Olivier Schrauwen
The Man Who Grew His Beard, is Belgian cartoonist Olivier Schrauwenâ€™s first American book, having staked a reputation over the last decade as one of Europeâ€™s most talented storytellers. It collects seven short stories, each a headspinning display of craft and storytelling that mixes early twentieth-century comics influences like Winsor McCay with a thoroughly contemporary voice that provokes and entertains with subversively surreal humor and subtle criticism of twentieth-century tropes and images. The stories themselves, though each stands alone, are intertwined thematically, offering peeks into the minds of semi-autistic, achingly isolated men and their feverish inner worlds and how they interact and contrast with their real environment. Though Schrauwen taps â€˜surrealistâ€™ or â€˜absurdistâ€™ impulses in his work, you will not read a more careful and precise collection of stories this year.,The stories included are: â€œHair Types,â€ a hilarious piece that on the surface explores the pseudoscientific classification of personality as a function of hair but becomes something more akin to a fable about self-fulfilling prophecy; â€œChromo Congo,â€ a silent story about two men on safari who meet a corpulent and obnoxious hunter; as well as â€œThe Task,â€ â€œThe Man Who Grew His Beard,â€ â€œThe Lock,â€ â€œThe Cave,â€ and â€œThe Imaginist.â€,Though this is Schrauwenâ€™s first U.S. edition of comics, he has wowed American fans with his appearances in the anthology ,MOME, over the last few years, and one of his ,MOME, stories was one of three comics selected for the 2009 edition of Dave Eggersâ€™ influential ,Best American Nonrequired Reading,.
Sequential Art,Comics,Sequential Art,Graphic Novels,Graphic Novels Comics,Cultural,Belgium,Short Stories
The Man Who Grew His Beard