Funds for Bookworm are provided in part by Lannin Foundation.

You are a human animal.

You are a very special breed,

for you are the only animal,

who can think, who can reason, who can read.

Hello and welcome to Bookworm.

I'm Michael Silverblad, and today I'm pleased to have, as my guest, Chris Ware,

who's the author of Jimmy Cargan, The Smartest Kid on Earth.

It's published by Pantheon. It's a comic book novelette, or as they used to be

called, it's a graphic novel. To my mind, it's a piece of wonder. I've been following the exploits of

Jimmy Corrigan and his creator, Chris Ware, for some time now,

and I'd like to describe the day I was exposed to this work.

The books are originally published by a company called Fantagraphics,

and they've been in volumes called the Acme

Novelty Library. There have been, is it 14? Yes, 14 volumes so far. And these are comic books that imitate comic books. Sometimes they imitate photograph albums. Sometimes their covers

have what look like lace, flowers, and doilies on them. There's all sorts of filigree work,

tiny advertisements, little places for you to fill in your name because you're meant in a sense to be as much the author of these works as their anonymous author, Chris Ware, in your participation.

I was handed one of these books by Art Spiegelman's wife. She didn't get to

look at it again for as long as I was a guest in their house, which was several days, and I knew that

I'd be looking at these things with enormous interest and pleasure.

Every time I've mentioned Chris Ware's name in the intervening years, it's like the initiation

to a secret club.

...