“A surprising look at the deep religious motifs of superheroes,” bills the poster for First-Plymouth Church’s upcoming event, Superman, Batman, and Jesus. And while the locale might be curious — Brewsky’s Food & Spirits in Lincoln, NE — its premier presenter, S&S’s own Prof. Dan Clanton, is a key authority on the topic, himself a co-editor of Understanding Religion and Popular Culture from Routledge in 2012.
The event will also feature music by local talent Andrea Von Kampen. (Does she perform any music on the combined theme of religion and superheroics?)
In advance of the Spring 2017 release of Muslim Superheroes: Comics, Islam, and Representation, Mizan has been featuring a series of related articles on its Mizan Pop site. The first, dated this past summer, provides an overview of that category’s — “Muslim superheroes” — history.
The study of Muslim superheroes has only quite recently begun in earnest, with scholars like comics historian Fredrik Strömberg and French scholar Shirin Edwin publishing some of the first scholarly articles in this specific field in 2011. There has been a small but steady stream of work on the subject since. Regrettably, while some of this scholarship is of high quality, it has, to date, been scattered over multiple disciplines, and new work has only rarely been in dialogue with what has come before.
In theory, Muslim Superheroes, edited by A. David Lewis and Martin Lund, is intended to further that dialogue and provide stronger connective tissue between the disciplines on the topic. Their promotional Facebook page features links to some of that “steady stream on the subject” and a preview of the book jacket (featuring art by Qaheraartist Deena Mohamed).
Iconic painting of ‘The Last Supper’ by Hans Holbein the Younger, ca. 1520. Treasure Chest of Fun and Fact, v. 18, n. 15, March 28, 1963.
Readers of The Archivist’s Nook blog well know the popularity of the Catholic comic book, the Treasure Chest of Fun and Fact, published for most of its history, 1946-1972, by George Pflaum of Dayton, Ohio. The digital version of the collection is especially popular and has been highlighted in three previous blog posts, the first reviewing the origin of Catholic University’s digital collections, ‘Hark! The Digital Angel Comes!’; the second examining issue covers featuring Jesus Christ,‘Treasure Chest – Your Own Virtual Jesus’; and the third an exposition of covers related to the celebration of Christmas, ‘A Merry Treasure Chest Christmas to All!’.
The Last Easter cover, silhouette of Christ’s profile while on the Cross,Treasure Chest of Fun and Fact, v. 21, n. 16, April 7, 1966.
It will therefore be no surprise The Archivist’s Nook returns to the Treasure Chest’s remarkable treasure trove to commemorate Easter, past, present, and future. From the first volume of the Treasure Chest in 1946, through the next twenty years, there was usually an annual issue with a cover marking an Easter related event. Occasionally, the Treasure Chest skipped a year, while other years had two Easter related covers. Overall, the most popular were scenes of the empty tomb with the resurrected Jesus Christ announcing his presence (6 occasions) or an angel or angels (3 times) proclaiming the good news to Christ’s followers. Also, there were usually no Easter related stories therein to march the covers, though there were sometimes short features such as ‘Easter Eggs You Can Make’ (April 1, 1947) and ‘Our Lady of Sorrows’ (April 8, 1954).
The first Easter cover, presumably the scene from the Book of Mathew, Chapter 28, Verses 1-2, with the Angel of the Lord at Christ’s empty tomb proclaiming the Good News to Mary Magdalene, and another Mary,Treasure Chest of Fun and Fact, v. 1, n. 4, April 23, 1946.
The Treasure Chest of the post Second Vatican Council era became more secular in outlook and appearance so that few religious scenes, including any depicting Easter related events, appeared in its last five years, 1967-1972. Sadly, this change of direction was perhaps a harbinger of the Treasure Chest’s ending. Gone, but most certainly not forgotten!
This Fall, Palgrave Pivot is releasing Re-Constructing the Man of Steel: Superman 1938–1941, Jewish American History, and the Invention of the Jewish–Comics Connection by S&S’s own Martin Lund. The super-sized title only hints at the herculean task Lund has taken on: To objectively explore the Judaic origins to the Last Son of Krypton’s publications, too often a site of distortion an mythicism. Rather than discard Superman’s Jewishness wholly, Lund “offers a new understanding of the Superman created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster in the mid-1930s, presenting him as an authentically Jewish American character in his own time, for good and ill.”
This November, Congregation Kol Israel, in conjunction with The Brooklyn Jewish Art Gallery at CKI will be running the first Jewish Comic Con, “a place to explore how Jewish identity has influenced comics both on the page and behind the scenes.”
Both programming and guests have yet to be announced, but their open call for interested artists to reserve free tables (provided they donate a piece of their art to CKI) raises an intriguing point: In their FAQ, the organizers note that one needn’t be Jewish to exhibit:
You have to have somewhat of a connection to Jewish characters or have Jewish themes in your body of work. If you’re from another minority and you feel we have a lot in common, please come too, we’d love to have you!
These inclusive, interfaith sentiments are quite laudable, though it will be interesting to see, when programming is released to their sign-up list, whether this proves to be an insular event or one in more of an pluralistic vein.
@ the intersection of religion and comics: Graphic Religion
This Fall, 
