The Someday Funnies Book Discussion
With Editor Michel Choquette!
Saturday, November 19th, 4pm-6pm
@ The Central, 603 Markham Street
next to The Beguiling
Free to attend.
RSVP at Facebook
What do William S. Burroughs, Wally Wood, Will Eisner, and Gahan Wilson all have in common? They’ve all got comic strips in the groundbreaking comics anthology THE SOMEDAY FUNNIES, edited over a period of 30 years by Michel Choquette!
Please join The Beguiling in welcoming Michel Choquette to Toronto as he discusses his new collection, The Someday funnies. Published by Abrams ComicsArts, The Someday Funnies features 129 previously-unpublished comic strips by 169 artists and writers from around the world, compiled in the 1960s and 70s across two continents and finally seeing the light of day! Choquette will be in Toronto to discuss this legendary work, how it was assembled and its checkered history, all in a lively audio-visual presentation.
Copies of the book are available at The Beguiling now, and will be available at the event. Michel Choquette will be signing copies at the event.
Full press-release for this book follows:
The Legendary Anthology About the 1960s Finally Resurrected
The Someday Funnies
Edited by Michel Choquette
Introduction by Robert Greenfield
Foreword by Jeet Heer
“This book is an awe-inspiring achievement—a unique collection of works that not only captures the mood of the 1960s, but shows how some of the world’s greatest comics artists emerged from the decade ready to revolutionize the form.”
—Jeet Heer, from his foreword
The Someday Funnies is the long-awaited collection of comic strips created in the early 1970s by world-famous artists and writers. What started out as a special insert for Rolling Stone took on a life—and mythology—of its own as writer/editor Michel Choquette traveled across two continents, commissioning this visual chronicle of the 1960s, only to find himself without a publishing partner or the financial support to continue—until now.
Among the contributors Choquette commissioned are cartoonists and comic book luminaries such as Will Eisner, Art Spiegelman, Harvey Kurtzman, R.O. Blechman, Jack Kirby, Ralph Steadman, Sergio Aragonès, C. C. Beck, Vaughn Bodé, Moebius, Jean-Claude Forest, Gahan Wilson, Barry Windsor-Smith and Wally Wood; notable writers William S. Burroughs, Harlan Ellison, Michael O’Donoghue, and Tom Wolfe; celebrated film director Federico Fellini; artists Red Grooms and Allen Jones; as well as renowned musicians Pete Townshend and Frank Zappa.
Comics historian Jeet Heer says it all in his foreword, “The possibility that such an amazing anthology of original strips was being compiled seemed too good to be true…that this fabled collection failed to materialize as planned in the early 1970s only reinforced its status as an enticing dream rather than an imminent reality.”
Forty years later, readers finally get to experience this legendary anthology as Choquette celebrates the birth, death, and resurrection of The Someday Funnies—129 previously unpublished strips by 169 writers and artists from 15 countries.
About the Authors:
Michel Choquette is a writer and filmmaker who had a successful career as a comedian, notably as one half of the popular 1960s television and night club duo “The Times Square Two”, before becoming one of the first contributing editors of National Lampoon. He now teaches how to write a nonfiction book, creative writing and screenwriting at Concordia University in Montreal.
Robert Greenfield is an award-winning journalist, novelist, playwright, and screenwriter (most notably of The ’60s for NBC in 1999, one of the most popular miniseries in network television history). Born in Brooklyn, he began his career as a sportswriter before making a mark with his many articles on the rock music scene as a writer for Rolling Stone, of which he was associate editor of the London bureau. He is the author of ten books, including his recent biography of Ahmet Ertegun, the founder of Atlantic records. Greenfield lives in Carmel, California.
Jeet Heer writes on political, social, and cultural topics, most particularly comics. His articles have appeared in many publications including the Comics Journal, the Boston Globe, the Los Angeles Times, the Virginia Quarterly Review, the Guardian (Manchester, England), and Canada’s Globe and Mail and National Post. He has co-edited or written for several books of comics history and scholarship, and is currently completing his PhD in history at York University in Toronto, Canada.
The Someday Funnies
Edited by Michel Choquette
Introduction by Robert Greenfield
Foreword by Jeet Heer
Abrams ComicArts | November 2011
U.S. $55.00 | Can. $62.00
ISBN 978-0-8109-9618-2
Hardcover with Jacket | 11½ x 15½”
216 pages | 200 color illustrations
