Pirates In The Heartland: The Mythology Of S. Clay Wilson Vol. 1 (CLAY WILSON HC) - Hardcover

Wilson, S. Clay

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1606997475 ISBN 13: 9781606997475

Publisher: Fantagraphics Books, 2014

Synopsis

The is the definitive account of the boldest and most audacious of the legendary underground cartoonists: the taboo busting, eyeball blistering S. Clay Wilson. This first volume contains all of his underground comic stories from Zap Comix, Snatch, Gothic Blimp Works, Bogeyman, Felch, Insect Fear, Pork, Tales of Sex and Death, and Arcade magazine as well as the many adventures of the Checkered Demon, Star-Eyed Stella, and Captain Pissgums, and even his earliest collaborations with William Burroughs. Also: selections from his teenaged and college years, both in comics and painting form. First person accounts from his peers, as well as Wilson’s own words, offer a revealing portrait of the artist who hid his shyness behind brash behavior and bluster. This first of a three-volume biography and retrospective gets to the heart and soul of an artist who lived his dreams and his nightmares.

About this title

About the Author

S. Clay Wilson, one of the founding members of the Zap comics collective. (Zap is a seminal underground comic book anthology, with contributors like R. Crumb.) He lives in San Francisco.

Patrick Rosenkranz is widely acknowledged as one of the premiere scholars of the underground comix movement. His books include Rebel Visions (the most widely-heralded history of the era) and The Artist Himself: A Rand Holmes Retrospective. He lives in Portland, OR.

Review

“...[F]or those readers with sufficiently girded loins, Wilson’s art -- and renegade life-story -- will prove a source of unhealthy, vital fascination.”
- Sean Rogers, The Globe and Mail

“Pirates in the Heartland: The Mythology of S. Clay Wilson Vol. 1 surveys the early, graphically fecund years of the most outrageous of the original cadre of underground cartoonists. Wilson... turned his id inside out and vomited forth exquisitely crosshatched panels... The best drawings coalesce into orgies of entwined, bulging, wriggling lines ― the grotesque tickling the sublime.”
- R.C. Baker, Village Voice

“Do you remember the first time you saw an S. Clay Wilson panel? It was almost as powerful as your first blowjob. ... S. Clay Wilson was just beautiful filth -- just mind-blowing.”
- Marc Maron, WTF Podcast

“...S. Clay Wilson’s comics are... profoundly underground creations, works by a man who doesn’t give two f***s about society, and that frustrates and annoys, offends and angers, brings bile to the throat while also bringing a thrill to the soul. ...[An] outstanding collection of vintage Wilson work... Pirates in the Heartland is the best kind of biography of an artist because it gives readers both context and classics. Patrick Rosenkranz, the unparalleled chronicler of the undergrounds, delivers yet another outstanding biography...”
- Jason Sacks, Comics Bulletin

“Thoroughly estimable and highly recommended.”
- Bob Levin, The Comics Journal

Edition details

• Publisher: Fantagraphics Books
• Publication date: 2014
• ISBN 10: 1606997475
• ISBN 13: 9781606997475
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 224
• Editor: Rosenkranz Patrick