Since all the Santa’s are in the stores and it’s christmas carols non stop already, I might as well start posting my book rec’s as a GFT GUIDE. But Perfect Nonsense: The Chaotic Comics and Goofy Games of George Carlson is a perfect gift for a fan of illustration and golden age comics and humor and, hm, absurdism. This is one of those books that Fantagraphics publisher Gary Groth mentioned as being something that had to be done but that won’t make a pile of Benjamins.
Carlson was an illustrator and absurdist—think an earlier Roger Langridge, who I’m sure must have been influenced by Carlson’s stuff at some point—probably best known for Jingle Jangle Tales, some of which were reprinted in The TOON Treasury of Classic Children’s Comics. This is a lovingly researched retrospective of all of Carlson’s work. For all comics scholars this is a MUST HAVE. FLOG has a sneak peek and it looks gorgeous.
