Expanding the Canon of Graphic Design

This was a special issue of the publication designed to highlight the choices of prominent critics in relation to ‘forgotten classics’ of graphic design. My choice was the 19th century comic Ally Sloper’s Half Holiday for its imaginative use of the grid, and the way in which it translated the feel of music hall onto the printed page via a series of ‘turns’.

Roger Sabin

Research Interests

Cultural history, cultural studies, subcultural studies, film and television studies. Specialisms: comics, graphic novels, manga; punk and counterculture; 19th century entertainment; television crime drama. Cultural theory, especially postmodernism in history.
Current Research

Currently completing one book and co-authoring two others. The sole-authored book is about 19th century ‘funny papers’/comics, and in particular the character 'Ally Sloper', the first comics superstar. The other two concern TV crime drama: one is about The Wire, and one about the history of the genre. Also, various smaller-scale projects involving comics, graphic novels, manga and other areas listed above.

Previous books include: As Author: Comics, Comics and Graphic Novels (Phaidon); Adult Comics: An Introduction (Routledge); The Lasting of the Mohicans (University Press of Mississippi – co-authored with Martin Barker). As Editor: Punk Rock: So What? (Routledge); Below Critical Radar: Fanzines and Alternative Comics 1976-Now (Codex - with Teal Triggs); The Movie Book (Phaidon – with Michael Newton).