The Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA) has their nominations for their annual great Graphic Novels for Teen list up. The list of recommended graphic novels and illustrated nonfiction for those ages 12-18 is prepared yearly. A shorter list of recommended titles will be made later in the year, with a Top Ten list released later in the year.

There are over a hundred titles on the list, covering all major genres, from manga and literary to mainstream.

2009’s list can be read here.

A couple of stories spotlighting the matter of graphic novels in libraries– GNs remain among the most popular books to check out, and libraries have been a major force in getting younger readers exposed to comics. But their popularity is not without controversy, as this story shows: Two Kentucky librarians were fired for not allowed a child to check out LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN.

“Residents in Jessamine County do not realize that these books that are so graphic are available in the library let alone to their children,” former Jessamine County librarian, Beth Bovaire, said.

Beth Bovaire worked at Jessamine County Public Library up until a month ago. She and Sharon Cook worked as librarians- the two were fired last month when they say they didn’t allow a child check out a book from the league of extraordinary gentleman series.

“My friend Sharon had brought it to me on Wednesday, and she said ‘look at this book it’s filthy and it’s on hold for an 11 year old girl,’ and I said well okay, lets take it off hold.”

A follow up shows local opinion divided.

§ On the PLUS side, the New Jersey State Library has awarded $3000 grants to 14 libraries to “assist them with establishing and growing graphic novel collections.”

This grant was specifically designed to help smaller libraries in the state with their graphic novel collections.

“We recognize that our smaller libraries face funding challenges when it comes to providing their customers with the variety of products they’d like,” said Norma Blake, New Jersey State librarian. “Although it’s rare for the State Library to fund a core collection like this, we believe it’s important to bring this popular genre to smaller libraries who otherwise couldn’t afford these books.”

As part of the grant, the State Library conducted workshops featuring experts discussing various aspects of graphic novel collection development, and furnished a core graphic novel bibliography for the librarians to use to purchase books for their collections. Workshop panelists were John Cunningham, vice president of marketing for DC Comics, Laverne Mann, librarian with the Mercer County Library, David Inabnitt, librarian with the Brooklyn Public Library, and Sophie Brookover, librarian with Eastern Regional Senior High School, Audubon.

[Both links via Kevin Melrose.]

Award-winning cartoonist Gene Luen Yang (AMERICAN BORN CHINESE) leads a double life: he’s a teacher as well as a ‘toonist. But he puts both skills to use in this edu-comic titled FACTORING WITH MR. YANG AND MOSLEY THE ALIEN, which covers factoring, a basic skill in algebra that involves breaking down numbers into their components.

Confession: We did okay with the first coupla lessons, but when it got to that Trinomial Expression stuff we just quietly went back to playing Wesnoth.

On the plus side, we are now totally up for using expressions like “When you factor that in…” and “Among the many factors affecting this are…” because now we can sound authentic!

Via Lee’s Comics newsletter.

Tonight, I will be moderating what sounds like a dandy event at the Brooklyn Public Library as Ben Katchor, Dan Goldman, and Youme Landowne discuss their work:
Where: Central Library, Dweck Center
When: Thursday, Mar 12 7 PM
Audience: For Adults

The works of graphic novelists Ben Katchor, Dan Goldman, and Youme Landowne, all explore New York City.

There will be slide shows, and a Q&A. Please come on out and support your local cartoonists!

As part of the Winter ALA fest, the list of 2009 Great Graphic Novels for Teens was also released. It’s a wide-ranging sampling, from manga to YA lit and back. The librarians also chose a Top Ten, which doesn’t include all of the creators, sadly, a librarian quirk, but we’ve added them in where we knew it:

Abel, Jessica, Gabe Soria and Warren Pleece. Life Sucks. First Second. 2008. 978-1-59643-107-2. $19.95.

Ashihara, Hinako. Sand Chronicles, v. 1. VIZ. 2008. 978-1-4215-1477-2. $8.99.
—. Sand Chronicles, v. 2. VIZ. 2008. 978-1-4215-1478-9. $8.99.
—. Sand Chronicles, v. 3. VIZ. 2008. 978-1-4215-1479-6. $8.99.

Clevinger, Brian. Atomic Robo: Atomic Robo and the Fightin’ Scientists of Tesladyne. 2008. Red Five Comics. 978-0-9809302-0-7. $18.99.

Inoue, Takehiko. Real, v. 1. VIZ. 2008. 978-4215-1989-0. $12.99.
—. Real, v. 2. VIZ. 2008. 978-1-4215-1990-6. $12.99.

Ito, Junki. Uzumaki, v.1. VIZ. 2007. 978-1-4215-1389-8. $9.99.

Landowne, Youme. Pitch Black. Cinco Puntos Press. 2008. 978-1-9336-9306-4. $14.00.

Steinberger, Aimee Major. Japan Ai: A Tall Girl’s Adventures in Japan. Go Comi. 2007. 978-1-933617-83-1. $16.99.

Tamaki, Mariko and Jillian Tamaki. Skim. Groundwood Books. 2008. 978-0-8889-9753-1. $18.95.

Way, Gerard and Gabriel Bá. Umbrella Academy: Apocalypse Suite. Dark Horse. 2008. 978-1-59307-978-9. $17.95.

Wilson, G. Willow and M.K. Perker. Cairo. Vertigo. 2007. 978-1-4012-1140-0. $24.99.

School LIbrary Journal has released a list of adult books recommended for younger readers:

It was a banner literary year and so SLJ’s Adult Books for High School Students Committee decided on 30 titles, published between September 2007 and November 2008 (with reviews published in 2008), to recognize as the best for high school readers. The list includes realistic and historical novels as well as some genre-blending titles. Biography, history, and books about the environment are well represented. Outstanding graphic novels and nonfiction also appear. The committee members are from public and school libraries across the United States and Canada, working with teens in urban, rural, and suburban settings. We are convinced that these titles will appeal to high school readers and provide a bridge into the vast world of adult publishing.

The graphic novels listed include:

Bourban Island 1730
Lewis Trondheim & Olivier Appollodorus. illus. by Lewis Trondheim. First Second. Tr $17.95. ISBN 978-1-59643-258-1.

What It Is
Lynda Barry. Drawn & Quarterly. Tr $24.95. ISBN 978-1-897299-35-7.

Ronald Reagan, A Graphic Biography.
Andrew Helfer, Steve Buscellato and Joe Staton. Hill and Wang. Tr $16.95. ISBN 978-0-8090-9507-0.

Me and the Devil Blues, 1: The Unreal Life of Robert Johnson
Akira Hiramoto. Del Rey. Tr $19.95. ISBN 978-0-345-49926-4.

Incognegro.
Mat Johnson & Warren Pleese. Vertigo. Tr $19.99. ISBN 978-1-4012-1097-7.

The Museum Vaults: Excerpts from the Journal of an Expert.
Marc-Antoine Mathieu. NBM ComicsLit and the Louvre Museum. Tr $14.95. ISBN 978-1-56163-514-6.

Cairo.
G. Willow Wilson and M.K. Perker. Vertigo. Tr $24.99. ISBN 978-1-4012-1140-0.

A People’s History of American Empire.
Howard Zinn & Paul Buhle. Metropolitan Books/Henry Holt. Tr $30. ISBN 978-0-8050-7779-7.

More in the link. A note: the list has left off a number of artists names, which we’ve added in. We’ll have a word with those SLJ people next time we’re in the office.

§ In Japan, a woman has been arrested for killing her husband. But it was only a MMORPG character that died, and the charge is computer hacking:

A 43 year old woman in Japan has been arrested on suspicion of hacking. She is suspected of ‘mudering’ an avatar of her virtual husband after they apparently divorced in the extremely popular MMORPG Maple Story. The woman allegedly used the login information taken from the virtual ex-husband, a 33 year old officer worker, when they were happily virtually married. If convicted she faces a jail term of 5 years or a fine of $5,000.

§ Meanwhile, in Brooklyn, a high school librarian’s pride over a manga Shakespeare adaptation illustrated by his daughter went too far, when he promoted the book in an unseemly manner: giving away copies for free and slipping a mention into the newsletter he edited.

On Monday, the city’s Conflicts of Interest Board announced it had settled a case it had brought against Mr. Grandt for promoting his daughter’s work. He agreed to pay a $500 fine and admit in a three-page stipulation that he had violated the city ethics code.

Mr. Grandt, who said he was an unwitting villain, was disappointed the board did not see things his way.

“There are so many things going on they could investigate,” he said in an interview, “and they had nothing better to do than allege that my daughter would have gotten 20 cents in royalties if someone bought the book. But nobody did. I gave out free copies. I was just so proud of my daughter for writing it.”

Indeed, if the diligence applied by the Brooklyn library system were applied to, say, the rest of the government, imagine the world we’d live in.

CORRECTION: The PSU collection is NOT, as the headline for this post originally claimed, “The Country’s First University Comic Book Archive,” but one of many great academic comic book libraries, as PSU Librarian Helen Spalding explained in our interview with her. In a rush out of the office, The Beat’s humble intern neglected to change the headline, which has resulted in many varieties of confusion. Apologies all around.

In an partnership formally unveiled last week, Dark Horse Comics‘ entire catalogue is now being shelved at Portland State University. Available for check-out from the PSU library’s general circulating collection will be one copy of everything Dark Horse has ever published: comic book, graphic novel, manga, hardcover and foreign edition, you name it. A second copy of each will be stored in the library’s special collection.

While it’s become increasingly common for libraries to stock graphic novels, the PSU arrangement goes far beyond that in a number of ways. They’re not just shelving books with a spine, but also the floppy “pamphlet” comic books, which have long been archived only in fans’ long-boxes and retailers’ back issue bins. At Portland State, each issue will be given an acid-proof cover and a call number, as well as an extensive catalog listing that will include credits for everyone involved, including letterer and colorist.

The library’s Dark Horse collection will include everything they’ve produced, from books in 24 different languages to Aliens stickers and Hellboy lunch-boxes. The Beat spoke with Portland State University Librarian Helen Spalding, who explained that even a Buffy marquee statue can be useful to academics. “The key rings, action figures, mugs and tee-shirts are all rich research material for examining marketing, gender roles, and many other topics,” she said.

The idea for the collection was sparked a few years back when Spalding saw DHC Publisher and PSU alumnus Mike Richardson speak at a university luncheon. “They’re an important Portland institution, and the University is really engaged with the community and the alumni,” Spalding said, “so it just made a lot of sense that we work together on this important collection to our mutual benefit.

“It’s so important to Mike Richardson that people get to read this stuff just like any other literature that we’re allowed to check out, so he’s provided a copy for us to check out, which is great.”

The library has already shelved 3,000 of an expected 6,000 volumes in their Dark Horse collection, which will continue to grow as the publisher releases new material. This positions PSU as a leading academic archive of comics in North America, and Spalding hopes it will attract other collections as well. Although they likely won’t be seeking the complete corpus of any other publisher, she said that the confluence of independent publishers in Portland make them a good place to start.

Related: The Oregonian interviews Richardson; Portland Monthly looks at the collection; PSU’s alumni mag says “Pow! Zowie! Comics in the Library”.

Posted by Aaron Humphrey

Is this guy the real-life Man With No Name or what?

Two questions inspired by my last post:

1. What are the best candidates for literary superhero comics?

And to turn the tables on my preferred reading material:

2. Are there any manga with literary merit?

While the online manga world continues to fret about whether manga will ever grow up, Chris Butcher spots some evidence in TIME Magazine:

Meanwhile, Time Magazine is running an article on the guilty pleasures of famous authors. #1? Why it’s Pulitzer Prize winner Junot Diaz talking about his love of Naoki Urasawa’s MONSTER:

“Urasawa is a national treasure in Japan, and if you ain’t afraid of picture books, you’ll see why.” - Junot Diaz, Time.com

Maybe there’s some hope that adult manga fiction will cross over into the mainstream after all, eh?

Only if you consider Junot Diaz “Mainstream.” Like, he’s a well-respected author and all but he’s no A-Rod, if you take my meaning.

Our prediction? Japanese literary manga will continue to be a small market for the artistically adventurous, but it will never go away.

Related: Butcher reprints an interview with Taiyo Matsumoto, of TEKKON KINKREET fame.

An English educator who has written government literacy reports recommends comics such as THE BEANO and DANDY as tools to get boys to read, in a desperate bid to catch up with girls, who apparently soak up the books like a hoard of vast omnivorous sponges:

Mr Brown said that Japanese-style Manga comics were particularly popular. “There is a very fine Manga Shakespeare appearing play by play and if Macbeth turns up in this style it will be perfect for 9s to 11s,” he said.

Mr Brown, a retired head teacher, was speaking at the launch of a £5 million government scheme, Primary Boys into Books, to encourage more boys to read. Research shows that boys are ten percentage points behind girls in English at Key Stage 2 at the age of 11. Ministers hope that better reading habits among boys will help close the gender gap.

Via Down the Tubes which has more on the whole topic, and the Kids’ Comics blog.

§ Kristy Valenti has the second part of her Gender and Reading Habits examination up, this time the girls are scrutinized, although more is known of their reading habits in general than comics reading habits specifically:

Additionally, women read more, maintained USA Today while discussing a 2007 poll: “the median figure — with half reading more, half fewer — was nine books for women and five for men [per year]. The figures also indicated that those with college degrees read the most, and people aged 50 and up read more than those who are younger. […] More women than men read every major category of books except for history and biography. Industry experts said that confirms their observation that men tend to prefer non-fiction.” (It doesn’t look like graphic novels were included as a category in that poll.)[3]
Apparently, girls don’t stop reading at a certain age in the same way that boys are said to do: empirically, many of the girls I spoke to at a 2005 manga-and-anime con said they loved to read already, and were supplementing their regular reading with manga[4]. So if women buy more stuff and read more,[5] why aren’t they buying more comics than men?

§ Jennifer de Guzman has her second column up for PW Comics Week and goes shopping at a variety of venues:

I left without buying All-Star Superman and decided to see if I could get a look inside of it at Border’s. No such luck. In the prominent graphic novel section at the local Borders were several shelves dedicated to comics, most of them manga. Scattered around on the floor were several young adolescent boys reading volumes drawn from the ample stock. (Plenty of Naruto here!) It was a bit difficult getting to the nonmanga shelves, since I had to squeeze around these boys, who seemed oblivious to their surroundings. The graphic novels were organized by title rather than author. The superhero comics were lined up neatly, but the “everything else” shelves were a jumble, the many different sizes of the graphic novels making the shelf difficult to scan. I found none of the books I was looking for, but the computer where customers can search for titles informed me that I could special order them.

§ As the “year of the Symposium” continues, PW blogger Barbara Vey reports that graphic novels were even discussed at a soap opera conference:

Next up was Graphic Novels. This was a wonderful insight into the fascinating world of graphic novels, Manga, anime and comic books. GB Tran is an artist who is developing his own graphic novel by writing the story and drawing the illustrations. Alisa Kwitney is an author, Editor, DC comics and is writing a Young Adult story that will be illustrated. [Tricia Narwani] is an associate publisher with Del Rey Books/Random House and she picks what’s to be written. She said Del Rey went from publishing 14 books a year to over 100 a year. A fast growing trend that could mean a whole different market for authors.

School Library Journal is a magazine aimed at…school librarians. It just had a big cover ppackage on graphic novels which you can read online, started with Michelle Gorman’s overview

What a difference a decade makes. After years of fighting for shelf space in libraries and classrooms, graphic novels have finally become an acceptable alternative to their prose-packed counterparts—and kids can’t seem to get enough of them. For that matter, neither can grown-ups. In 2006, U.S. consumers dropped an estimated $330 million on graphic novels and comics, with librarians accounting for about 10 percent, or $33 million, of those purchases.

She also lists 25 core graphic novels for school-age readers. Ther package also include a giant review section, with grade-appropriate ratings and a report on the Graphic Novels Core Collection, a databse which will cost you $205-225, depending on the size of one’s library.

The Big Picture Graphic Novels Core Collection features over 2,000 recommended titles with descriptions, annotations, and cover art for some of the most popular graphic novels published. Through the WilsonWeb interface, subscribers can search the database by author, title, subject, genre, and grade level.

Annotations provide users with a brief description of the content, review excerpts, and any awards that the title has won. Ratings by age appropriateness within the entry are strictly applied, which allows librarians to quickly determine placement within the collection. Additionally, cover art displayed within each search entry can also provide insight regarding suitability.

YALSA, the young adult librarian society, has picked it top grahpic novels of 07:

Abadzis, Nick. Laika. First Second
Carey, Mike. Re-Gifters. DC/Minx
Fleming, Ann Marie. The Magical Life of Long Tack Sam. Penguin Group
Giffen, Keith. Blue Beetle: Shell-shocked. DC Comics
Blue Beetle: Road Trip. DC Comics
Iwahara, Yuji. King of Thorn, vol. 1-2. Tokyopop
Loux, Matthew. Sidescrollers. Oni Press
Mizushiro, Setona. After School Nightmare, vol. 1-5. Go Comi!
Mori, Kaoru. Emma, vol. 1-5. CMX
Sis, Peter. The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain. Farrar, Strauss, Giroux
Tan, Shaun. The Arrival. Arthur A. Levine

We knew it! Barely a week after looking at comics as teaching aids, The New York Times is back with a freaking EDITORIAL saying how great comics are as teaching aids:

The point is not to drop a comic book on a child’s desk and say: “read this.” Rather, the workshops give groups of students the opportunity to collaborate on often complex stories and characters that they then revise, publish and share with others in their communities.

Teachers are finding it easier to teach writing, grammar and punctuation with material that students are fully invested in. And it turns out that comic books have other built-in advantages. The pairing of visual and written plotlines that they rely on appear to be especially helpful to struggling readers. No one is suggesting that comic books should substitute for traditional books or for standard reading and composition lessons. Teachers who would once have dismissed comics out of hand are learning to exploit a genre that clearly has a powerful hold on young minds. They are using what works.

Is this some kind of new obsession at the comics-loving New York Times. See also these letters commenting on the original piece. [Last link via Kids’ Comics]

We’re always hearing about how comics are a great tool for literacy (and those among us who learned to read from comics would back this up) but how are comics being accepted in the educational field? The New York Times investigates with an article that includes many yaysayers, but also the most common objections, as it looks at two rather modest programs, including the pilot program rolled out in Baltimore by Diamond and Disney Publishing.

In Maryland, the State Education Department is expanding a new comics-based literacy curriculum, after a small pilot program yielded promising results. In New York City, a group of educators applied to open a new small high school that would be based around a comics theme and named after the creators of Superman; their application was rejected but they plan to try again next year. And the Comic Book Project, a program run out of Teachers College at Columbia University that has children create their own comic strips as an “alternative pathway to literacy,” is catching on. Six years after it started in one Queens elementary school, it has expanded to 860 schools across the country.

BUT SEE ALSO: a recent issue of the New Yorker includes a modestly titled piece called “Twilight of the Books” which discusses the changes to thinking that take place in societies that no longer read:

There’s no reason to think that reading and writing are about to become extinct, but some sociologists speculate that reading books for pleasure will one day be the province of a special “reading class,” much as it was before the arrival of mass literacy, in the second half of the nineteenth century. They warn that it probably won’t regain the prestige of exclusivity; it may just become “an increasingly arcane hobby.” Such a shift would change the texture of society. If one person decides to watch “The Sopranos” rather than to read Leonardo Sciascia’s novella “To Each His Own,” the culture goes on largely as before—both viewer and reader are entertaining themselves while learning something about the Mafia in the bargain. But if, over time, many people choose television over books, then a nation’s conversation with itself is likely to change. A reader learns about the world and imagines it differently from the way a viewer does; according to some experimental psychologists, a reader and a viewer even think differently. If the eclipse of reading continues, the alteration is likely to matter in ways that aren’t foreseeable.

Expect the discussion of literacy, post-literacy and where words and pictures fit in to become even more of a topic of discussion in 2008.

Karen Green, Columbia University’s Ancient/Medieval Studies Librarian and Graphic Novel selector starts a blog at Comixology explains how an Ivy league university starts collecting graphic novels:

University libraries tend to get their books from large vendors according to a subject outline known as an approval plan, and let’s just say that Columbia’s approval plans didn’t include material from DC Comics, Fantagraphics, or First Second—these publishers simply weren’t on our radar. If a professor requested a graphic novel for a course, it would be bought—otherwise? Not a chance.

The final nominations for YALSA’s Great Graphic Novels for Teens list is up.
Via David Welsh, who has analysis, as does Blog@.

Tokypop and DC Comics lead the final nominations for the Young Adult Library Services Association’s annual list of Great Graphic Novels For Teens with 23 nods each.

DC’s nominations include titles from its CMX, Minx and Vertigo imprints.

Tokyopop and DC are followed by Del Rey with 11 nominations, Viz Media with 10, Go! Comi with eight, and First Second and Marvel with seven each.

Nate Fisher, the teacher in Eightball-Gate, has posted in our comment section, and in the interest of giving his comments equal prominence, here’s a link.

While I’m well on my way in my effort to move on and I have mixed feelings about generating MORE press, I’d like to send out a note of thanks to the blogosphere for all the passionate and reasoned posts I’ve been reading over the past few months. While I am tempted to address the numerous factual errors and outright affronts to my character that have been made public (at times anonymously) concerning this incident, I’ll instead address a larger outcome that I see as tragic and one better suited to the audience here: This has been bad for comics in education.

More in link.

Lots of literate stuff going on in LA, this weekend, including the West Hollywood Book Fair on Sunday, but on Saturday, there’s another worthy event taking place, with Mark Waid, Kazu Kibuishi and many more:

September 29th the Los Angeles Public Library’s Art Department is proud to present The Future of Graphic Literature at the Central Library in Downtown Los Angeles. Hosted by Joshua Hale Fialkov (Elk’s Run, Punks, Vampirella), the panel will be a meeting of the minds amongst some of L.A.’s most diverse talent. Acclaimed comics scribe Mark Waid will join the group, including Kazu Kibuishi (Flight), Christos Gage (Stormwatch:PHD, World War Hulk:X-Men, Law and Order:SVU), Ross Richie (Boom! Studios), and Tony Fleecs (In My Lifetime, Postcards).

The discussion will be Q+A style, discussing how comics have changed and evolved over the past decade from specialty shop niche product to something that’s being widely embraced by Librarians, Book Publishers, and Hollywood.

The event will be held at the Los Angeles Public Library’s Central Library, in the Mark Taper Auditorium on Saturday September 29th at 2:00 pm. There will be a meet and greet style book signing after the program. There is convenient $1 parking with validation on Saturdays underneath the Library, entrance at 524 South Flower.

For more information on the event, please visit the events page of the LAPL’s website, here: http://events.lapl.org/viewEvent.cfm?eventID=9694.

The Future of Graphic Literature
September 29th, 2:00pm
Mark Taper Auditorium
Central Library
630 W. 5th St.
Los Angeles, CA 90071
(213) 228-7000

ForeWord Magazine writes up a recent graphic novel event for librarians.
\

It may have been the first all-day event for librarians devoted exclusively to the graphic novel. Graphic novel consultant John Shableski and librarians from the Harborfields Public Library, headed by Director Carol Albino, assembled a mesmerizing series of panels and speakers early this month, sponsored by the Suffolk (NY) Cooperative Library System, and coordinated by librarian Barbara Moon.

Shableski set the stage by pointing out that virtually “every major publisher now has a graphic novel imprint and now they’re trying to figure out what works.” He noted that the graphic novel (GN) is to publishing today very much as rock and roll was when it first entered the music industry mainstream: a strange format already familiar to the popular culture but not yet understood by the established distribution channels.

If you happen to be up really early and going to the Harborfields public library, you can attend this great event with Mark Siegel, Raina Telgemeier, Jommy Gownlet, John Gallagher, and a ton of librarians.

Seriously: A Graphic Novel Symposium
Thursday September 6
Harborfields Public Library

Click above link for info.

Of all the panels at San Diego the one we most wanted to see podcast or transcribed or whatever was COMICS ARE NOT LITERATURE and now Newsarama has a report by Zack Smith, although two of the participants have already said it isn’t entirely accurate. Dammit, we should have been there.

Wolk criticized comics written by Joss Whedon, saying that, “the artists can’t create great actors on the page,” that is, people who bring extra layers to the characters the way a flesh-and-blood actor could. “You’re just reading a script with a bunch of crappy pictures on it – but it’s a great script,” Wolk said.

Wolk asked Grossman, who had brought some prepared statements, about whether there was anything in the definition of “sophistication” that could be useful to comics.

“One of the downsides of thinking of comics as a ‘low art,’ is that it makes you lazy,” Grossman said. “Let’s raise the game.”

Castellucci and Ryan agreed. “It’s about having a set of critical tools, and what you use the tools on is wherever people are making good stories,” Ryan said.

“Why don’t we just call it art?” Nadel said. “Sometimes cinema is art, sometimes it’s not. Sometimes a Bjork record is art, sometimes it’s not…” Castellucci and Ryan interjected that a Bjork album is always art.

Nadel went on to propose that he didn’t consider comics reading. “Why is that a big deal?” he asked. “Comics is about looking and reading. It’s not just about reading – it’s a dual process. It’s different from reading a novel, and it’s different from watching a movie.”

Douglas tells us he didn’t mention Joss Whedon specifically, and Cecil has her own footnotes.

BONUS: DO NOT MISS COMMENTS AFTER REPORT!

§ Dave Astor has several reports from the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists’s 50th Anniversary convention:
Can editorial cartoons survive?

Before audience members came up with the suggestions, the problem was described by editorial cartoonist Paul Fell — one of the session leaders. “Part of the reason the AAEC was founded was a concern about the dimimishing number of editorial cartoon positions in the U.S.,” said Fell, a Nebraska-based creator syndicated by Artizans. “Here we are 50 years later and we’re facing the same problem — only now there’s roughly 25% of the staff positions [about 80]compared to 1957.”

Plus: Tooners on blogging
• Comments from Beat hero Helen Thomas.
• 3 cartoonists honored
• Various issues regarding the Mohammed Cartoons.

§ Phil Yeh talks literacy: as always.

Troubled by the fact that so many Americans were functionally illiterate, he organized a group called Cartoonists Across America to encourage kids to dive into books. Beginning with a cross country tour to 34 states and two Canadian provinces, Yeh (pronounced, “Yay”) and his cohorts appeared at schools, shopping malls, and other public spots to paint murals, enlist literacy tutors, and give away original comic books with a reading-is-fun theme.

§ Minnie Driver is the new Lara Croft in Re\Visioned: Tomb Raider, a new animated series from GameTap, Turner Broadcasting’s video-game-themed broadband network.

§ Jack Black, ‘tooner.

“I’ve been a big fan of cartoons, and I actually got in there and did some animating when I was in high school,” he says. “I won a prize. I won a Rocky & Bullwinkle for my don’t-drink-and-drive cartoon.”

ICv2 goes to the American LIbrary Association show and reports findings to base:

The two hour “Teen Graphic Novels: Maintaining Your Collection for Maximum Impact!” panel on Saturday was the primary programming event on graphic novels. Teen librarian panelists Brenner, Pawuk, Angela Reynolds (Annapolis Valley, Nova Scotia), and Todd Krueger (Baltimore County), along with moderator Anne Leon (Broward County) spoke to a packed room of 200 librarians, with over a dozen seated on the floor.

The range of sizes and interest in graphic novels on the panels was instructive, with the smallest graphic novel collection (Nova Scotia) only a few hundred books, and the largest (Baltimore) over 16,000 in teen graphic novel volumes alone.

Much more of great interest in the link.