Harvey Pekar – författare

In Not the Israel My Parents Promised Me, one of the final graphic memoirs from the man who defined the genre, Pekar explores what it means to be Jewish and what Israel means to the Jews. Over the course of a single day in his hometown of Cleveland, Ohio, Pekar and the illustrator JT Waldman wrestle with the mythologies passed down to them. Combining his increasing disillusionment with Israel with an account of the Jewish people since biblical times, Pekar, aided by Waldman's protean art, weaves a personal and historical odyssey of uncommon power. Plainspoken and empathetic, Pekar had no patience for injustice and prejudice, and he arrives at the firm belief that all peoples should be held to the same universal standards of decency, fairness, and democracy. With an epilogue written by Joyce Brabner, Not the Israel My Parents Promised Me is an essential book for fans of Pekar and anyone interested in the past and future of the Jewish state.

By the late 1960s, America felt like it was teetering on the edge of a vast transformation. Helping push it over that edge was a brigade of young radicals, the Students for a Democratic Society, who were fighting the establishment for peace abroad and equality at home. In "Students for a Democratic Society: A Graphic History", the famed graphic novelist Harvey Pekar, the gifted artist Gary Dumm, the renowned historian Paul Buhle, and a marvelous cast of they-were-there contributors illustrate their struggle, bringing to life the tumultuous decade that first defined and then was defined by the men and women who gathered under the SDS banner. "Students for a Democratic Society" captures the idealism and activism that drove a generation of young Americans to believe that even one person's actions can help transform the world.