David Hajdu. The Ten-Cent
Plague: The Great Comic-Book Scare and How It Changed America.
New
York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008. 448pp.
ISBN-10: 0374187673;
ISBN-13: 9780374187675 (hardcover).
Library of Congress: PN6725 .H33 2008
Dewey: 302.23/2 22
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in a Library with WorldCat
Publisher's On-Line Information ||
Author's website
Publisher's
description:
In the years between World War II and the emergence of television as a
mass medium, American popular culture as we know it was first
created--in the pulpy, boldly illustrated pages of comic books. No
sooner had this new culture emerged than it was beaten down by church
groups, community bluestockings, and a McCarthyish Congress--only to
resurface with a crooked smile on its face in Mad magazine.
Read the Prologue
via the New York Times
(March 23, 2008)
Read excerpts via
Bookforum
(February 2008)
Note: Page numbers
are taken from an advance review copy, so they are only approximate at
this time.
- Society Iss Nix ... 9
- It Was Work ... 32
- Crime Pays ... 53
- Youth in Crisis ... 71
- Puddles of Blood ... 92
- Then Let Us Commit
Them ... 112
- Woofer and Tweeter ...
132
- Love... LOVE... LOVE!!
... 154
- New Trend ... 175
- Humor in a Jugular
Vein ... 193
- Panic ... 209
- The Triumph of Dr.
Payn ... 228
- What Are We Afraid Of?
... 245
- We've Had It! ... 274
- Murphy's Law ... 305
- Out of the Frying Pan
and Into the Soup ... 319
- Epilogue ... 331
- Appendix ... 337
- Notes ... 353
- Bibliography ... 407
- Acknowledgments ... 413
- Index ... 417
Reviews /
Features:
See also: Reviews featured on author's website
Advocate Opinion Page
Staff. 2008. "Our Views: When comics raised anxiety [opinion]." 2theadvocate.com
(March 21, page 8B). [access online]
Akst, Daniel. 2008.
"Pulp factions: Wildly popular in the 1940s and '50s, edgy comics
aroused the ire of teachers, religious leaders, and lawmakers." Boston Globe
(March 16).
[access
online]
[anonymous review]. 2008.
The Week Daily
(April 1). [access online]
Baker, R.C. 2008.
"The Ten-Cent Plague:
Weird tales, indeed; David Hajdu's History of the
Comic-Book Panic." Village
Voice
(March 18).
[access
online]
Bartilucci, Vinnie.
2008a.
"David Hajdu On The Ten Cent Plague [interview]." Newsarama
(March 20). [access
online]
Bartilucci, Vinnie.
2008b. "Book Review: The Ten-Cent Plague." Newsarama (March
25). [access online]
Beaty, Bart, and Jeet
Heer. 2008. "Symposium: Culture Wars." Globe and Mail
(March 29). [access online]
Boucher, Geoff. 2008.
"'The Ten-Cent Plague' by David Hajdu: How comic book creators tested
the limits of content in the face of an ever-changing bonfire brigade."
Los Angeles
Times (March 16). [access
online]
Cardace, Sara. 2008.
"David Hajdu on the Great Comics Scare [interview]." Vulture (March 26).
[access online]
Clayson, Jane. 2008.
"WBUR & NPR's
On Point: The 1950s Comic-Book Scare." Hosted by Jane Clayson. WBUR & NPR's On Point -
Boston, MA - 909.0FM (March 26). Includes podcast. [access online]
Cremins, Robert. 2008.
"New in fiction and nonfiction: threats to wholesomeness." Houston Chronicle
(March 28). [access online]
DeLuca, Dan. 2008.
"Step aside, Elvis; comics changed it all." Philadelphia Inquirer (March
16). [access online]
Deusner, Stephen M. 2008.
"Not So Funny: David Hajdu on Comic Book Controversies." Express (April 7). [access online]
Dotinga, Randy. 2008.
"Why comic books scared us so: Captain Marvel reduced to ashes by
terrified parents? David Hajdu examines the great comic-book panic of
the 1950s." Christian
Science Monitor (March 25).
[access
online]
Drabelle, Dennis.
2008.
"Horror! Suspense! Censorship! A cultural critic recounts how comics
were ripped out of kids' grubby hands." Washington
Post Book World (March 23): BW08.
[access
online]
Duin, Steve.
2008a. Cartoonist quotations from Ten-Cent Plague
posted on April 1, April 2. The OregonianLive: Comics.
Duin, Steve. 2008b. "'Ten-Cent Plague' illustrates history of early comic-book scare." The Oregonian (April 11). [access online]
Ford, Gavin. 2008.
"When Comic Books were the Villains." Star-Gazette (27
March). [access online]
Frazier, Joseph B. /
Associated Press.
2008. "When Comic Books Were Under Attack." SFGate.com
(February 26). [access
online - also via The Intelligencer - also via London Free Press]
Frazier, Joseph B.
2008.
"Book talks about when comic books were under attack."
Canadian Press (February 26). [access
online]
Friedwald, Will. 2008.
"The Secret History of Comic Books." The New York Sun
(March 24). [access online]
Froehlich, Cliff.
2008. "Browsing graphic literature." St. Louis Post-Dispatch
(March 16). [also discusses Students for a Democratic
Society: A Graphic History; J. Edgar Hoover: A Graphic
Biography; Satchel
Paige: Striking Out Jim Crow; and Hotwire Comics No. 2.]
[access online]
Hajdu, David. 2008.
"David Hajdu: The
Ten-Cent Plague: The Great Comic-Book Scare and How It
Changed America."
Free Library of Philadelphia podcast (March 18). [access
online]
Heer, Jeet. 2008.
"How comic books ruined the nation." The Globe
and Mail (March 22).
[access
online]
Heer, Jeet. 2008a. "The
Caped Crusader: Frederic [sic] Wertham and the campaign against comic
books." Slate
(April 4). [access online]
Henriksen, Erik. 2008.
[review.] The Portland
Mercury (April 10). [access online]
Hodler, T. 2008. "A
Journal of the Plague Year." Comics
Comics [blog] (April 9). features dozens of comments.
[access online]
Hogan, Ron. 2008.
"Hajdu's Comic Turn: From Strayhorn to Dylan to the homoerotic in
Batman." Publishers
Weekly (January 7).
[access
online]
"The Horror! The
Horror!: Four brave
nonfiction writers [David Hajdu, David Gilmour, Louis Masur, Mary
Roach] discuss their subjects, which range from the surprising to the
taboo: creative parenting techniques, censorship, sex research, and
racial violence." Titlepage.tv,
episode 3. [video - access online]
Jensen, Van. 2008. "The
witch hunt that nearly killed comics." ComicMix (26
March). [access online]
Kaufmann,
David. 2008.
"Comics: Marvel's Mavens." Forward
(March 19). [also discusses Disguised
as Clark
Kent: Jews, Comics, and the
Creation of the Superhero]
[access
online]
Klaw, Rick. 2008.
"Readings." Austin
Chronicle (March 21). [access online]
Maslin, Janet. 2008.
"The Amazing Adventures of the Midcentury Comic Book Trade." New York
Times (March 10).
[access
online]
Mattise, Nathan. 2008.
"Comic books becoming geek chic with movie adaptations." The Daily Orange
(April 15). [access online]
Mautner, Chris. 2008.
"Comics' history not so comic, new book says". Patriot-News
(March 21).
[access
online]
Menand,
Louis. 2008.
"The Horror: Congress investigates the comics." New Yorker.com
(March 31). [access
online]
Miller, Laura. 2008.
"Panic in the Pages." Salon.com
(March 24). [access online]
Miller, Roger K.
2008a.
"Mad about comics: As the popularity of comics increased in the 1940s,
so did the fear and loathing of parents, churches and lawmakers." Minneapolis
Star Tribune (March 14).
[access
online] See also Shepherd-Express
(April 7, 2008): 38 [access online -
also via n-paper]
Miller, Roger K. 2008b.
"'Sick' influence on teens worried 1950s U.S." Pittsburgh
Post-Gazette (March 23).
[access
online]
Minzesheimer,
Bob. 2008.
"'Ten-Cent Plague': Comic books and censorship." USA Today
(March 19).
[access
online]
Mozzocco, J. Caleb. 2008a.
"A forgotten culture war." Las
Vegas Weekly (April 9). [access online]
Mozzocco, J. Caleb. 2008b. " Sixteen things I learned from The Ten-Cent Plague." Every Day is Like Wednesday (April 11). [access online]
Poague, George. 2008. "When U.S. trembled in fear of comics." The Leaf-Chronicle (April 13). [access online]
Powers, Ron. 2008.
"Penny Dreadfuls." New
York
Times Book Review (March 23).
[access
online]
Raeburn, Daniel. 2008.
"Arts: Back before Spider-Man and the X-Men, comic books were the
villains [book review]." Mother
Jones (March/April). [access online]
Reese, Jennifer.
2008.
"Comics On Trial: David Hajdu's book recalls the early decency battle
over that '50s scourge: comic books." Entertainment Weekly
(March 14). [access
online]
Rosenberg, Scott A. 2008.
"Curse of the comics." AM
New York (April 15). [access online]
Salie, Faith. 2008. "Fair
Game - Nicholas Christakis, Chris Parnell, David Hadju." PRI's Fair Game with Faith Salie
(April 1). [access description
online || MP3 direct link]
Schappell, Elissa.
2008. "Hooked on Comics." Vanity
Fair (March). [access online]
Seligman,
Craig. 2008.
"How Prudes, Senators Almost Killed Comic Books." Bloomberg
(March 18). [access
online] see also: The Plain Dealer (April 15, 2008). [access online]
Smith, Scott. 2008. "Book review: The Ten-Cent Plague." Time Out Chicago 163 (April 10-16). [access online]
"'The Ten-Cent Plague'
Streets Next Week: Strong Press in Run-Up to Release."
2008. ICv2 News (March 11). [access online]
Usborne, David. 2008.
"Congress and a comic caper: Popular culture and the American way have
never been comfortable bedfellows. As a new book reveals, even cartoons
were accused of corrupting the nation's youth." Independent
(March 25).
[access
online]
Wirick, Richard. 2008.
[review.] Bookslut
(April). [access online]
Wolff, Carlo. 2008. "The
Horror of Comic Books: Like communism, 1950s comic books scared the
U.S. government." St.
Petersburg Times (April 14). [access online]
Wolk, Douglas. 2008.
"Scare Tactics." Boston
Phoenix (March 24). [access online]
Wolk, Douglas and David
Hajdu. 2008. "A TNR Debate: 'The Ten-Cent Plague.'" The New Republic.
"Part One" (April 7) [access online].
"Part Two" (April 9) [access online].
Part Three" (April 10) [access online]
Zwicker, Jason A. 2008.
"Subversive Reading: David Hajdu recounts the controversial beginnings
of comic book history." Charleston
City Paper (April 9). [access online]
For many of these review
references, we send hearty "Thank
You!"s to Mike Rhode & the comics research bibliography; Tom
Spurgeon's Comics Reporter; The
Comics Journal's news blog, ¡Journalista!; and to
the members of the Comics Scholars Discussion List.