The Golem's Mighty Swing - Softcover

Sturm, James

Softcover

ISBN 10: 177046283X ISBN 13: 9781770462830

Publisher: Drawn and Quarterly, 2017

Synopsis

A new edition of the classic tale of a barnstorming Jewish baseball team during the great depression

Before penning his acclaimed graphic novel Market Day and founding the Center for Cartoon Studies, James Sturm proved his worth as a master cartoonist with the eloquent graphic novel, The Golem’s Mighty Swing, one of the first breakout graphic novel hits of the twenty-first century. Sturm’s fascination with the invisible America has been the crux of his comics work, exploring the rarely-told or oft-forgotten bits of history that define a country.

By reuniting America’s greatest pastime with its hidden history, the graphic novel tells the story of the Stars of David, a barnstorming Jewish baseball team of the depression era. Led by its manager and third baseman, the nomadic team travels from small town to small town providing the thrill of the sport while playing up their religious exoticism as a curio for people to gawk at, heckle, and taunt.

When the team’s fortunes fall, the players are presented a plan to get people in the stands. But by placing their fortunes in the hands of a promoter, the Stars of David find themselves fanning the flames of ethnic tensions. Sturm’s nuanced composition is on full display as he deftly builds the climax of the game against the rising anti-semitic fervor of the crowd. Baseball, small towns, racial tensions, and the desperate grasp for the American Dream: The Golem’s Mighty Swing is a classic American novel.

About this title

From the Publisher

James Sturm is one of the best and perhaps one of the most underrated cartoonists to have emerged in the 1990's. Sturm's first comic book series was The Cereal Killings, published by Seattle's Fantagraphics Books. This was followed by an ambitious series of stories, "The Revival" in 1996, "Hundreds of Feet Below Daylight" in 1998, and the soon-to-be-published "The Golem's Mighty Swing", a trilogy of which Sturm refers to as American "historical fiction". Outside of his cartooning, Sturm also has had extensive experience in both academic and publishing fields. In 1990 he worked as production assistant on Art Spiegelman's and Francoise Mouly's RAW. After his move to Seattle in the following year, he co-founded The Stranger, that city's free weekly alternative paper, where he worked for the following six years as an art director and writer. As a teacher, he has lectured in high schools and colleges in New York and Seattle, and he is currently a professor at the Savannah College of Art and Design in Georgia, where he heads the "Sequential Arts" program (that's the fancy word for "comics"!).

About the Author

James Sturm lives in White River Junction, Vermont, with his wife and two daughters, where he helps run a cartooning school that he co-founded, The Center for Cartoon Studies. James’ books include Market Day, James Sturm’s America, Satchel Paige: Striking Out Jim Crow, The Fantastic Four: Unstable Molecules, Denys Wortman’s New York, and the popular Adventures in Cartooning series. His comics, writing, and illustrations have appeared in scores of national and regional publications including The Chronicle of Higher Education, The Onion, The New York Times, Slate, and on the cover of The New Yorker. James has taught and exhibited his work throughout the world.

About this edition

• Publisher: Drawn and Quarterly
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 177046283X
• ISBN 13: 9781770462830
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 112