10/08/2000 |
#71 Alvin wonders his position and if he's in the right place. |
10/01/2000 |
#70 On Fields... |
09/25/2000 |
#69 Two things came to Alvin's attention this week. First, there was the article in US New & World Report predicting the doom of the comics industry... |
09/18/2000 |
#68 Alvin asked what readers of this site are reading besides this site and comics. It was a dangerous question and the answers were dangerous. |
09/11/2000 |
#67 There seems these days to be a great deal of questioning among both fans and professionals about the future of comics. |
08/07/2000 |
#63 -- Alvin goes on vacation to Bathurst, New Brunswick and changes his focus, practice preceding theory in literature and Alvin's writing |
07/17/2000 |
#62 -- Alvin's Literary Annex of the Golden Age, lowbrow and highbrow and the publishing world, the deleterious effects of modern publishers |
06/26/2000 |
#59 -- the comics page of the newspaper, Superman read as a fan and as a writer |
06/19/2000 |
#58 -- Alvin's experience at the All Time Classic New York Comic Book Convention, comic book publishers aiming at the wrong target, brand tampering |
06/12/2000 |
#57 -- X and Y chromosomes in men and women, and why they have led to variegated shifts in meaning, what kinds of stories Alvin prefers to tell, why genre restrictions should be transcended |
06/05/2000 |
#56 -- Alvin's benign paroxysmic positional vertigo, an attack Alvin once had in Florida, how this affects and has affected Alvin's flying, Alvin's experience with comic conventions |
05/29/2000 |
#55 -- The new US missile strategy, Alvin's connection with the first nuclear attack on Japan |
05/22/2000 |
#54 -- Alvin talks to his neighbor Rawley about how Superman flies |
05/15/2000 |
#53 -- Enantiodromia, how it happened to communism, gun control, Clark Kent as essential to good Superman stories |
05/08/2000 |
#52 -- the myth of the difference between the sexes, the Pentagon's new missile system, Alvin as a mystic, what kind of column we want Alvin |
05/01/2000 |
#51 -- The nature of reality, unhappy consciousnesses |
04/24/2000 |
#50 -- "Easter Sunday A.D. 2000" |
04/10/2000 |
#48 -- Alvin counsels Dr. Maranto |
03/27/2000 |
#46 -- Electronic publishing and ebooks and the future of publishing, an Hasidic story |
03/20/2000 |
#45 -- Alvin's double life, as a comic book writer and as a speculative philosopher, Alvin's reaction to current comics and fiction |
03/06/2000 |
#43 -- How culture works, highbrow vs middlebrow vs lowbrow, what factors led to the condemnation of comics, the alleged corruption of languages and ideas in comics of the 1940s, why comics were popular in the 1940s |
02/28/2000 |
#42 -- Alvin visits Horatio the psychic and decoheres |
02/21/2000 |
#41 -- Alvin visits Madame Gorelli and gets a few surprises, more about the future |
02/14/2000 |
#40 -- Alvin visits the Allister fair and speaks with Dr. Maranto, a visionary, about why there's no future |
02/07/2000 |
#39 -- Alvin visits, by chance, a comic book store in Allister and speaks with the owner, a fair in Allister |
01/31/2000 |
#38 -- creating a good comic strip, innovation and originality, why art requires constraints, DC's declining sales and the need for both change and restraints |
01/24/2000 |
#37 -- creation and ownership, royalties and the proprieties of creation versus ownership, payment for work and art |
01/17/2000 |
#36 -- winter south of Ottawa, a strange encounter with an out of focus woman |
01/10/2000 |
#35 -- Alvin corrects an error in last week's column, strange things that have happened to Alvin, what ghosts might be, what reality is and how it relates to experiencing strange things |
01/03/2000 |
#34 -- finding reality, and why comic writers do the opposite, probabilities and different realities, the morphogenetic field |
12/27/1999 |
#33 -- Alvin's meeting with Santa Claus |
12/20/1999 |
#32 -- e-mail from Rich Morrissey pointing out Alvin's work on DC's 1940s Buzzy title, the development of Buzzy, working with Jack Schiff, Alvin's Avondale as the source for Buzzy's milieu |
12/13/1999 |
#31 -- acquiring wisdom, villains, The Lamp, the personalities that lead cults |
12/06/1999 |
#30 -- insults and motherhood, "saving babies", the history of abortion and when it became immoral/illegal |
11/29/1999 |
#29 -- Alvin reads a Batman daily and sees a wrestling move that reminds him of how he saved his own life once, Marianism, jealousy, both male and female |
11/22/1999 |
#28 -- how Alvin learned to write comics by reading the classic adventure stories |
11/08/1999 |
#26 -- Bill Finger's unique talents as a writer, the clash of superhero and villain in Bill Finger's career and life, Bill Finger's life, and legacy |
11/01/1999 |
#25 -- Alvin's experiences in Greenwich Village, Alvin's attacks on Freud on Dr. Wertham, Pauline Kael, Alvin's discussions with Bill Finger |
10/25/1999 |
#24 -- Greenwich Village at the end of the 1930s and its dream logic, the musicians of the Village, Alex as the source of the Chef of Bohemia |
10/18/1999 |
#23 -- the Superman strip goes whimsical, ogies, lurkers, and silent readers of the column |
10/11/1999 |
#22 -- Alvin's dog Angus and his ability to fly |
10/04/1999 |
#21 -- Finding out who you really are, examining your life choices, the placebo effect, choosing your life now |
09/27/1999 |
#20 -- the adult world and Alvin's escape from it to the reality of childhood |
09/20/1999 |
#19 -- credits at DC, then and now, DC hiding secrets, even from the FBI |
09/13/1999 |
#18 -- Alvin's ownership of a most unique item of Superman memorabilia |
09/06/1999 |
#17 -- Alvin's history with Mort Weisinger, advertising, Alvin's return to the world of comics and to Superman, effects preceding causes |
08/30/1999 |
#16 -- rescuing comics by, among other things, not calling them "comics" any more |
08/23/1999 |
#15 -- tulpas, making synthetic propositions a priori |
08/16/1999 |
#14 -- what were writers during Comics' Golden Age really trying to do, why there was no money in publishing and why writers tried to leave comics |
08/09/1999 |
#13 -- story defining experience, and why comics have declined in circulation |
06/28/1999 |
#7 -- gun control, America's fascination with guns, and the relationship of slavery to our gun culture |
06/21/1999 |
#6 -- comics as a serial medium, why writing is not usually available as a skill to artists |
06/14/1999 |
#5 -- Jack Adams, the decline in circulation and story quality of comics |
06/07/1999 |
#4 -- how Superman's costume inspired people, and how modern conceptions of heroes have changed Superman's portrayal, Superman's archetypal reality as a rescuer |
05/31/1999 |
#3 -- the ideational basis of reality, Mr. Thongden as a tulpa, events outside our rational contexts |
05/24/1999 |
#2 -- Superman in the background versus Superman in the foreground, Superman as archetype, Alvin's relationship to Superman, Alvin's meeting with a tulpa, matter's relationship to thought |
05/17/1999 |
#1 -- Alvin's introductory column, Superman's role at his debut, Superman as archetype |