Larry Gonick is a veteran American cartoonist best known for his delightful comic-book guides to science and history, many of which have previews online. Chief among them is his long-running
Cartoon History of the Universe (later
The Cartoon History of the Modern World), a sprawling multi-volume opus documenting everything from the Big Bang to the Bush administration. Published over the course of three decades, it takes a truly global view -- its time-traveling Professor thoroughly explores not only familiar topics like Rome and World War II but the oft-neglected stories of Asia and Africa, blending caricature and myth with careful scholarship (cited by
fun illustrated bibliographies) and tackling even the most obscure events
with intelligence and wit. This savvy satire carried over to Gonick's
Zinn-by-way-of-
Pogo chronicle
The Cartoon History of the United States, along with a bevy of
Cartoon Guides to other topics, including
Genetics, Computer Science, Chemistry, Physics, Statistics, The Environment, and (yes!)
Sex. Gonick has also maintained a few sideprojects, such as
a webcomic look at Chinese invention,
assorted math comics (
previously), the
Muse magazine mainstay
Kokopelli & Co. (featuring the shenanigans of his
"New Muses"), and
more. See also
these lengthy interview snippets, linked
previously. Want more? Amazon links to the complete oeuvre inside!
[more inside]
posted by Rhaomi
on Jun 6, 2011 -
29 comments
Click here? Was structuralism, the big idea of Claude Lévi-Strauss, more cult than science? Apostolos Doxiadis, Alecos Papadatos and Annie Di Donna – the team behind the bestselling graphic novel Logicomix – investigate.
posted by infini
on Mar 18, 2010 -
30 comments
The Great War: "People at the time experienced it differently. We may think they were misinformed and deluded, and perhaps they were, or maybe we have become incredibly cynical and mistrusting. What were once considered to be civic virtues are now thought to be quaint anachronisms at best or grand delusions at worst. Things change." The site proffers an incredible variety of popular-press articles and imagery concerning the unfortunate European events of 1914 to 1918.
posted by mwhybark
on Sep 1, 2006 -
40 comments
"You live in the big here. Wherever you live, your tiny spot is deeply intertwined within a larger place, imbedded fractal-like into a whole system called a watershed, which is itself integrated with other watersheds into a tightly interdependent biome. At the ultimate level, your home is a cell in an organism called a planet. All these levels interconnect. What do you know about the dynamics of this larger system around you?
30 questions to elevate your awareness (and literacy) of the greater place in which you live.
posted by Hartster
on Jul 13, 2006 -
31 comments
Wow.
Spartacus Educational is a masterwork of hyperlinked history with a rather eclectic list of focus topics that can suck you in and never let go. Start anywhere, and then just click, and click, and click...
In light of recent events, you might begin, if you wish, with a brush-up on the 1914
assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo, and from there go on to find out more about the
Black Hand secret society responsible for the killing. You may attempt to sidestep politics by going to
cartoonists, or
U.S. novelists and poets, but you will find that the site is organized against a backdrop of world politics (viewed chiefly from a British perspective), a point of view that weaves its own endlessly looping and mesmerizing mesh.
posted by taz
on Mar 14, 2003 -
9 comments
