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This text examines comics, graphic novels, and manga with a broad, international scope that reveals their conceptual origins in antiquity.

Graphic narrative art is a fascinating phenomenon that emerged centuries ago with the expansion of literacy and the publication industry. The earliest example of a repeating comic character dates back to the late 1700s. By following the growth of print technology in Europe and Asia, it is possible to understand how and why artists across cultures developed different strategies for telling stories with pictures.

This book is much more than a history of graphic narrative across the globe. It examines broader conceptual developments that preceded the origins of comics and graphic novels; how those ideas have evolved over the last century and a half; how literacy, print technology, and developments in narrative art are interrelated; and the way graphic narratives communicate culturally significant stories. The work of artists such as William Hogarth, J. J. Grandville, Willhem Busch, Frans Masereel, Max Ernst, Saul Steinberg, Henry Darger, and Larry Gonick are discussed or depicted.

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CHOICE Review

Much of what Petersen (art, Eastern Illinois Univ.) offers here has been covered previously, and in greater detail, in the numerous studies chronicling the histories of the graphic narrative traditions, and visual arts precedents, of various countries. What sets this study apart is Petersen's effort to detail how developments in the world of graphic narrative track with developments in publishing and literacy. Claiming that the focus on 20th-century graphic narrative has "distorted the nature of the medium of comics by exaggerating the significance of such modern genres as superheroes and obscuring the underlying and larger development of this visual language," the author has a broader aim: he extends the discussion to the history of popular printing in countries such as China, and the precedents set by fine artists such as Goya. Unfortunately, this material constitutes a small portion of the overall narrative. Readers unfamiliar with the subject will find this introductory volume a way in; but it offers little that is new or has not been handled (in a more focused way) elsewhere. Summing Up: Optional. Lower-division undergraduates; general readers. E. K. Rosen Lafayette College

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Robert S. Petersen is associate professor of art at Eastern Illinois University, Charleston, IL.