Francoise Mouly and Comics

Francoise Mouly came to New York City from France in 1974 and taught herself conversational English by reading comic books. She published Raw Magazine with husband Art Spiegelman beginning in 1980. She veered toward the more educational side of comics with the later publication of Little Lit volumes. And an article in The New York Times two days back told me that she has formed Toon Graphics as an imprint of her Raw Junior with the explicit intent of producing educational comics for elementary school classroom use.

Out now is Theseus and the Minotaur and there is a good deal over on amazon so I might check that out. Among the upcoming releases will be Hansel and Gretel adapted by Neil Gaiman. These books aim to be Classics Illustrated for the modern age.

The newspaper article wraps up with Ms. Mouly expressing her distaste for the term "graphic novel." I am with her on that. They're comic books!