In giacod 's collection
Description
Page 42 from "A Contract with God, and Other Tenement Stories" by Will Eisner, published for the first time by Baronet Books in 1978.
The book took two years to finish. Eisner worked through a variety of approaches and styles, and toyed with using color, overlays, or washes, before settling on a hard-lined style printed in sepia. As he had no deadline, he reworked and resequenced the stories until he was satisfied.
Eisner intended "A Contract with God" to have an adult audience, and wanted it to be sold in bookstores rather than comic shops; as such, he turned down an offer from Denis Kitchen to publish it. Though he had contacts at Bantam Books, he knew they would be uninterested in publishing comics. To secure a meeting with editor Oscar Dystel there, he called the book a "graphic novel". When Dystel discovered that the book was actually comics, he told Eisner Bantam would not publish it, but a smaller publisher might.
Baronet Press, a small New York publishing house, agreed to publish A Contract with God, which bears the credit "Produced by Poorhouse Press" of "White Plains, N.Y." on its indicia page. Eisner had originally intended to call the book "Tenement Stories", "Tales from the Bronx", or "A Tenement in the Bronx" but Baronet titled it "A Contract with God", after the lead story, as the term "tenement" was not widely known outside the eastern US. The trade paperback carried the term "graphic novel", though it is a collection of stories rather than a novel. As Baronet was not financially sound, Eisner loaned it money to ensure the book was published. (*)
(*) From Wikipedia
The book took two years to finish. Eisner worked through a variety of approaches and styles, and toyed with using color, overlays, or washes, before settling on a hard-lined style printed in sepia. As he had no deadline, he reworked and resequenced the stories until he was satisfied.
Eisner intended "A Contract with God" to have an adult audience, and wanted it to be sold in bookstores rather than comic shops; as such, he turned down an offer from Denis Kitchen to publish it. Though he had contacts at Bantam Books, he knew they would be uninterested in publishing comics. To secure a meeting with editor Oscar Dystel there, he called the book a "graphic novel". When Dystel discovered that the book was actually comics, he told Eisner Bantam would not publish it, but a smaller publisher might.
Baronet Press, a small New York publishing house, agreed to publish A Contract with God, which bears the credit "Produced by Poorhouse Press" of "White Plains, N.Y." on its indicia page. Eisner had originally intended to call the book "Tenement Stories", "Tales from the Bronx", or "A Tenement in the Bronx" but Baronet titled it "A Contract with God", after the lead story, as the term "tenement" was not widely known outside the eastern US. The trade paperback carried the term "graphic novel", though it is a collection of stories rather than a novel. As Baronet was not financially sound, Eisner loaned it money to ensure the book was published. (*)
(*) From Wikipedia
Comment
An astonishing key-page from the comic book that is considered the initiator of the graphic novel.
I had first read this work many years ago and even then this page impressed me so much that I identified the whole story with it.
Consequently, due to the importance of the comic and the page itself, when I had the opportunity to acquire it I interpreted it as a true sign from God :)
I had first read this work many years ago and even then this page impressed me so much that I identified the whole story with it.
Consequently, due to the importance of the comic and the page itself, when I had the opportunity to acquire it I interpreted it as a true sign from God :)
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About Will Eisner
William Erwin Eisner, known as Will Eisner, is an American comic book writer. He was the creator of the Spirit and of the concept of the "graphic novel" and its first applications in the United States, as well as a theorist and editorial director. He is a major figure in 20th-century comics and one of its greatest authors.
