Events & Classes

Modern Marvels

A series of discussions on graphic novels by Jewish artists, moderated by Professor Judith Katz.
A program of Nextbook and the American Library Association.

Register by emailing s-gang@umn.edu or calling 612-626-2281. Presented by the University of Minnesota Libraries and Center for Jewish Studies, and The Friends of the Saint Paul Public Library.

All programs take place on Tuesday evenings, 7 p.m. at the Highland Park library.

June 24

Will Eisner's A Contract with God

Set among 1930s Bronx tenements, these four stories capture the brutal, tender world of working-class Jews. In the title story, Frimme Hersh's daughter suddenly dies, sorely testing the "contract" this self-made man once entered into with God. In "Cookalein," Eisner casts a humorous eye on the amorous, social-climbing tendencies of young urbanites spending a summer in the Adirondacks. Wry, honest, and sad, these four stories showcase Eisner's unique ability to capture character with the quick stroke of his pen.

July 8

Art Spiegelman's The Complete Maus: A Survivor's Tale

The comic book transfigured, this graphic novel tells the story of Spiegelman's parents Vladek and Anna, Jews reaching maturity in a Europe on the verge of Nazism, and their terrifying history and eventual survival in the concentration camps. Spiegelman uses the broadest tools of the genre—Jews are drawn as mice, Nazis as cats, Poles as pigs, Frenchmen as frogs, and so on—to make vivid the unimaginable, both to the reader and to himself, appearing as a character in the book listening to his father's story.

July 22

Ben Katchor's Julius Knipl, Real Estate Photographer: Stories

Steeped in a melancholy, grey-tinted world of elevated trains, luncheonettes, and gently decaying tenements, Katchor's perambulating photographer Julius Knipl documents a rapidly vanishing urban netherworld. Peopled by men who map the migration of hairstyles and those who belong to the Amalgamated Panty-Waist Fitters Union, his cityscape is a familiar one, albeit with the touch of a demented fairy tale.

August 5

Harvey Pekar's The Quitter

Ostensibly covering Pekar's early years, this dark graphic novel tackles everything from his brief stint in the Navy to jazz criticism and mid-century race relations. The gritty and atmospheric artwork by American Splendor collaborator Dean Haspiel perfectly captures Pekar's cantankerous tone. But a surprisingly hopeful message ultimately surfaces. It's possible to find your way in the world, Pekar suggests, even if it takes a lifetime to do it.

August 19

Joann Sfar's The Rabbi's Cat

After eating a parrot, an aged Algerian rabbi's cat develops the ability to speak and quickly declares his desire not only to be Jewish, but to have a bar mitzvah. The rabbi engages his pet in a spiraling debate, touching on topics such as spelling, parental love, and the very nature of Jewish identity.