Cortazzo+2nd+Genre+first+draft

Interview with a comic book illustrator of the 1950's

"In the 1950's, can you help me to understand the strife you've encountered as an illustrator?"

"//Yes. It is very easy to explain the struggles I had to endure, not to mention every other artist of the time. We were criticized for nearly everything we did. Every character we produced was found to have a flaw that was morally incorrect. It did not matter if the character was fighting evil, a critic always found an unintended sexual innuendo, or a trait that was undesirable. What the critics did not understand was that the flaws our characters had were essential to the characters growth and helped us to tell our stories."//

"Was the censorship difficult to get around as you wrote your stories?"

"//Of course it was difficult. Anything we did had to be revised or thrown away to start over again. The censorship became so ridiculous that many artists were run out of the business. The bigger companies such as Marvel and D.C. Comics survived because they had already made a huge name for themselves and had enough money to get through and lawsuits brought against them. The censorship we encountered really made the industry take a huge hit, and many artists simply quit, not finding it worth the trouble anymore."//

" Is the censorship the reason you stopped illustrating?'

"//Censorship had everything to do with me quitting. However much I loved drawing comics, I did not want to be socially exiled because of my work. I decided to stop too because I simply could not afford a lawsuit against me. Countless others did the same, and I wasn't the first."//

//"//Do you think the era of censorship in the 1950's crippled the industry forever?"

//" The industry will never be the same. Sales started dropping into the '60's and continued that trend slowly over time. It's really sad that this was allowed to happen, but it's almost irreversible. Today, video games are under the same kind of scrutiny, but it is a different time. Video games stand a better chance because the video game industry has followers that band together. It was unheard of in the 1950's for a bunch of kids to band together, and even if they did then, no one would have ever listened to what they had to say."//

" Have you considered coming back to the industry?"

"//The thought has crossed my mind, but it's very difficult to make a living in it anymore. Japan is a place in the world where comic books still strive, but it is different in America. A small cult following isn't enough for a new artist to find a following, since any prevelant comics these days have an iron fist in the industry. There simply isn't a big enough demographic anymore."//