Jimmy Corrigan – The Smartest Kid on Earth – Chris Ware
Jimmy Corrigan – The Smartest Kid on Earth by Chris Ware / ISBN 9781681374048 / 380-page hardback from the Pantheon Graphic Library
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The first book from the Chicago author of the “stunning” Building Stories (The New York Times) is a pleasantly-decorated view at a lonely and emotionally impaired “everyman,” who is provided, at age 36, the opportunity to meet his father for the first time.
“This haunting and unshakable book will change the way you look at your world.” —Time magazine
“Jimmy Corrigan pushes the form of comics into unexpected formal and emotional territory.” —Chicago Tribune
An improvisatory romance which gingerly deports itself between 1890’s Chicago and 1980’s small town Michigan, the reader is helped along by thousands of colored illustrations and diagrams, which, when read rapidly in sequence, provide a convincing illusion of life and movement. The bulk of the work is supported by fold-out instructions, an index, paper cut-outs, and a brief apology, all of which concrete to form a rich portrait of a man stunted by a paralyzing fear of being disliked.
