Comical comics
Comical comics |
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Page 29 of 34  Cover, Mad (1969). Art: Norman Mingo. A dig at patriotism at the height of the Vietnam War. Mad was also responsible for spawning a variety of copyists - none of which garnered quite the same following. Titles included Crazy, Eh! and Whack, all 1953; Flip, Wild and Panic, all 1954 (the latter a sister title from EC) and Harvey Kurtzman's Trump (1957) and Help! (1960). Later on, they were joined by Brand Echh (1967) and Crazy (1973). They may not all have been particularly hilarious, but put together they represented a new American comics genre. Yet despite all these notable comedy titles, and taking the American humour industry as a whole, it was still true that exploitation of artists and writers was as much of a problem as in Britain. The traditional American working method was to split creative task down among artists, writers, inkers and letterers, and this both guaranteed anonymity and militated against collective action. Unions were near impossible to organize (though some attempts were made), and in general comics creators were considered factory workers on an assembly line. Like in Britain, pay was by the page, with no royalties or rights over characters. (The team behind Mad were more . fortunate than most: standards at EC were relatively high, and artists always signed their work.) |