Comics - The link between art and literature

A Brief History of Comics

Throughout the ages, the comic has evolved from caricature pictures, aimed to jibe at political figures, to the comics we now know today, a means of both art and literature.

Throughout your first task, you will be asked to look up on any comic material. This part is crucial through your web quest. It is vital for you to understand what a comic really means, therefore some notes will be provided for you.

What are comics?

A comic basically is a mixture of text and picture. They began from early civilizations, for example, the earliest recorded narrative through pictures is the Lascaux cave which depicts animals being chased by early humans. The Egyptians used combinations of images and hieroglyphs to record a story of the afterlife and the life of certain important people; these formed narratives. 

The first regular comic strip came out in 1884 in England featuring the first comic hero; Ally Sloper. A few years after in 1890, the first comic series appeared called Comic Cuts, the world�s first regular appearing comic. 

In the 1930�s the popularity of comics encouraged publishers to collect these into books. Therefore the term �comic book� came into existence. However, during later years, writers and artists started to have motives behind their comics, in result, creating one of the most famous characters in comic history. As the saying goes; necessity is the mother of all invention. Hence, in 1941, Captain America was born. During World War Two, to prevent American demoralization, Marvel comics came out with Captain America to give the soldiers a reason to fight and read about his heroics against the Nazi forces.  His origins are mainly to create a super soldier during the war that wielded an indestructible shield and fought against the Axis powers. Captain America is just an example of how reality bleeds into the comic world. 

Meanwhile, during 1939, Detective Comics, were creating their own versions of superheroes, thus the birth of Batman and Superman. Therefore we can wrap up these genres of comics (1930�s-1950�s) as the Golden Age of comics.

Following the Golden Age, came the Silver Age (1950�s-1970�s), followed by the Bronze age, in other words, the American period which introduced characters such as Spiderman and his nemesis, the Green Goblin. The Modern age brought comic writers and artists such as Stan Lee, Steve Ditko, Gil Kane, John Romita Sr., Jack Kirby and many more.