pñvñpt kñ bachmann in other words non-fiction category of comics is pretty darn small and too much of it is by harvey and

myself. [laughter] so we are very much hoping that this kind of comic will be a gateway drug for young people to go ahead and read the books, but also that the art which is made by comic artists would be taken seriously as a form of art and understood as such and appreciated as such and it may overcome the great difficulty which is these books are expensive to produce because you have to pay artists. writers don't have to be paid if they teach some place and generally are not paid. artists me to be paid and secondly these books don't cost so much because they can't have a heavier price themself been over someone. these are serious disadvantages but at least in terms what critics are beginning to say we seem to be going some place. >> i think that especially

younger and readers are enthusiastic for graphic novels, and they have sort of gandy cultural and critical legitimacy allyson beck -- becktell's book was a finalist, will persepolis -- people are reading them. >> that certainly is true. >> this book is only $23. you people in the front, took a look. a seriously that seems unbelievable reasonable to me. we have got to open this up for questions, and they are meant to be questions, not first comic book you ever read. you asked to any questions. i'm telling you, you sat up there five minutes last time. [laughter] i'm sorry? to the microphone.

i appreciate you, you were great last time that you can't monopolize the microphone. >> i was hoping one or all of you would comment on the difference between the way that the book like this book portrays nonfiction verses the way that perhaps the culture is becoming abscessed with reality through reality television. >> that is a wonderful question. >> this is a more honorable and respectable way -- >> it's not reality and the cold reality television -- when these people go on these ridiculous races around the world, what does that have to do with reality? [laughter] you know, i don't know where they get that from. they show people getting mad at each other and yelling at each other all the time and, you know, it's like conflict all the time. you know, i mean, reality is, you know, just, you know, going

home and eating supper or something like that. [laughter] >> american splendor complaining about the cleveland indians. >> you had made a quote he said there's no such thing as an ordinary person however within the books you highlight people's ordinary lives with, you know -- >> how do you define an ordinary life? >> exactly, that's kind of a segue to her question if there is no such thing as an ordinary person would do you gauge as extraordinary in ordinary and then on top of that, to parts, sorry. do either you, harvey or paul feel that you are romanticizing the working class as far as turning it into this is how it should be looked at instead of like harvey, eating dinner is the reality of the job? >> i think that, you know, what i would like to do i am not a

jogging to put so-called ordinary people ahead of so-called extraordinary people will, but i would like to seek them who, you know, the same level. because everybody -- there are all kind of essential jobs in society and very few people get credit for doing these jobs. >> you should never mistake celebrated with extraordinary either. i don't know how good of a singer britney spears is. she might be a great singer. but i saw paris hilton on david letterman last night and people were like you were extraordinary, for what? laughter, and i think it's subjective, the whole view but don't mistake -- i think too often we mistakes of the credit for extraordinary and that is unfair to all but concerned. go ahead, paul, what do you think?

>> i think if you go through the book and read carefully any number of the people you could say why don't they drop their job and go to another, why do they stay with a miserable job and there's no easy answer to that. there's also some business executives and others that are by no means favorably treat in their own words. you know, they actually think highly of themselves, but the reader doesn't think they do very much with their hands coming to his or her own conclusion and studs was taking a straight on. you never have this sense of studs talking town or engaging in false uplifting and i am hoping not to have done that through my editing process and i will think harvey did that either. there is inclination to those underrepresented and this also comes from my social history world to discover the lives of latino farm workers that nobody has been willing to talk about before or the other cases where

so-called hillbillies' from appalachian who are not thought to be articulate unless the appear as horrible murders or johnson or wherever the usual portrait is and to let them speak for themselves. that may be a form of room anticipation as possible, but mostly i think to hear the voice and straight out, not to hear them through some other means or interpreted by us is a victory for ordinary life and for the perception of ordinary life in a far more space way than most literature. >> well put. no more questions? go ahead. stand up. >> welcome harvey and paul, you guys have done three books including the sts book so i am wondering what are you working on now other than being a defense like this?

>> he wishes me to speak. [laughter] which is curious since i am the editor and he is the speaker. we have been starting work on a book called yiddish land and i am a gentile from downstate illinois and i stumbled into the yiddish world history and start interviewing and ended in communities with yiddish native speakers of all socialism. they adopted me as a grandchild and i was eager to adopt them as grandparents and i fell under reading yiddish poetry and so forth. for harvey the first language was yiddish, so what is the story of that 800 years that isn't entirely gone but which has an enormous richness and a huge impact in american popular culture that is rarely recognized. number two, harvey has been writing about jazz close to 50 years and everybody knows how police and his writing is, so what we want to do after that is

do a comic about jazz and various kinds of ways. it is a fabulous idea of somebody will offer some money we will do it. >> this is a precursor, please, sir. >> thank you. i want to honor you guys for bringing this form to something more powerful. i learned an awful lot from studs terkel and the thing i learned to do best is how to be curious and a way that left space for the person curious about and i hope that your book helps us learn better. thank you. studs was as other panelists know him at it closer level fabulous personality and you could hardly think of not looking at him when you are in the same room as him, but just the idea that you have raised

that he ceases to be the standard of attention by his own determination and the other person has the kind of space, that is the remarkable thing. let me connect with one more matter. frequently there are these breakthroughs in communications and mosul frequently but it's happened the last few centuries and most often there is a period of ten or 20 years when all kind of so-called amateurs come in and like the first newspapers were the first radio station thank you the retial was taken over by the monopolies or the first days of live television when studs had studs' place on local chicago and to the local degree about the webbs' well and by throwing comics and we go through each one of these cases and after the beginning phase and these areas or corporatized and formulas are set and then it is people who are grinding out

the material expected of them and they don't have room for creativity. i discovered probably only when i began working on comex again after the lapse most people growing up thought the comics were written, john and everything else by the same artist who often wasn't acknowledged and we learned later in life is like a assembly line. that is the way that d.c. and comics are produced. you might write or do something else but it's just a job to come in and spend your hours and so on and so forth. we are in that phase now without work comics. that is what is exciting about it. it is probably because there is such little money and nobody wants to take it over and there is no indication that anybody wants to take over but there is enormous amount of excitement and especially artists under 30 there is so much more on the web and harvey can talk about some of the stuff he's connected with on the web, i am not, that is

larger in volume than anything in printed form for obvious financial reasons. but it represents forms of expression and especially young people finding forms of expression, creating new forms of art which is altogether remarkable and hopefully we will point the way towards a new way of seeing the connections of art and life. >> this question basically is for harvey and studs, where they gave people a voice that normally didn't have a voice. and to preface this i grew up in cleveland ohio so when i read american splendor i don't see you getting the ordinary person eight weeks but i see you giving an entire region, the city of cleveland itself and i was wondering if you look at in retrospect in hindsight america's splendor, do you look at your work and see it as giving a voice to this larger

region or individual person? >> maybe both. like one of my concerns is to make people feel better about themselves to not feel bad about themselves because maybe they don't make as much money as the other guy but cleveland is not, it's not that bad to live. [laughter] you hear stuff about the river catching on fire and stuff like that but i mean there's nice stuff about. >> i grew up there, i loved it. >> i think it's okay. it's decent and people are fine. and yes, i have concerns. i'm actually writing a book like a graphic novel will have --

about cleveland and also like talking about great experiences on hand like when i was a little kid and i listened to the 1948 world series and the broadcast assets will over the p.a. system and the indians won. [laughter] it's been a long time since cleveland has won a championship. [laughter] they bombed out like lebron james didn't make it to the finals of the nba championship having the best record in the league. but i guess if you know about the cubs -- [laughter] >> thank you. ladies and gentlemen, harvey, paul, he elizabeth, me, studs. thanks for coming, by this book. [applause]

>> thank you for attending today's discussion and supporting the chicago tribune's commitment to literacy. a book signing will take place in the arts room as you exit this room to the left, it is the first room on your left. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations]

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