''Anarchy Comics'' is a series of underground comic books published by Last Gasp between 1978 and 1987, as part of the underground comix subculture of the era. Edited by Jay Kinney (#1-3) and Paul Mavrides (#4), regular contributors to ''Anarchy Comics'' included Melinda Gebbie, Clifford Harper, and Spain Rodriguez, as well as Kinney and Mavrides. (Kinney, Mavrides, and Rodriguez had been noted for "adding new dimensions to the political comic" in the underground comix press of the 1970s and '80s.)
Publication history
A total of four issues of ''Anarchy Comics'' were published between 1978 and 1987, with individual issues appearing in 1978, 1979, 1981, and 1987. Each issue of ''Anarchy Comics'' was created by an international cast of
anarchist
Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that is skeptical of all justifications for authority and seeks to abolish the institutions it claims maintain unnecessary coercion and hierarchy, typically including, though not neces ...
or sympathetic contributors. Each issue included a mixture of fiction, history, commentary, and artwork, with wide ranges in style and format.
Only the first issue remains in print. A collected edition titled ''Anarchy Comics: The Complete Collection'' () was published in December 2012 by
PM Press
PM Press is an independent publisher, founded in 2007, that specializes in radical, Marxist and anarchist literature, as well as crime fiction, graphic novels, music CDs, and political documentaries. It has offices in the San Francisco Bay Area, ...
.
Contributors
Each issue of ''Anarchy Comics'' showcased an international cast of artists who identified as anarchists or nonsectariansocialists. An example of this is Spain Rodriguez, a
Marxist
Marxism is a Left-wing politics, left-wing to Far-left politics, far-left method of socioeconomic analysis that uses a Materialism, materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to understand S ...
, who was considered of "sufficient
libertarian
Libertarianism (from french: libertaire, "libertarian"; from la, libertas, "freedom") is a political philosophy that upholds liberty as a core value. Libertarians seek to maximize autonomy and political freedom, and minimize the state's e ...
bent" to be included.
List of contributors
The following is a list of each contributor in alphabetical order.
Themes
Anarchism
Overtly anarchist in its bent, all content included was based on anarchist philosophy and history. The humor of each anthology was satirical in nature, mocking both mainstream culture as well as traditional leftist ideas of revolution.
Punk rock
Roger Sabin, an English historian of comics and subculture, noted a number of connections between the comic and the Punk rock subculture of the '70s, suggesting that Jay Kinney "clearly hoped to pick up a share of the punk market with this very political comic." The covers of issues No.2 and No.3 both feature archetypal "punk" characters, and issue No. 2 features the short comic "Kultur Documents", a punk rock parody of
Archie Comics
Archie Comic Publications, Inc., is an American comic book publisher headquartered in Pelham, New York.Situationist and punk rock imagery. Sabin noted that many of the comics didn't have any relationship to Punk culture, but thought that the comic may have introduced radical ideas to a generation of new, young punks.
Issues
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**"Too Real" by Jay Kinney
**"Nestor Makhno" by Spain Rodriguez (originally published in T.R.A.; 1976)
**"Smarmy Comics" by Jay Kinney
**"The Quilting Bee" by Melinda Gebbie
**"Blood and Sky" by Spain Rodriguez
**"Gilbert Shelton's Advanced International Motoring Tips" by Gilbert Shelton
**"Liberty Through The Ages" by Epistolier and Volny, with translation by Berangere Lomont (originally published in ''L'Echo Des Savanes'' No.29; 1977)
**"What's The Difference" by J.R. Burnham
**"Owd Nancy's Petticoat" by Clifford Harper
**"Safehouse" by Dohrn
**"On Contradiction" by M. Tsetung
**"Today's Rhetoric" by 'Spud' Silber
**"Some Straight Talk About Anarchy" by Paul Mavrides
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See also
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Anarchism and the arts
Anarchism has long had an association with the arts, particularly with visual art, music and literature. This can be dated back to the start of anarchism as a named political concept, and the writings of Pierre-Joseph Proudhon on the French re ...
*
Anarky
Anarky is a supervillain appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. Co-created by Alan Grant and Norm Breyfogle, he first appeared in ''Detective Comics'' #608 (November 1989), as an adversary of Batman. Anarky is introduced as ...
— DC Comics supervillain
*
Leonard Rifas
Leonard Rifas (b. April 16, 1951) is an American cartoonist, critic, editor, and publisher associated with underground comix, comics journalism, left-wing politics, and the anti-nuclear movement. He is notable for his contributions to the form ...
— cartoonist, editor, and publisher focused on similar themes
*
Trashman Trashman may refer to the following:
*Trashman (character), a fictional character and eponymous comic book created by Spain Rodriguez
* ''Trashman'' (video game), a 1984 video game for the ZX Spectrum
*The Trashmen, a band from Minneapolis, Minneso ...
— comics character with Marxist-anarchist overtones, created by Spain Rodriguez