Wolfgang J. Fuchs (1945–2020)

In Comics: Anatomy of a Mass Medium, Reinhold Reitberger and Wolfgang Fuchs examine the history of comics from the earliest newspaper strips through modern comic books. This 1971 volume is, in many ways, the first textbook to take this medium seriously and is a good follow-up to Coulton Waugh’s 1948 study, simply titled The Comics. Addressing comic books and their audience, Reitberger and Fuchs write, “The high standard of Marvel publications made them interesting also to older readers, and the average age of the Marvel Comics readership is far higher than that of any other comics publishing concern. In the mid-sixties Marvel was favourite reading matter on the campus for both students and professors” (pg. 114). Their discussion of censorship is particularly revealing.

Reitberger and Fuchs write or sexuality in comics, “After 1948 sex was beginning to be strongly emphasized in comics and Gregory Page created The Phantom Lady, a very feminine super-heroine indeed, as her generous décolleté proclaimed. But after 1954, when the Code Authority had come into being, all the girls except Wonder Woman, whether they had super-powers or lived in the jungle, disappeared into the comics limbo, and only a few made a comeback in the sixties, notably the Black Canary and The Black Widow. For a while comics denied American matriarchy and sexual behaviour and showed a world ruled exclusively by men. Even the slightest suggestion of sex stimulus was avoided; censorship would have clamped down immediately on any accentuation of the female form. What, girls in tight-fitting tights? Impossible!” (pg. 125). Turning to the Code and official censorship, they write, “Since the censorship of 1954 came into force death is only shown as fiction in comics: a kind of unreal state of non-existence which can never figure as a satisfactory solution to any problem” (pg. 127).

They continue, “In 1968, after the assassination of Robert Kennedy, President Johnson appointed the National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence. Its brief extended to the mass media, inclusive of comics. The Commission’s findings were that the causes of the problem were deeply rooted in American society itself; but despite this verdict the comics’ enemies are once more on the warpath. An increasingly liberal application of the rules of the Code, which, so they say, did not curb violence anyway, the growing number of pre-Code comics being reprinted and the large number of publishers who do not adhere to the Code, have prompted critics to revive all the old worn-out anti-comics arguments fashionable in Dr Wertham’s heyday in the forties and fifties” (pg. 130-131). According to Reitberger and Fuchs, “Content of comics is dictated by the type of society in which they appear. Taboos, censorship or control do not change the aspirations, wishes and longings for which comics offer compensation; that is the reason why the controversy raging around comics has never bothered the readership – comics continue to be avidly read by young and old alike” (pg. 131).

Of the Comics Magazine Association of America’s Comics Code Authority, Reitberger and Fuchs write, “The Code was, and still is, strictly applied. In 1969, 309 books out of 1,000 failed to satisfy the Authority; but on the whole offences against the Code are but minor lapses. Sometimes they are just grammatical errors, or perhaps the dress of one character in one picture of a booklet does not meet with approval. Publishers try their best to comply with the rules of the C.M.A.A. before submitting material. Between the autumn of 1954 and end of 1969 the C.M.A.A. tested exactly 18,125 books” (pg. 137). They continue, “The Comics Code also had its positive effects. More attention was given to dialogue and the standard of drawings rose, because after the shrinkage of the overall production incompetent graphic artists no longer found employment. Stories did not become less fanciful, but they tended to suffer from academic, stereotyped boredom – especially in the realm of science fiction – because violence in action was forbidden” (pg. 138).

Shifting their attention to how comics condition and engage with their readers, Reitberger and Fuchs write, “Stan Lee of Marvel, for instance, who does try to be didactic to influence society through his publications. Marvel is the perfect example of what Marshall McLuhan described as ‘talking back to the media’, for their contact with readers is expressed through a gigantic volume of readers’ letters (and their replies)” (pg. 152). They continue, “Comics help, as part of the ‘culture industry’ (to borrow Adorno’s expression) to condition readers, like Pavlov’s dogs, to life in a consumer society, demanding that ever new needs be created which the consumer-industry can then exploit” (pg. 155). Reitberger and Fuchs conclude, “Not every contribution finally published without the Comics Code’s seal of approval proves that better things can be achieved when no holds are barred. The best sign that comic books have become conscious of their opportunities today is the founding of the Academy of Comics Book Art in late 1970” (pg. 247).… (meer)