Comic Book Confidential.

• Author: Rothenberg, Robert S.

For 65 years, the comic book has reigned as a distinctly American art form, though the ride has been a bumpy one. Starting with Funnies on Parade in 1933, basically a stapling together of strips from the Sunday papers, it proceeded through the rise of superheroes in the late 1930s; jingoistic patriotism during World War II; postwar condemnation as corrupters of American youth; the return of superheroes, albeit many with neurotic character flaws, and the advent of "underground" comics in the 1960s; stardom in the movies and on television throughout the 1970s and 1980s; and their acceptance as an art form in illustrated novel format today. En route, they became collectibles with vastly inflated values, even being auctioned off in such posh establishments as Sotheby's and Christie's, to the consternation of all those despairing baby boomers...