Will Eisner - Böcker

In Graphic Storytelling and Visual Narrative, Will Eisner—one of the most influential comic artists of the twentieth century—lays out the fundamentals of storytelling and their application in the comic book and graphic novel. In a work that will prove invaluable for comic artists and filmmakers, Eisner reveals how to construct a story and the basics of crafting a visual narrative. Filled with examples from Eisner's work as well as that of artists like Art Spiegelman and R. Crumb, this essential work covers everything from the fine points of graphic storytelling to the big picture of the medium, including how to:Combine words and images into seamless storytelling.Wield images like narrative tools.Master different types of comic book stories.Write and illustrate effective dialogue.Develop ideas that can be turned into dynamic stories.

Designed and outlined by Will Eisner before his death in 2005, this posthumous masterwork, the third and final book in the Will Eisner Instructional Series, finally reveals the secrets of Eisner’s own techniques and theories of movement, body mechanics, facial expressions, and posture: the key components of graphic storytelling. From his earliest comics, including the celebrated Spirit, to his pioneering graphic novels, Eisner understood that the proper use of anatomy is crucial to effective storytelling. His control over the mechanical and intuitive skills necessary for its application set him apart among comics artists, and his principles of body grammar have proven invaluable to legions of students in overcoming what is perhaps the most challenging aspect of creating comics. Buttressed by dozens of illustrations, which display Eisner’s mastery of expression, both subtle and overt, Expressive Anatomy for Comics and Narrative will benefit comics fans, students, and teachers and is destined to become the essential primer on the craft.

Will Eisner (1917–2005) saw himself as "a graphic witness reporting on life, death, heartbreak, and the never-ending struggle to prevail." The publication of A Contract With God when Eisner was sixty-one proved to be a watershed moment both for him and for comic literature. It marked the birth of the modern graphic novel and the beginning of an era when serious cartoonists could be liberated from their stultifying comic-book format.More than a quarter-century after the initial publication of A Contract With God, and in the last few months of his life, Eisner chose to combine the three fictional works he had set on Dropsie Avenue, the mythical street of his youth in Depression-era New York City.As the dramas unfold in A Contract With God, the first book in this new trilogy, it is at 55 Dropsie Avenue where Frimme Hersh, the pious Jew, first loses his beloved daughter, then breaks his contract with his maker, and ends up as a slumlord; it is on Dropsie Avenue where a street singer, befriended by an aging diva, is so beholden to the bottle that he fails to grasp his chance for stardom; and it is there that a scheming little girl named Rosie poisons a depraved super’s dog before doing in the super as well.In the second book, A Life Force, declared by R. Crumb to be "a masterpiece," Eisner re-creates himself in his protagonist, Jacob Shtarkah, whose existential search reflected Eisner’s own lifelong struggle. Chronicling not only the Crash of 1929 and the Great Depression but also the rise of Nazism and the spread of left-wing politics, Eisner combined the miniaturist sensibility of Henry Roth with the grand social themes of novelists such as Dos Passos and Steinbeck.Finally, in Dropsie Avenue: The Neighborhood, Eisner graphically traces the social trajectory of this mythic avenue over four centuries, creating a sweeping panorama of the city and its waves of new residents—the Dutch, English, Irish, Jews, African Americans, and Puerto Ricans—whose faces changed yet whose lives presented an unending "story of life, death, and resurrection."The Contract With God Trilogy is a mesmerizing, fictional chronicle of a universal American experience and Eisner’' most poignant and enduring literary legacy.

With an unparalleled eye for stories and expressive illustration, Will Eisner, the master and pioneer of American comics art, presents graphic fiction's greatest celebration of the Big Apple. No illustrator evoked the melancholy duskiness of New York City as expressively as Eisner, who knew the city from the bottom up. This new hardcover presents a quartet of graphic works (New York, The Building, City People Notebook, and Invisible People) and features what Neil Gaiman describes as "tales as brutal, as uncaring as the city itself." From ancient buildings "barnacled with laughter and stained with tears" to the subways, "humorless iron reptiles, clacking stupidly on a webbing of graceful steel rails," Will Eisner's New York includes cameo appearances by the author himself; several new illustrations sketched by Eisner, posthumously inked by Peter Poplaski; and three previously unpublished "out-takes"—a treasure for any Eisner fan, and sure to become a collectible. Introduction by Neil Gaiman.

In what will be the closest thing Eisner fans will see to an autobiography, the great master and pioneer of American graphic arts presents the most intimate and personal perspective yet on his life as a writer, a professional, and an artist. “The Dreamer” and “To the Heart of the Storm” describe Eisner’s gritty early life and career, while “The Name of the Game” chronicles a personal history of his wife’s family. Finally, two shorter pieces illuminate the bookends of a legendary career: “The Day I Became a Professional” —which will appeal to any hopeful young artist—describes Eisner’s first rejection from a potential publisher, and “A Sunset in Sunshine City” provides a poignant portrait of Eisner in old age. The book features famous characters from the world of comics (under pseudonyms, of course) and other historical figures and family members, all drawn with Eisner’s characteristic mastery and technique.

This Norton Critical Edition includes:Jared Gardner’s insightful introduction and explanatory notes.Generous selections from four of Will Eisner’s major graphic novels and story collections, carefully chosen with student readers in mind.Will Eisner’s interviews and published writing on comics and the graphic novel genre from 1978 to 2000.Thirteen wide-ranging reviews and assessments of Eisner’s works.Critical essays by Andrew J. Kunka, Paul Williams, Jeremy Dauber, Greg M. Smith, and Derek Parker Royal.A chronology of Will Eisner’s life and work and a selected bibliography.

Called “a masterpiece” by R. Crumb, A Life Force chronicles not only the Great Depression but also the rise of Nazism and the spread of socialist politics through the depiction of the protagonist, Jacob Shtarkah, whose existential search reflected Eisner’s own lifelong struggle.

Through a quartet of four interwoven stories, A Contract With God express the joy, exuberance, tragedy, and drama of life on the mythical Dropsie Avenue in the Bronx. This is the legendary book that launched a new art form and reaffirmed Will Eisner as one of the great pioneers of American graphics.

Before the Lower East Side was cool, there was the grit and grime of Avenue C, a world filled with street musicians, overflowing sewers, and peeping toms, all recalled in Eisner’s unforgettable style.

Character sketches and timeless snapshots of the eccentric denizens of the American city that perfectly capture Eisner’s genius and powers of observation.

A collection of brilliant short-story gems, including "A Sunset in Sunshine City"—an ode to memory and nostalgia inspired by Eisner's transition to life in Florida after his "retirement" in 1985.

A roman à clef about Eisner's early years in the thriving comics industry prior to World War II—featuring new annotations that reveal comics pioneers such as Bob Kane and Jack Kirby who appear under pseudonyms.

A haunting trio of stories about life’s forgotten shut-ins in the tradition of Kafka, Gogol, and Melville.

A historical novel touching on prejudice, assimilation, and anti-Semitism, this sweeping saga takes us from New York in the eighteenth century to Vienna before World War I, and finally to America during the depression and World War II.

In Dropsie Avenue: The Neighborhood, Eisner graphically traces the social trajectory of this mythic avenue over four centuries, creating a sweeping panorama of the city and its waves of new residents, whose stories present an unending “story of life, death, and resurrection.”

In this graphic novel, Will Eisner’s pen cuts an expansive swath through all aspects of the human condition. Life on Another Planet places American life within a broader perspective, chronicling the lives of scientists, politicians, spies, and nobodies as they come to terms with the discovery of extraterrestrial life: in reaching out to other galaxies, Eisner’s characters ultimately find themselves focusing within.

In this classic graphic novel, Will Eisner’s pen cuts an expansive swath through all aspects of the human condition. A Family Matter starts close to home, following a family as it gathers to observe the ninetieth birthday of its patriarch. While they must decide how best to provide for him, he ends up making a crucial choice of his own.

In this classic graphic novel, Will Eisner’s pen cuts an expansive swath through all aspects of the human condition. A powerful portrayal of Jewish life in the New York City of Eisner’s youth, Minor Miracles encourages similar introspection as it examines how luck and coincidence converge in everyday life in ways that, in hindsight, seem miraculous.

Loosely based on the story of Eisner's wife's family, this epic tale spanning three generations of power and privilege explores wealth, marriage, and jealousy in a sprawling American dynasty.

With an unparalleled eye for stories and expressive illustration, Will Eisner, the master and pioneer of American comics art, presents one of his renowned celebrations of the Big Apple. No illustrator evoked the melancholy duskiness of New York City as expressively as Eisner, who knew the city from the bottom up.The Building is a story filled with ghosts, and a testament to our greatest human qualities—a deeply moving chronicle of a city building and the people who inhabited it.

The Plot, which examines the astonishing conspiracy and the fabrication of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, has become a worldwide phenomenon since its hardcover publication, taught in classrooms around the globe. Purported to be the actual blueprints by Jewish leaders to take over the world, the Protocols, first published in 1902, have become gospel truth to international millions. Presenting a pageant of historical figures from nineteenth-century Russia to today's ideologues, including Tsar Nicholas II, Henry Ford, and Adolf Hitler, Will Eisner unravels and dispels one of the most devastating hoaxes of the twentieth century.

Will Eisner is one of the twentieth century's great American artists, a man who pioneered the field of comic arts. Here, in his classic Comics and Sequential Art, he refines the art of graphic storytelling into clear, concise principles that every cartoonist, comic artist, writer, and filmmaker meeds to know.Adapted from Eisner's landmark course at New York's School of Visual Arts, Comics and Sequential Art is an essential text filled with invaluable theories and easy-to-use techniques. Eisner reveals here the fundamentals of graphic storytelling. He addresses dialogue, anatomy, framing, and many other important aspects of the art form. Fully updated and revised to reflect current practices and technology, including a section on digital media, this introduction to the art of comics is as valuable a guide as it was when first published.

Published in 1978, Will Eisner’s revolutionary literary work A Contract With God marked the invention of the modern graphic novel. A mesmerising fictional chronicle of a universal American experience, it inspired a generation of sequential artists. Through a quartet of interwoven stories, A Contract With God expresses the joy, exuberance, tragedy and drama of life on the mythical Dropsie Avenue in the Bronx. Crafted with the highest fidelity to Eisner’s artistic vision, this edition uses new, high-resolution reproductions of Eisner’s original artwork, bringing new clarity and immediacy to Eisner’s writing, illustration and composition.

Wherever men live, be they nomads or city dwellers, there they must have law and a man to enforce it. Meet Detective John Law of Crossroads City. Strong, decent, hardworking and hard-nosed. He’s a man who believes in the law and order. He’s the last of a dying breed. In 1948, Will Eisner produced the first issue of “John Law Detective”, which he intended to add to a line of self-published comics. However, after Eisner's “Baseball Comics”, “Kewpies”, and “Pirate Comics” failed to find an audience, John Law never made it to the newsstand and was quietly dropped, with much of the original artwork reworked in 1950 for his most famous creation, The Spirit. Featuring original stories by Will Eisner, Gary Chaloner’s award-winning reboot from 2004, including a previously unpublished John Law Story, and a forward by long-time Eisner publisher Denis Kitchen, this is a must-have for not just Eisner fans but comic collectors of all ages.