Sunday, February 17, 2008

The Early Years of Mutt and Jeff - Bud Fisher (1909)

In this selection of early 20th century comic strips Mutt & Jeff travel all over the world including participating in the Mexican revolution and several encounters at the baseball field. The humor is low-brow vaudeville, but Fisher's artwork is all spindly contrasts.

Unfortunately the book suffers from poor design and editing. Some damaged or dirty strips are understandable due to the age of this material, but the artwork is reprinted too small to read comfortably in many cases. In addition, none of the strips are dated leaving you to wonder if you are reading strips in order or out of order, especially when a continuity sequence of strips is interrupted with a non-sequitur.

A useful 16 page introduction by Allan Holtz gives an overview of Bud Fisher's career and a peek at some rare artwork.

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