I think you’d have to put his hands in cement to stop him from creating stuff. I love how he drew those crazy little faces on all those wooden spools.
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Magnetic resonance angiographies? I confuzz.
Yeah, that was cute, but I hated how he treated women like little more than cum-buckets.
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A lot of men seem to feel that way. He is far more candid than most. He’s been pretty consistently saying for years that he is messed up, damaged goods. If nothing else, he provides an unflinching look into the psyche of an all-too-common type. (Sometimes it’s interesting to have a window into someone’s brain. I sat behind a little kid at BAMBI who said everything that came into his mind, and it turned out to be worth the price of admission all by itself.)
I’ve been reading his work long enough not to be shocked by his admissions any more, and the more I find out about other creators, the more it looks like most people whose work I enjoy (not all, I hope) are assholes, sick in the head, or support politicians who are just plain evil. I’m just about okay with the notion of enjoying the work of people who I might not want to be alone with in meatspace. If I didn’t, I might have to shut off the Glenn Gould recording I’m listening to right now, and maybe everything written by Mozart or Beethoven.
And nobody has to follow my example. (I’m just saying that so you know I know you know that, you know?)
Okay, there’s that compelling separation between the creator and the work, but it’s not there really with Crumb, is it? I mean, if you read a lot of his stuff, how do you deal with the repeated expression in it of such repulsive, sickening attitudes towards women? For me, it keeps the work from being fairly compared to that produced by Gould, Mozart and Beethoven.
Like Gould et al, I cut him slack because he’s a brilliant artist and writer. Seeing his body of work from childhood on shows a lot of how he got there, and it’s fascinating in its way. I read less of the sickening stuff than of the rest, though having seen that tells me something going in. Yeah, sometimes the misogyny ruins his fiction, but in non-fiction, it’s like seeing inside someone’s head without having to go there. I also find some of the art of the insane interesting, but mostly only if it’s technically good work, not a puddle of scrawls. It takes me someplace that I’m vaguely afraid of, and it’s a warning at the same time.
Like the famous painting by Kurelek, “The Maze,” which I first saw in a Time-Life book on the mind:
I’m not hoping to convince you you should like somebody you don’t, but I can’t always resist a conversation.
[Edited to replace image with one that held detail better.]
As time goes on, Woody Allen and Crumb seem to be converging. Soon Woody will start drawing and Crumb will be Jewish and we’ll be there.
It’s not that I don’t like a lot of his work. I just have to turn away so often. And I go back less and less, all because of the misogyny. I wish he’d at least put it to good use (like someone else did here – I can tell by the lettering).
ETA: I see enough misogyny. Too much. I don’t see any value in traveling inside Crumb’s mind or whatever to encounter more.
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…you are being funny yes? Please don’t make me type out MRA or PUA, I will hate you forever…
I understood PUA immediately because you know, wanna come back to my place and see my teddy bear collection? But MRA was a new one. I’ve never met any of those douchebags, so it wasn’t in my reality.
Oh you’ve met them, you just didn’t know the secret handshake so they didn’t reveal themselves to you.
If you want an education at a safe distance I heartily suggest We Hunted the Mammoth, they keep track of these douchecanoes and report on them so we don’t have to!
Egads. You’re killing me. I died today.
Sorry, hope you didn’t need to do any work today. 
Seriously, WHTM is doing the world an amazing favour keeping an eye on these guys. (Cuz you know if a woman did it we’d be SWAT’d in seconds.)
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I need more coffee for this. Got any crumb cartoons instead?
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what for, not joining the Crumb haters club?
First bbs Terms of Service rule. I’ll let you figure out how many you broke:
Be cool. Don’t post insulting, bullying, victim-blaming, racist, sexist, or homophobic remarks.
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(FYI for anyone trying to parse the preceding exchange, some comments got eaten. Yay!)
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My new rule: I won’t support living assholes, but have no problem spending money on their works once they’re dead.
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