The Best of the Spirit
The Best of the Spirit by Will Eisner
Somehow, during all the comics reading I did when I was younger, I never really connected with the Spirit. But I’ve read a lot about Will Eisner’s contributions to the genre, so when DC recently issued a full-color The Best of the Spirit collection, I decided to give it a try. Within about 20 pages, I was hooked and soon wondering how I’d missed this for all these years. Though to be fair, when I was a kid, I probably wouldn’t have appreciated the humor of some of the stories and in fact – being a “serious” comics reader – would probably have been a bit impatient with them. But now … It’s enough to make me contemplate investing in the Spirit archives (the complete run of the Spirit) that DC is publishing.
The Spirit is a crime fighter in the more in the mold of the great pulp characters like the Shadow than like the super-powered heroes of most comics. He was a policeman who was “killed” – actually put into a deathlike state – by a poison gas. He was presumed dead, but comes back, puts on a mask, and fights crime. Sounds somewhat mundane, but the stories are anything but.
The Spirit stories – or at least all of the ones in this volume –are all seven pages long. Yet each is packed with as much creativity, action, adventure, humor, and what have you as most 20-page comics. The styles, point of view, artistic approach, and so on very from story to story. Eisner was often blazing new trails, ones that would only much later be followed by other comics artists.
The first two stories are perhaps ordinary – if by “ordinary” one means merely “quite good.” One tells the origin of the Sprit, the next of his encounter with a couple of international criminals. They are well told, but stylistically only contain hints of what is to follow. Much of what is to follow is, in fact, extraordinary.
Take, for example, “The Killer,” where several of the panels are from within a character, literally looking out through his eyes. Or “Wild Rice,” which starts out with narrow panels interspersed with wider columns of text – a technique many would associate with recent graphic novels but used by Eisner in the 1940s.
“The Story of Gerhard Shnobble” adopts a more cartoonish style than Eisner used in many of his other stories. If you just thumb quickly through it, you might assume that this is a more light hearted Spirit. Instead, Eisner actually plays the artistic style off against one of the sadder storylines in the book.
“Two Lives,” on the other hand, is humorous. Eisner uses irony masterfully to contrast the lives of man in prison and a man stuck in a bad marriage. The story-telling style is also new, as Eisner, in several parts, uses parallel pages with in the page to contrast and compare the lives of the two men.
“The Christmas Spirit” is a touching Christmas story, but also another vehicle for Eisner’s artistic innovation, as he again breaks the model of simple sequences of panels on pages, and instead uses central panels with other action wrapped around them.
“Rat-Tat the Toy Machine Gun” uses yet another style; the story is told in strips down the pages, with no gaps between the “panels.” The tone and narration meanwhile is reminiscent of a children’s story, as is the art. Yet it tells quite a good Sprit crime story.
“The Embezzler” contains perhaps the most tension of any story in the book. It tells the story of a man who is losing his vision – which, incidentally, gives Eisner yet more room to try different artistic styles – who is accused of embezzling money from his company. The scenes in which he’s stalked by the real embezzler are actually tenser than many a movie, and again the whole thing is very well done.
As impressive as all the individual stories are, the overall effect is wonderful. It’s a pleasure to start another short story and find yet a new style and be surprised by yet a new twist. From story to story, there’s something new and fascinating. Even all these years after their original publication, these stories seem fresh and new. One can only speculate on what it must have been like at the time, when Eisner really was doing this sort of thing for the very first time as he helped invent and expand a new medium.
Somehow, during all the comics reading I did when I was younger, I never really connected with the Spirit. But I’ve read a lot about Will Eisner’s contributions to the genre, so when DC recently issued a full-color The Best of the Spirit collection, I decided to give it a try. Within about 20 pages, I was hooked and soon wondering how I’d missed this for all these years. Though to be fair, when I was a kid, I probably wouldn’t have appreciated the humor of some of the stories and in fact – being a “serious” comics reader – would probably have been a bit impatient with them. But now … It’s enough to make me contemplate investing in the Spirit archives (the complete run of the Spirit) that DC is publishing.
The Spirit is a crime fighter in the more in the mold of the great pulp characters like the Shadow than like the super-powered heroes of most comics. He was a policeman who was “killed” – actually put into a deathlike state – by a poison gas. He was presumed dead, but comes back, puts on a mask, and fights crime. Sounds somewhat mundane, but the stories are anything but.
The Spirit stories – or at least all of the ones in this volume –are all seven pages long. Yet each is packed with as much creativity, action, adventure, humor, and what have you as most 20-page comics. The styles, point of view, artistic approach, and so on very from story to story. Eisner was often blazing new trails, ones that would only much later be followed by other comics artists.
The first two stories are perhaps ordinary – if by “ordinary” one means merely “quite good.” One tells the origin of the Sprit, the next of his encounter with a couple of international criminals. They are well told, but stylistically only contain hints of what is to follow. Much of what is to follow is, in fact, extraordinary.
Take, for example, “The Killer,” where several of the panels are from within a character, literally looking out through his eyes. Or “Wild Rice,” which starts out with narrow panels interspersed with wider columns of text – a technique many would associate with recent graphic novels but used by Eisner in the 1940s.
“The Story of Gerhard Shnobble” adopts a more cartoonish style than Eisner used in many of his other stories. If you just thumb quickly through it, you might assume that this is a more light hearted Spirit. Instead, Eisner actually plays the artistic style off against one of the sadder storylines in the book.
“Two Lives,” on the other hand, is humorous. Eisner uses irony masterfully to contrast the lives of man in prison and a man stuck in a bad marriage. The story-telling style is also new, as Eisner, in several parts, uses parallel pages with in the page to contrast and compare the lives of the two men.
“The Christmas Spirit” is a touching Christmas story, but also another vehicle for Eisner’s artistic innovation, as he again breaks the model of simple sequences of panels on pages, and instead uses central panels with other action wrapped around them.
“Rat-Tat the Toy Machine Gun” uses yet another style; the story is told in strips down the pages, with no gaps between the “panels.” The tone and narration meanwhile is reminiscent of a children’s story, as is the art. Yet it tells quite a good Sprit crime story.
“The Embezzler” contains perhaps the most tension of any story in the book. It tells the story of a man who is losing his vision – which, incidentally, gives Eisner yet more room to try different artistic styles – who is accused of embezzling money from his company. The scenes in which he’s stalked by the real embezzler are actually tenser than many a movie, and again the whole thing is very well done.
As impressive as all the individual stories are, the overall effect is wonderful. It’s a pleasure to start another short story and find yet a new style and be surprised by yet a new twist. From story to story, there’s something new and fascinating. Even all these years after their original publication, these stories seem fresh and new. One can only speculate on what it must have been like at the time, when Eisner really was doing this sort of thing for the very first time as he helped invent and expand a new medium.
posted by Jim Mann at 10:27 PM
2 Comments:
I've just srtaed reading The Spirit after havig it recommended as a good place to start in comics, and I was tempted to give up after just a couple, it seemed so dated - but after reading your review I think I'll stick with it.
Thanks.
I've just started reading The Spirit after having it recommended as a good place to start in comics, and I was tempted to give up after just a couple, it seemed so dated - but after reading your review I think I'll stick with it.
Thanks.
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