Does Rob Schmidt know about this?
My response:
I've heard of WHITE INDIAN and seen that cover before. I didn't know Frank Frazetta did it.
Half-naked Indians engaged in savage warfare is par for the course. Pure 1950s stereotyping.
The whole concept of white Indians is troubling also. The white guy is a better Indian than the Indians--how bogus is that?
I'd suggest using a different cover for the volume, but I imagine all the covers are tainted. There's probably no help there.
Naturally, I recognize the historic importance of Frazetta's work. And I wouldn't argue for banning the comics no matter who did them. But I would suggest an introductory essay to explain the "white Indian" phenomenon and what's wrong with it. I wouldn't just present the comics to readers uncritically.
For more on the subject, see Native American Heroes in the Comics: An Overview (Part 1).
4 comments:
I can't believe you left out BraveStarr and 30-30. ;-)
Yeah, actually I have a book of Frazetta art, and it has White Indian.
And yeah, I can't believe we haven't seen BraveStarr. Or "ambiguously Indian" Black Star.
I don't see the connection between the WHITE INDIAN comic book and the Bravestarr TV series. I covered the latter in Review of Bravestarr.
For more on the subject, see:
http://captaincomics.ning.com/profiles/blogs/archie-celebration-white
Archie 'Celebration,' 'White Indian' welcome additions; 'Strange Tales' kneecapped by Code
The latest volume in Vanguard’s Frazetta library is White Indian ($49.95), a strip that appeared in various Western comics published by Magazine Enterprises from 1949 to 1953. It featured Dan Brand, a Philadelphia socialite during Revolutionary War times who ends up being trained by Native Americans, gains a sidekick named Tipi and runs around the frontier in a breechclout. Brand, who is heroically proportioned and amazingly competent at everything, mostly arranges peace between Indians and settlers, while fighting frontier bad guys like “bad” Indians, bootleggers, gun-runners and Tories.
This is pretty clichéd stuff, of course, not to mention historically inaccurate, incredibly implausible and more than a little insulting to Native Americans. But we’re not here for the stories--we’re here for Frazetta’s art, which does not disappoint.
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