Trending Now Robert Crumb

Sketchbook Vol. 5. 19891998
Volume Five of the R. Crumb Sketchbooks covers two of the most noteworthy events of the artists life: the familys 1991 move to southern France and the 1994 documentary CRUMB. Amidst his midlife crisis, our curmudgeon finds a measure of peace with fateuntil the final pages, when he famously pronounces himself such a fucking QUEER.

As this volume opens we find our hero at age 46, solidly into the midlife crises years. Crumb has lived his entire life in anxious, introspective, self-flagellating crises, however, so the middle years bring only a refinement of his lifelong turmoil and further honing of artistic talent. More words accompany the drawings, demonstrating Crumbs brilliant powers of observation, as in a long paragraph devoted to an encounter with one of brother Maxons vegan turds, and a poetic paean to the heartbreak of life and aging. The familys move to Sauve, France, in 1991 is heralded by a switch