I’m pleased to announce that the next selection for the FBOTU Book Club is Stuck Rubber Baby by Howard Cruse. Here’s a synopsis:
Art and story combine powerfully in this lyrical tale of a young man caught in the maelstrom of the civil rights movement and the entrenched homophobia of small-town America. Told in flashback, this is the story of Toland Polk, the son of an uneducated white carpenter, who has grown up in the Southern town of Clayfield. It is the 1960s, a time of passionate beliefs and violent emotions, and Clayfield’s citizens are divided in the fight over segregation. As Toland fights on the side of the civil rights activists, he slowly begins to realize and try to deny that he is gay. With a subtle yet intricate plot, and distinctively evocative illustrations, Stuck Rubber Baby is an unflinchingly honest look at one man’s world of fears, dreams and prejudice.
An Eisner and Harvey Award winner, Stuck Rubber Baby is easily considered one of the most important graphic novels of our time.
How It Works
Discussion of the book will begin on Wednesday, September 29 in this thread. That means you have a whole month to get and read the book. I’ll be posting weekly reminders to help keep you on track. But once you start reading Stuck Rubber Baby, I doubt you’ll be able to put it down.
You can buy Stuck Rubber Baby at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Prism Comics, your local comics shop or wherever groundbreaking graphic novels are sold. You should also be able to find it in your local library.
The FBOTU Book Club discussion of Stuck Rubber Baby by Howard Cruse is now open!
Since its publication in 1995, Stuck Rubber Baby has won Eisner and Harvey Awards in the US, a Comics Creators Award in the UK, a Luchs Award in Germany, a 2007 Saló del Còmic de Barcelona Award in Spain, and a 2002 Prix de la critique at the Angouleme International Comics Festival in France. The Comics Journal also included Stuck Rubber Baby among its listing of the “100 Best Comics of the Century.”
Clearly, the story resonates with people all over the world. It had been a few years since I read the book, but reading it again, in the midst of our current struggle for civil rights, it struck me as more relevant than ever. Of course, the book was published in 1995, not 1965. And a modern sensibility creeps into the story from time to time, no matter how well written or crafted it is as a period piece.
But to start things off, let’s talk about Toland Polk, the narrator and central character in the story. Toland admits he’s not the smartest, most talented or most savvy person around. He is self-aware enough to declare himself a homosexual during his selective service interview (!), but then immediately begins trying to repress or change his orientation. Even as he becomes more involved in politics and activism, he asks Ginger, “Does a waked-up Toland Polk do anybody on the planet any good?”
So what do you think? Does he? Is there a significant result of his journey and his realization that “it could’ve been me”?
Or is he just another bumbling white guy narrator who manages to survive history, when so many others around him don’t, then goes on to tell the story from his perspective?
These are just a couple of ideas to get us started. Feel free to start your own discussions or ask your own questions.
So in reading this graphic novel I was struck by how relevant it was to our time today, dealing with LGBT rights. Our fight for Marriage Equality is very similar to past civil rights struggles and it’s interesting to read about a time when both African-American citizens and Gay and Lesbian citizens were both on the outside of civil rights. More so now that we have politcal idiots like Ann Coulter telling gays that we’re not in the same battle as black Americans, or telling people that gays should be against abortion because once they find the gay gene gay babies will be getting aborted.
It all boils down to the fear and hatrid. A need to supress a group that “mainstream” society doesn’t understand and views as different, other, and less than human. All of these themes are played upon in this graphic novel, and as I stated, it’s amazing just how real and timely this book still is, years and years after it was first published.
First off, I want to thank Chance for suggesting this graphic novel for discussion on FBOTU. I read it when it first came out back in the mid-nineties and was quite moved and affected by it. And, though I had been reading comic books for years, it was probably the first time I had felt such an intimate connection to the subject matter. Alongside such works as Art Spiegelman’s “Maus” or Marjane Satrapi’s “Persepolis”, I think that Cruse’s “Stuck Rubber Baby” shows how much the graphic novel is unique and important genre of world literature.
However, after rereading the novel after coming across the FBOTU book club suggestion, I have to say that I think its social and political impact has lessened somewhat over time. The novel was written during the early nineties at the same time as the plays “Angels in America” and “Rent” and the explicit themes of GLBTQ civil rights issues influenced by AIDS activism in those works are echoed by Cruse’s association of GLBTQ rights with African-American civil rights movements in the 1960s. This was not an uncommon association that was being made in the late 80s and early 90s as governments, media and religious groups ignored and even seemed to actively seek the deaths of those impacted by AIDS in the gay community. If you add to this the silences around those who were murdered (like Matthew Shepard in 1998) merely for their sexual orientation - the association of Black civil rights movements and GLBTQ rights activism seemed like a natural connection to make. Regardless of the ways they differed, the violence and oppression seemed to make them natural allies.
Cruse’s novel and the story of Toland Polk growing up homosexual in the segregated 1960’s Southern US explicitly makes this association. However, what I realized when reading it in today’s climate, is that the current political struggle for middle-class bourgeois acceptance represented by gay and lesbian marriage activists cannot comfortably be compared to what was going on in the 1960s.
Within the novel’s somewhat problematic version of history, blacks and gay/lesbians associated freely as oppressed outsiders in an intolerant, abusive society. I give Cruse great credit for acknowledging Toland’s and his white friend’s racism and the fact that it is unlikely Toland would ever have had significant African-American friends if he had not discovered the night-time world of outsider jazz clubs where they intermingled. Its not that I doubt the accuracy of this fact (though I also doubt it was that common either) its that I think it is quite clear that this is a historical anomoly and a somewhat revisionist history. Quite likely done because of the political climate of the graphic novel’s creation and not with regards to the historical content of the story itself.
I think this is especially clear with regards to the novel’s climatic scene and its life changing effect on Toland and his “it could have been me” moment. Again, in today’s political climate, it makes me uncomfortable to see such an explict use (or misuse) of the emotional impact of the history of the lynching of African-Americans for the narrative purpose of the main character’s self-realization and political consciousness raising. Again, its not that I don’t doubt that a white, out, gay man could have been killed in such circumstances or even that they are and have been. As I noted in my earlier reference to Shepard and my own personal experience of being attacked and stabbed while leaving a gay bar in the early 90’s shows, violence against GLBTQ people is real and its impact really is as powerful as what happens in the novel.
However, in the context of this novel and the story of the Black civil rights movement and a white gay man’s self-actualization, I question whether such a strategy of association is either desirable or necessary. Perhaps its the fact that I am rereading it in a different political climate and my own views regarding marriage activism as a plea for privilege and social status rather than a plea to stop killing us that is affecting my comments. I should say however that these are just some of my initial thoughts and I still really enjoyed the book.
The one thing I really liked about the novel is the way it shows how history just happens to us and while we are living it we don’t think of it as history but simply as our lives. In this sense, Toland Polk is a kind of everyman that perhaps only realizes how significant the moments of his life have been in hindsight.
If Chance has not picked this book as a book club selection, I probably never would have read it. That is not to say it’s not good or not worth reading, but it’s not the kind of graphic novel I usually go for. I’m used to things like Watchmen, which I actually find resonates much more with me about the nature of humanity and what it means to live within it or outside of it. But that’s a different essay.
I’ll start with my impressions of the technical side. Cruse has a distinctive style. It kind of reminds me of an Archie comic if R. Crumb had drawn it. The characters are drawn very realistically, flaws and all. I especially liked details like Riley’s chipped tooth or the regal lines he gave Anna Dellyne. However, the structure of the panels is very, very dense. Each one is filled, and it made it very difficult for me to get into the book. I read about 80 pages in, put it down, and was honestly reluctant to pick it back up. However, once I got about to the midway mark, I was comfortable enough with the style to plow right on ahead to the end.
In relation to story and theme, I agree with the majority of what frustrated.buddha said. I think a lot of the events are highly idealized to the point where it seemed too much like fiction. I know this is not supposed to be non-fiction, but it’s supposed to be historical. Most of it felt too romanticized. However, you have to remember that all of this is told by Toland years later. We have to remember the angle of the “unreliable narrator.” Toland comes off as a bit of a Gary Stu at times, but again, he’s made himself the star of the story.
For the most part, I think Cruse works this unreliable narrator angle well until the climactic “It could have been me speech.” Those pages are by far the most arresting visuals in the book, and I was actually excited to see the panel structure break up so much. But for me, it was kind of marred by Toland turning the whole moment onto himself. I understand where he’s coming from, but it kind of soured the climax for me. Cruse also wraps up the story far, far too quickly. Toland’s final confrontation with Orley has almost no drama or compelling emotional pull. Granted, that may be the point, but it seemed like an afterthought. He rushes through about 40 years in the span of a few pages, leaving it on an ending that’s far too ambiguous for the rather direct, straightforward story that came before it.
While the story itself didn’t always grab me, I will say that Cruse has a very real, organic set of characters populating the book that keep you reading even when the plot falters. He has a very large cast, but they never seem to get too out of hand. It’s easy to tell who’s who and what’s what thanks the distinctive look he gives each character. They seem like real, genuine people even when the details of the story seem to be wholly artificial. (I refer again to frustrated.buddha’s wonderful take on that)
It may seem like I’m coming down on the book, but I’m really not. It’s a well done book, and Cruse definitely has a talent for characterizations. I grew up with a mother who actually was a peace activist back in the 60s and 70s. She always told me that her house was All In The Family with herself in the role of Meathead. So I kind of grew up hearing all about the civil rights movement. I think that given the struggles GLBT people face with equality, it’s important to remember the civil rights battles that came before, but it’s also important to remember how they differ. Cruse kind of muddles the whole picture, and that’s why I’m kind of cautious with my praise. I still think it’s great that such a distinctive gay artist is getting his day, though, and the book was worth the read.
...“Does a waked-up Toland Polk do anybody on the planet any good?”
So what do you think? Does he? Is there a significant result of his journey and his realization that “it could’ve been me”?
Or is he just another bumbling white guy narrator who manages to survive history, when so many others around him don’t, then goes on to tell the story from his perspective?
I think a “waked-up” Toland Polk did do the planet some good. There was certainly some bumbling going on for his character throughout the book, but who among us hasn’t bumbled our way through some portion of our life (or all of it)?
As in real life, when Toland eventually came out, he positively affected people around him. His sister became a stronger ally than she seemed to be before he came out and even Orley was affected positively in the long run. Along the way, his being “waked-up” put him in a position to help others. He was there to fend off Bernard’s attackers. Maybe he prevented a death then. Even though they may not have had immediate positive affects and weren’t shown in the book, I think his standing up to his boss’s racism was likely to have planted a seed for growth in his boss as well and simply taking part in that sit in at the park, as accidental as it may have been for them to become a part of it, would have had a positive affect by showing solidarity with people who are demanding their rights.
I sometimes think it would be easier to be ignorant, but I think humanity’s success depends on all of us being “waked-up”.
Thanks, Chance, for running the contest that allowed me to get and re-read a copy of this graphic novel. It was a wonderful read the first time I read it many years ago and it was a wonderful read again this time. I believe it definitely belongs in the same category of lauded comic works like ‘Maus’ and ‘Watchmen’.
While the gay experience and the black experience have clear differences, I do think it’s safe to say that parallels can be drawn, even if the experiences aren’t exactly identical. The murders of people like Emmett Till and Matthew Shepard are certainly one extreme, while everyday concerns like job and housing discrimination and civil liberties like marriage equality are another facet of a decades-long struggle. Marriage equality is the big news item now, but I think we all know that countless gays and lesbians have died along the way, getting us to this point, whether they were speaking out or just living openly and honestly in a hostile world.
I think Cruse, through Tolland’s narration, presents—not so much an idealized version of gay/black camaraderie—but a late 1960s view of communal life, love and acceptance. A whole other book could have been written about internal conflicts between the two groups, but I think Cruse was wise to keep the book focused on the characters finding friends, allies and lovers among their numbers, with the Rhombus and Alleysax representing a kind of escape and safe harbor for everyone.
This is sort of a tangent, but one of the things that annoys me with the press coverage of the Target boycott, is the media keeps saying that it’s a gay boycott, never acknowledging that we have a lot of straight allies who are boycotting as well. I mean, no oppressed group can really make any progress without allies on the “other side.”
Johnny is right about the density of text and visuals in the book. It really forced me to slow down and study it from panel to panel in a way I don’t usually read, graphic novels or otherwise. I was also fascinated with Anna Dellyne. She ended up having much more in common with Tolland than I could have imagined at the start of the book. Like Tolland, she could have lived her life being something and someone she wasn’t, pleasing other people along the way. Defying expectations and being who you want to be does take a lot of courage. I think a lot of the characters Tolland encounters help him realize that and find the courage to be who he really is. We have to assume he does, sometime between the events of the story and the retelling.
What did you all think of Sammy and his encounter with his father?
What did you all think of Sammy and his encounter with his father?
Ouch! It was a painful scene. Ultimately, I think I agree with Riley and wish Sammy had shown at least a little bit of compassion for his father. I relate with the anger that Sammy feels and the wish to express it, but it does feel like a bit too much. I would probably have felt differently if his father could still talk and we could have gotten a sense of whether or not he felt any regret for the way he treated Sammy, though I also wouldn’t wish to deny Sammy his catharsis after finally getting up the nerve to express his pain. If Sammy could have just acknowledged the pain his father may have been in, I think it would have been more “fair”, despite the fact that life rarely is. “Real life” is messy and closure isn’t easy to come by so Cruse’s writing here connected with me.
The scene with Sammy and his father really sucked out a lot the compassion I had for his character. I think that might have been the point, but it seemed like a total about face for the guy. It really seemed mean-spirited on Sammy’s part, but I do get where Sammy was coming from. I think Cruse wanted to remind us that even “waked-up” people have serious flaws, but it seemed like such a radical shift in Sammy’s character that it was kind of jarring.
