Word: gonick
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Nobody can accuse Gonick of lack of ambition. The author of the Cartoon Guide to Genetics, used in Harvard genetics course and the now-defunct weekly Cartoon Kitchen has his work cut out for him: cartooning the entire history of humankind. After leaving Harvard's math department in 1972, Gonick has managed to produce seven "volumes" (read: comic books) of History so far, up to the time of Alexander the Great...
Asking of the Math Department, "what do they know about time travel? Snort! Most mathematicians can't tell a second hand from second base," Gonick begins his history with an excellent overview of the origins of the universe and life on earth...
After quickly tracing the development of life from the first crude cells (which cry "Free! *&#! We're free!" as they "colonize the open ocean") to the first primates, Gonick moves on to early pre-history in volume two, "Sticks and Stones. Homo Erectus, Neanderthal and the more advanced Cro-Magnon human of the Stone Age give way to the Homo Sapiens of the first post-ice age settlements of 12,000 years ago. Volume two ends with the founding of cities in Sumer, between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in Iraq. Four billion years in 100 pages...
Volume three describes the rise of the first civilizations in Sumer and Egypt and uses the first written texts as a guide through early history, including the origins of Judaism with the migration of Abraham from Hammurabi's Ur. Gonick then moves from the earliest bible texts to the conquest of Saddam Husseun's idol Nebuchadrezzar to the rise of the Greeks, devoting the last two volumes more extensively to Athenian life (with much cribbing from Herodotus...
With such a large period to cover and only 350-odd pages in which to do it, Gonick pulls off a spectacular feat by making history both readable and meaningful. The cartoon medium is uniquely suited to describing the essential facts of history and conveying a sense of everyday life in the ancient world. Because he can show us how people dressed, cut their hair, furnished their homes and conducted their religious ceremonies, Gonick can concentrate on using his text for historical or scientific narrative and explanation...