This is a continuation of my previous post on the film Winchester (2018) and its earlier comic book adaptations. I want to take a look at a page from Peter J. Tomasi and Ian Bertram’s House of Penance (Dark Horse Comics, 2017) and think about how it brings together several elements of the real and speculative histories associated with the Winchester House, while also adding its own emotional and spiritual undercurrents.
Coming to theaters this Friday, February 2, is Winchester (2018), the new horror thriller by the Spiereg Brothers (Daybreakers, Jigsaw), starring Helen Mirren, Sarah Snook, and Jason Clarke. It’s a film I’m excited to see, not only because it offers the incomparable Helen Mirren another juicy role in a genre she hasn’t explored much even in her diverse & distinguished career, but because the story itself is one that has haunted my imagination since I first encountered it in the pages of Alan Moore’s Swamp Thing, over 30 years ago (more on that in a moment).
If you’ve been standing in one place spinning in circles on the first floor of Willis Library looking for the Graphic Novels section, you’re not hallucinating, they really did move!
You can find them in their own section on the third floor of Willis. Just take the elevator (or the stairs if you’re feeling frisky) and you’ll find them front and center.
Graphic Novels section on 3rd Floor of Willis Library
We’re building up our graphic novels collection this semester, so look for those shelves to fill up!
Comics studies at UNT dates back to at least 2011 when Dr. Shaun Treat, a Communications Studies faculty member, organized the first UNT Comic Studies Conference. This was a scholarly and pedagogical conference devoted to, “broadly surveying the diverse disciplinary approaches to studying or using comics as a resource for education, criticism, or critical engagement with relevant social issues.”
The UNT Libraries has a number of resources for folks interested in studying comics for research, coursework, collecting, or plain old pleasure reading. Below are a few places to get started.
These aren’t the only places you can find useful information, though, since every discipline may have its own approaches to comics as art, as literature, as a form of education, as digital media, as an industry,as a social or cultural phenomena, etc.–so it may be worth looking at books or articles in those areas of study as well (consult with a subject librarian, if you aren’t sure where to begin). But these resources might be of special interest to comics scholars from a variety of disciplines.
Welcome to the brand new Comics Studies at UNT Blog. This blog is a project of the UNT Libraries, and will include contributions from across the Libraries’ divisions, as well as from faculty, students, and others in the UNT community who share an interest in comics studies.
We include under “comics studies” the scholarly or critical examination of comic books, comic strips, graphic novels, cartoons, animation, films, and other forms of graphic narrative or sequential art. This examination may, but doesn’t have to, conform to traditional modes of scholarly inquiry. We encourage alternate ways of thinking and writing about comics, including interviews, images, videos, or multimedia artwork. Our scope is purposely broad in order to reflect the interests and range of disciplinary expertise in the comics studies community, as well as the scope of the collections and resources available at the UNT Libraries.
