Krazy Kat

Colin and I sat down for a different type of Inkstuds show. This week was a retrospective on the work of George Herriman. We were joined by comix scholar Jeet Heer as he schooled us on a lot of biographical history of Herriman and some interesting insights to Krazy Kat. To quote the Fantagraphics website,Krazy Kat is a love story, focusing on the relationship of its three main characters. Krazy Kat adored Ignatz Mouse. Ignatz Mouse just tolerated Krazy Kat, except for recurrent onsets of targeting tumescence, which found expression in the fast delivery of bricks to Krazy’s cranium. Offisa Pup loved Krazy and sought to protect “her” (Herriman always maintained that Krazy was genderless), mostly by throwing Ignatz in jail. Each of the characters was ignorant of the other’s true motivations. This simple structure allowed Herriman (1881-1944) to build entire worlds of meaning into the actions, building thematic depth that led critics like Gilbert Seldes and e.e. cummings to recognize Herriman’s genius almost immediately.

It is a very interesting episode on one of comicdoms most underrated and influential masterpieces. Special thanx to Jeet for his vast knowledge on all things Krazy.f

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