Hemingway in Comics by Robert K. Elder (review)

Hemingway in Comics discusses Ernest Hemingway's worldwide reach through the medium. The writer from Oak Park, IL appeared in 120 comics in myriad languages. It turns out that "comic book creators and Hemingway share a natural kinship. The comic book page demands an economy of words, much like Hemingway's less-is-more 'iceberg theory,' only in graphic form" (1). Therefore, artists, like Hemingway, urge readers to become part of the story.

Robert Elder's exhaustive research shows Hemingway combatting fascists with Wolverine, "leading a revolution in Purgatory in The Life After" (X), starring with Mickey Mouse, and at the center of a Peanuts strip. "In comics, the Nobel Prize winner is often treated with equal parts reverence, curiosity, and parody" (X). Although Hemingway read multiple newspapers daily, he did not write about or read the comics; he was doodler though, and he appeared as a character in his high school yearbook in 1917.

The study begins with a chapter about the famous Hemingway photo in which he dons a Christian Dior turtleneck sweater. The artist is Yousuf Karsh, a preeminent portrait photographer, who also conducted sittings with Albert Einstein, Winston Churchill, and authors Thomas Mann, Somerset Maugham, Pearl Buck, and Albert Camus. Elder believes it is an important photo: "For Superman, it's the giant S on his chest. For John Lennon, it's a New York City T-shirt. For Ernest Hemingway, it's a bulky turtleneck sweater" (1). This iconic photo was published in numerous publications including Atlantic Monthly. Additionally, the Karsh photo is featured on a 1989 US postal stamp. Elder's assertion about Hemingway donning the sweater bears fruit: in February of 2019 Jef Mallett's Frazz comic strip features a character in the sweater up to his eyeballs, stating "Check it out! It's an Ernest Hemingway sweater." In the next panel, the character states: "Kind of a bulky sweater for a writer considered minimalist … who lived in Cuba. Then Frazz, a janitor in an elementary school, states, "Who am I talking to?" (2).

Hemingway's first appearance in a mainstream comic was in Captain Marvel Adventures (July 1950). Readers can barely see Hemingway, featured on a panel, as Captain Marvel and President Harry Truman tour the Half-Century Fair of 1950, the same year that Charles Schulz's Peanuts premiered in seven newspapers. Hemingway makes only one appearance in Peanuts – August 28, 1984. In the strip, Lucy reads Snoopy a review: "Listen to this… It's a review of your latest novel. Your writing has been compared to Faulkner and Hemingway. Unfavorably!" This is an impressive feat. At its height, Peanuts was printed in 2,600 newspapers in 75 countries and in 21 languages. Like Hemingway, Schultz regards himself as a "precisionist in the selection of words. It is a subject on which he stands his ground. 'Nobody tells Hemingway [what words to use],' says Schulz" (27).

Two rather funny spoofs appeared in 1955 and 1958. First, Hemingway is the subject of a caricature in "Mad's first issue as a magazine, after 23 years as a comic book. 'Pappa' Heminghaw—finds himself in the jaws of a lion" (8). Then, in a rather funny parody in Frantic, a Mad knockoff, Cuban-born creator Ric Estrada writes a fullpage story titled "The Old Man and the She," by Ernest Heminghay. It begins "He was an old man who lived alone in a skiff in the Gulf Stream and he had gone eighty-four years now without taking a wife" (9). When readers compare this spoof to Hemingway's seminal and rhythmic first sentence of the Pulitzer winner—"He was an old man who fished alone in a skiff in the Gulf Stream and he had gone eighty-four days now without taking a fish" – they will respect Estrada's powers too.

Elder's study also supports Hemingway's continued worldwide reach. Cartoonists and graphic artists from many countries are fascinated with Hemingway's stories and his persona, but artists in Italy, in particular, adore the author...