![]() Then, stuff that takes itself very seriously. So I tend more toward books people read in high school, which a lot of 16-year-olds are forced to read to begin with. But you don't want to ruin a book for somebody. You can Wikipedia a historical figure and get the gist of things. When I do historical figures, I feel better going to obscure territory. If you make in-jokes about Chopin, then people who love Chopin will think it's just the best thing.Īre certain types of books or historical figures better candidates for the kind of satire you do than others?ĭefinitely the ones that more people have read. And they'll be the ones who like it the most. If I choose a historical figure or a book, it's going to be somebody's favorite. I do a fair service to the people I'm making fun of, even if I'm making fun of them. You have to celebrate the things that make them memorable. If you write a comic about somebody that makes fun of them, you can't just tear them to pieces. I want to make something that will make people feel good. There's that wish for a charming presentation. Even the evil guys are so evil, how do you exaggerate that? You can see his influence in my work, if you look for it. Micawber and stretch him out into a joke? He's already a joke. It's hard because his novels are funny anyway. I don't recall you doing many comics about Dickens, though. Before that, it was, "If you're poor, you're poor. It was action-packed, the birth of our modern society. The seeds of all of these movements were happening: workers revolting, unions starting, people breaking off from monarchies. It was a time of real change, especially for the lower classes and for women. I gravitated toward the 18th and 19th centuries. Do you have a favorite historical period? You were a history and anthropology major in college. I sat down with Beaton to ask her about the art of being funny about history and books. That something became a popular website and now a book, also titled "Hark! A Vagrant" (a line from an old comic), just published by Drawn and Quarterly. "The response was way bigger than I ever imagined," she said recently over lunch. Raskolnikov tips off his own police nemesis by penning an Op-Ed titled "Murdering Old Ladies: Not Even a Big Deal."īeaton, a native of Nova Scotia who recently relocated to Brooklyn, N.Y., began writing comics about historical figures and characters from literature for her college newspaper her first strip offered tips for surviving a Viking invasion of campus. Inspector Javert from "Les Misérables" is detailed to the Bread Crimes Division. There are the three Brontë sisters, checking out surly guys: "So passionate!" "So mysterious!" "So brooding!" swoon Charlotte and Emily, while Anne Brontë (author of "The Tenant of Wildfell Hall," in case you didn't know she existed), retorts, "If you like alcoholic dickbags!" "No wonder nobody buys your books," hisses Charlotte. The characters in Kate Beaton's hit webcomic, "Hark! A Vagrant," are familiar, and also not. ![]()
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