more and edited by two guys who know their Noir. Includes Tod Robbin's dark and deranged short story, Spurs (the story Tod Browning's 1932 film Freaks was based on).

Chantale

Leaving the Atocha Station
by Ben Lerner

I just finished this book in May and it stealthily became a book that I will continually look back upon fondly. The first novel by poet Ben Lerner, Leaving the Atocha Station is about language and displacement. It is about those sensations you get when you are suddenly in an environment where few speak your mother tongue and you only grasp suggestions of conversations. Lerner explores those events that slowly shift our position from outsider to insider. Summary: It's great.

(psst, we also recently got in two of his superb poetry books...)

Julia

Fortress of Solitude
by Jonathan Lethem

Some books, when you read them, declaim to you that they are the author's story. We just have to be thankful that Jonathan Lethem's story takes place in an incredibly rich moment in Brooklyn and America's story, and that it happened to be soaked in graffiti, art, comics, and punk cultures. Far and away my favourite thing of Lethem's. The relationship between Dylan and Mingus feels heart-breakingly real.

Helen

Believing Is Seeing (Observations on the Mysteries of Photography)
by Errol Morris

I first fell for Errol Morris when I learned that he had famously incited Werner Herzog to eat his own shoe (it was cooked, granted, but still) by successfully making and releasing a documentary about the pet cemetery business (Gates of Heaven, 1979). He turned the seemingly ho-hum realities of burying domesticated animals into a truly engrossing full-length feature; he is no less adept at uncovering the complex truths behind a range of (often) well-known documentary photographs. 

In a memorable section, he explores and rejects Susan Sontag's analysis of Roger Fenton's 1855 pair of photographs of a 1) cannonball-strewn and 2) cannonball-free road from the front lines of the Crimean War. It's an absorbing case of "what came first" guesswork, and the rest of the book offers plenty more brainfood for the detail/photography/history oriented.

Jade

Birdseye Bristoe
by Dan Zettwoch

Small-town USA has never looked as nice as in Dan Zettwoch’s debut graphic novel BIRDSEYE BRISTOE. The book recounts the tale of uncle Birdseye, the sole citizen of a small town where a corporate cell phone tower is being built. With a ballpoint pen, colored pencils and whiteout, Zettwoch creates some phenomenal artwork: intricate cross sections of industrial parts, detailed aerial maps, and a gorgeous fold-out that just might make you swoon a little. But don’t let Zettwoch’s bright colors and great sense of humor fool you, this book also contains some strong messages about corporate America that are definitely worth paying attention to.

 

Conquest of the Useless
by Werner Herzog

Surely you're familiar with Bernard Pivot's famous questionnaire (think Actor's Studio or SNL) that ends with the query: ''If Heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the Pearly Gates?'' My answer is: I really don't care what is said; I just want it to be done in the voice of the great Werner Herzog. Unlike other "behind the scenes" film books, Herzog’s CONQUEST OF THE USELESS is the director’s personal journal written during the making of his masterpiece Fitzcarraldo. As if bordering tribe wars, the irrational Klaus Kinski, plane crashes, and the image of Mick Jagger trotting through the jungle in a suit wasn't intense enough, the journal is rendered in a beautiful and hypnotic prose that will have you hooked in no time.

Darth Vader and son

This just in! New book by cat-enthusiast Jeffrey Brown. Apparently, he is also a Star Wars enthusiast.

Basic concept of Darth Vader and son: What if Darth Vader was a dad? Like, what if he was really a dad? Like, a dad dad. Someone who takes lil' Luke trick or treating, or teaches him how to swing a lightsaber like a baseball bat, or feigns delight in the tie lil' Luke got him for his birthday?

The results are delightful.

Upcoming launch for English language Colosse/Export books: Pinkerton, In Situ, and Melanies!

Montreal-based Colosse (www.collectioncolosse.com - check it out, seriously, it is a sight for sore eyes!) has been publishing beautiful, lovingly crafted "ephemeral print runs of experimental comics, essays and sketchbooks from (mostly) Québécois authors", since 2002. Up until now, they've been publishing in French (and we've been carrying many of their titles in the store!); luckily for you English-language readers out there, they have now created the Colosse/Export collection, which is in English!

To celebrate this, and the recent publication of three Colosse/Export books, Pinkerton, In Situ, and Melanies, the Drawn and Quarterly Bookstore is hosting an evening of comics reading on Thursday, June 28m, at 7pm, with the following awesome and talented Colosse artists: Alexandre Fontaine Rousseau and François Samson Dunlop (Pinkerton), Sophie Yanow (In Situ), Julie Delporte (Le dernier kilomètre), David Turgeon (Melanies, Les pièces détachées), and Vincent Giard (Le wagon engourdi, Les pièces détachées).
 

Sophie Yanow's In Situ No. 2 is a continuation of her daily comics, whose earlier incarnations were published as the first ever Colosse/Export title and delved into her experiences as a cartoonist in her hometown of Oakland, and her current location, Montreal, where she was the artist in residence at the Maison de la Bande Dessiné de Montréal in 2011. In the French section of the store, you will find the first In Situ!

David Turgeon's Melanies is a "tiny, tiny tale" in comic form, that is perhaps in the vein of "ancient Czech animated film". What's not to love? David Turgeon lives in Montreal, where he pursues various artistic endeavours, of which comics is only one! He has published several comics with Colosse in addition to Melanies, in both French and English. In the French section of our store, you will find Salon du livre, and a couple of issues of Pièces détachées.

Pinkerton, already a hit in its French edition, is written and drawn with shameless Weezer-nerd hilarity and wit by François Samson Dunlop and Alexandre Fontaine Rousseau. It is "an indie-rock rom-com", described in the French edition as being "hardly emo" - "more Pavement than Death Cab, more Clerks than Singles". The protagonists dissect Weezer's seminal album by going methodically through each track, one by one, through the lens of their own love(lorn) lives. Subtitle: How I Learned To Stop Worrying and Love Pop Music. A worthy goal, to be sure.

All this and more next Thursday evening! Hope to see you there!

Kate Beaton's Cover for The Walrus!

And the July/August issue of The Walrus doesn't just have that to recommend it. There's also a new story from Heather O'Neill (Lullabies for Little Criminals) and poetry from David McGimpsey (Li'l Bastard). Librairie D&Q favorites, both!

Co-mix, Art Spiegelman : a retrospective of comics, graphics, and scraps

Published on the occasion of the recent travelling Spiegelman retrospective, this bilingual (French and English) artbook/catalogue is a must-read for any fan of the legendary artist!

Full of rare illustrations, preparatory sketches and original artwork, this beautifully made book offers a complete and meticulous look at Spiegelman's entire body of work - from the critically-acclaimed and game-changing graphic novel Maus and RAW Magazine, to his work as an illustrator, underground artist, editor and bubblegum trading cards designer.

The exhibition left the Centre Pompidou this May, and it will be up at the Ludwig Museum in Cologne this fall, after which it will be heading for Vancouver and New York in 2013.

Ai Weiwei Speaks

Perhaps you've heard of Ai Weiwei. Openly critical of the Chinese government, he was arrested in 2011 for "tax evasion," causing international appeals for his release. There is a new documentary about him, Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry, which won the Special Jury Prize at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival. Contemporary Chinese artist, architect, curator, publisher, poet, urbanist, and all-around shit disturber, Ai Weiwei is a pertinent figure in our current political and cultural landscape. 


As the title suggests, Ai Weiwei Speaks with Hans Ulrich Obrist is a small book of interviews conducted over the years between Ai Weiwei and Hans Ulrich Obrist (mega-curator and professional artist interviewer). 


Here's a (random) sample of what is to be found in this treasure chest:
"In 2003 I agreed to teach in Tsinghua Art University in China. You know I hate school, so I told the University that and said I can teach but we have to do the teaching in a bus, so we rented a bus. We divided the Beijing map into sixteen parts, and each day the bus would go through all the streets, so one day the bus went through one part, the next day through the next part, but after sixteen - about 150 hours - we had really been through all the streets of Beijing. We had a video camera mounted in front of the bus to take the whole long video, lasting about six days and nights, and it tells the story of what Beijing would look like in this line. Of course, before and after we made the video, the city was always changing; we couldn't even find the same road again, it was being destroyed or rebuilt."

L'ostie d'chat - Tome 3

Le troisième et dernier volume de la série des québecoises Iris et Zviane vient de nous arriver! On y trouve des rebondissements sentimentaux en masse, sur fond de likes facebook, de band-drama et de beaucoup de vino sur le plateau.

Ce « blogue-feuilleton » qui porte bien son nom se laisse lire avec le plaisir qu'on a à lire le wall de ses meilleurs amis, surtout ceux qui ont tendance à overshare..

A night with the New Yorker, Saturday June 30th

It's not every day we get a gaggle of New Yorker artists out of the metropolis and into the Librairie. I'm very pleased to announce a most excellent event with Barry Blitt, Matthew Diffee, and Anita Kunz. All three have longstanding relationships with the venerable publication and all three will be in our shop, signing copies of their hilarious books: Blown Covers and The Best of the Rejection Collection.

The Best of the Rejection Collection: 293 cartoons that were too dumb, too dark, or too naughty for The New Yorker is, well, pretty much what you'd guess. But so much more!

From the back cover: "It’s the best of the worst: 293 of the funniest cartoons rejected by The New Yorker but luckily for us, now in paperback and available to enjoy. The Rejection Collection brings together some of The New Yorker’s brightest talents—Roz Chast, Gahan Wilson, Sam Gross, Jack Zeigler, David Sipress, and more—and reveals their other side. Their dark side. Their juvenile side. Their sick side. Their naughty side. Their outrageous side."

Blown Covers: New Yorker covers you were never meant to see was edited by Francoise Mouly, and it's an equally fearsome collection:

"Françoise Mouly takes us behind the scenes at the New Yorker and reveals how the magazine creates its signature covers commenting on the most urgent political and cultural events of the day. She shows the shocking and hilarious sketches that didn’t make the cut and explains how these are essential stages in the evolution of a cover that stands the test of time but retains its edge. Her book captures contemporary history—from the farce of Monica Lewinsky to the adventures of Michelle and Barack to nuclear meltdown in Japan—in images that are as acute as they are outrageous. More than that, it shows how the magazine that exemplifies journalistic excellence in America also dares to cultivate a sense of humor when grappling with complex moral and political issues."

We are indeed honoured to have three such unique talents in store, and even more honoured to have them talking about their work. This will be a very fun (and funny!) night, and it all takes place Saturday June 30th at 6 pm at the Librairie D+Q (211 Bernard O.)

The Bike Owner's Handbook

Here's a cool new addition to our ever-expanding bike section. Written by Peter Drinkell and illustrated by Peter Smith, this beautifully designed handbook will guide you through the basics of repairing and maintaining your bike in a way that's informative and very detailled without getting too technical.

A notable plus is the addition of a QR code at the end of each chapter that, when scanned with a smartphone, will link the reader to a short film demonstrating the tasks described.

This might be the best, most convenient and prettiest book of its kind.

New Anorak!

Always cause for celebration, the newest Anorak magazine has arrived!

And it's their "Sports issue"!

Fear not though, there's plenty of other stuff inside besides sports.

Short stories, all beautifully illustrated...

...and life questions that aren't just for kids!