Category Archives: interviews

academic, contributors, interviews, online

A. David Lewis Discusses Islam, Comics, Syria, and Flintstones with Boston’s NPR

A. David LewisIn just under a span of 10 minutes, S&S’s own A. David Lewis managed to address a span of issues with “Here & Now” co-host Robin Young on a recent WBUR broadcast. Touching on Ms. Marvel, the upcoming Muslim Superheroes essay collection, Ta-Nehisi Coates’s Black Panther and the Crew, and his own Kismet, Man of Fate, Lewis blitzed Young with a full update of many topics at the intersection of the comic book medium and Islam. And, he vouched for the surprising brilliance of the new Flintsones series, to boot!

Additionally, WBUR provided this video clip of Lewis going into further explanation of his charity work for Syria.

To support this venture, go to their Razoo fundraising page.

academic, contributors, controversy, interviews, online

Returning to the Religious Studies Project’s Comics Warning

A year or two ago, S&S Founding Members David McConeghy and A. David Lewis sat down to discuss the latter’s new book, American Comics, Literary Theory, and Religion: The Superhero Afterlife for The Religious Studies Project. Since that time, The Superhero Afterlife went on to be nominated for an Eisner Award, and McConeghy has switched American coasts, moving from West to East.

However, at around the same time, RSP’s own David G. Robertson penned this incisive response to the subject of their conversation, which, in light of 2017 politics and recent criticism of mainstream superhero storylines, now feels remarkably prescient.

Therefore it is vitally important for a non-essentialist and non-elitist study of religion that we consider comics in their cultural and historical context. Without that, structural analyses may be merely repeating hegemonic categories and structures of power.

Robertson is a Co-founding Editor of the Religious Studies Project and a committee member of the British Association for the Study of Religion. For his full CV, see his Academia page or personal blog here.

contributors, interviews

The Martian Chronicles of Julian Darius, Part III

MARTIN COMICS #5In this third and final installment of our discussion with Martian Comics creator and Sequart Organization founder Julian Darius, we discuss characters’ vs. readers’ vs. believers’ perspectives on Jesus and Paul, as well as the future of his series and any relationship it might have to real-world religions dealing with extraterrestrials.

S&S: I wonder: Of all the stories in this issue, “What Has Athens to Do with Jerusalem?” features the titular Martians the least, perhaps only in reference to the Athenians “Unknown god […] a placeholder the Athenians use, knowing their knowledge of the gods to be limited.” Do readers know from “Ezekiel” (and “The Galilean” and “Lazarus”) what it is the Athenians don’t, namely that aliens have had an influence in the spiritual affairs of humankind? Is this the manner of answer that Lazarus is seeking?

JD: I love that you saw a connection between the Unknown God and the Martians. That’s not my own primary reading, but it’s there. It follows, once you connect this story with “Ezekiel” — the Martians are, in a sense, an unknown god to the Greeks. And you’re right that they don’t know about Martians, any more than the ancient Jews did. There are other Martian stories to come that kind of play with this same sort of thing, in which humans sort of realize there are forces or divinities out there, beyond their ability to understand. So that’s definitely there, and you’re smart to pick up on it, but to me, that’s a layer, rather than the primary meaning.

Paul cites the “Unknown God” in Acts. There’s a historical dispute as to whether it really existed or not, or to what extent. Was there a temple to the Unknown God? Was there a statue or monument? From what I’ve read, some think yes, some think no. If I remember correctly, Paul only mentions an inscription to the Unknown God, and there’s some ambiguity about what he’s referring to. But it’s a wonderful concept, this polytheistic statement of humility. I suppose you could see it as a parody of polytheism — “We hope we didn’t leave anyone out!” And it is that. But it’s also this wonderful admission, by the smartest city around, that yeah, we don’t know anything. Here’s a monument to that idea. Wow.

I was always fascinated by the Unknown God. As a kid, I thought it was funny that Paul said he was going to tell people about it, because this frames his god in the context of Greek polytheism. Saying that, you’re essentially saying that you’re going to add a god to the Greek pantheon. You can’t say this and then preach monotheism, really. It’s at least very disingenuous. It wasn’t until studying Greek history in college that I began really appreciating the humility of the concept and how it fit into the Greek philosophical outlook. So I love the Unknown God concept and this story from Acts, and I included it on that basis. It illustrates more the difference between Paul’s arrogant “you’re ignorant!” preaching and the nuances of Athenian philosophy.

But yeah, you’re totally right: you can look at the Unknown God and think, “Yeah, they don’t know about the Martians, who played the role of God to Ezekiel.” And who were behind Jesus in the series. Continue reading The Martian Chronicles of Julian Darius, Part III →

contributors, interviews

The Martian Chronicles of Julian Darius, Part II

Continuing our interview with Martian Comics creator and the Sequart Organization founder Julian Darius, we move from his depiction of the prophet Ezekiel to his treatment of Lazarus and of Jesus, “The Galilean”:

S&S: “Ezekiel” is followed by the longer, 11-page, “What Has Athens to Do with Jerusalem?” The title, presumably, comes from the writings of the Church Father Tertullian, yet the story focuses on Lazarus, the man Jesus resurrected, and Paul. What’s the connection between the title and the concerns of the story?

JD: The quote comes from a later period. But it’s key to the point of the story.

On the one hand, the story allows us to catch up with Lazarus, seeing how he’s evolved —

S&S: Since readers last saw him in issue #2 of Martian Comics, freshly resurrected by Jesus but, in effect, unable to fully live or rejoin what was his life.

JD: Right. Lazarus actually has a cameo in issue #1, but issue #2 is the first to have a story all his own. The idea is to follow up on the Lazarus story, because the Bible never tells us what happened to him. The point is that Jesus resurrected him, and it’s a miracle – but Lazarus is just a prop, really. He’s a demonstration of Jesus’s power. So I thought “what happened next” was an interesting idea, and I thought this tension – about how Lazarus is kind of forgotten, once he’s resurrected – should be part of the story.

So in issue #2, Lazarus is resurrected, but he’s been decaying a little, and these rural Jews of the first century, who were pretty superstitious, would have seen him as a supernatural thing. They’re scared of him, and he doesn’t look right. It’s not going to be like “Oh, Lazarus, glad you’re alive again, old chap!” No, there are going to be rumors, and any physical deformity or ailment was seen as potentially demonic or dangerous. That’s why Jesus ministering to lepers was such a thing. And in those days, you really needed a community to survive. So Lazarus is alive, but he’s kind of a pariah. And he sees how this is hurting his family – that, as he says, he’s of no use to them.

So Lazarus is kind of figuring out what being resurrected means. It’s not just that you came back to life. You’re different now. You look different, and you’re treated differently. Jesus does his miracle, and everyone’s impressed, but no one really follows up with Lazarus. There’s no post-resurrection counselors or anything.

Along with this, what does resurrection mean biologically? Does someone who’s been resurrected return to life and live out a normal lifespan, as if they hadn’t died? Do they get a week and then die again? Maybe resurrection’s not permanent! Or do they live forever? I think we usually don’t ask these kinds of questions, and it’s not a focus of these stories in the Bible, where the point is that Jesus is powerful because he resurrected someone – implicitly encouraging us to believe. We kind of assume that any bodily decay is healed as part of the resurrection, although that doesn’t necessarily follow. And I was interested in exploring all of this. My Lazarus doesn’t have his bodily decay healed, and whatever energy resurrected him is still in him. He’s immortal, although he doesn’t know it at first. He learns it in pretty dramatic fashion in that story.

Continue reading The Martian Chronicles of Julian Darius, Part II →

from the Internet, interviews

Third Time’s the Charm: Steve Bergson on Barry Deutsch

Over at his Jewish Comics blog, S&S’s own Steve Bergson interviews Barry Deutsch on his latest installment of the Hereville series as well as the recent honor of once again winning the Sydney Taylor Award. The Hereville graphic novels feature, as quoted on the latest cover, “yet another 11-year-old time-traveling Orthodox Jewish babysitter” Mirka Hirschberg.

In their third interview together, Bergson asks Deutsch about his inspiration for Hereville: How Mika Caught a Fish:

When I first started writing this story, the villain was originally a magic chicken. But then I was inspired to use a magical fish character by a 2003 news story in New York, in which some Hasidic Jews reported hearing a carp in a fish market yell in Hebrew. This eventually got mixed up with the old fairy tale “The Fisherman and His Wife,” about a wish-granting Fish – the Brothers Grimm collected that fairy tale, among others.

More on this last of the 11-year-old Mirka books (not to rule out a 12-year-old Mirka’s set of adventures) and its link to Menachem Luchins in the interview!