Arresting Development: Comics at the Boundaries of Literature by Christopher Pizzino; Why Comics? From Underground to Everywhere by Hillary Chute Available to Purchase

Is comics literature? One simple answer is no: if “literature” refers to works in prose and verse, then comics is not literature any more than film is. Comics is a distinct medium, complete with its own set of aesthetic concerns, its own aesthetic challenges, its own grammar. Another answer might emerge, however, if we are interested less in definitions or in establishing borders between different modes of representation than in assessing the sophistication of the comics form. Taken in this vein, the question “Is comics literature?” asks not how we might differentiate comics from novels and poems but whether the form is capable of aesthetic sophistication that merits serious, sustained, and intense critical attention. Despite their starkly different conclusions about the current state of comics, Christopher Pizzino’s Arresting Development: Comics at the Boundaries of Literature and Hillary Chute’s Why Comics? From Underground to Everywhere both raise salient questions about...