Students for a Democratic Society: A Graphic History

From the Publisher

“Students for a Democratic Society: A Graphic History will make old timers remember, discuss, argue and laugh, while the young will bubble with questions. For me, it brought back untold memories and induced visions of the next great wave of social activism!”—Michael James, JOIN/SDS organizer, founder of Rising Up Angry, and proprietor of Chicago’s Heartland Cafe

“My own radical journey began with Mad Magazine, so it feels great that SDS should enter the culture of comic folklore thanks to Harvey Pekar and Paul Buhle. May this graphic history be an informing contribution as a new generation of SDS writes its own story.” —Tom Hayden, founding member of the Students for a Democratic Society

“Hey! Did you know grandpa was a revolutionary? If you want the inside story from SDS veterans themselves, with a minimum of rhetoric and a maximum of sex, drugs, violence, and internal faction-fighting, check out this wonderful graphic history. Almost—but not quite—like being there. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, and no cop will hit you over the head, either. Grandma and grandpa’s bedtime stories are guaranteed to get the children dreaming of their own anti-imperialist movement.” —Mark Rudd, a founder of the Weather Underground, the last National Secretary of SDS, and the Chairman of the Columbia University chapter of SDS during the 1968 student strike

“Students for a Democratic Society: A Graphic History brings the historical power of SDS to life for the new generation of SDS activists. At a time when the state repression and militarism of the 1960’s and 70’s finds its closest parallel in the Iraq War and the Patriot Act, this accessible book maps out the legacy of resistance our generation has inherited. This is mandatory reading for serious, young organizers who desire to combat oppression while avoiding the errors of their predecessors.” —Senia Barragan, Brown University/Providence SDS

Publishers Weekly

American Splendor'sPekar has been incredibly prolific in the last few years, and more recently he has taken on nonautobiographical projects to varying degrees of success. This newest effort works on a variety of levels. For one, Pekar is not the sole author. He constructs a narrative of the history of the Students for a Democratic Society, but frequently steps aside to allow actual participants in that history to tell their own stories, using his casual first-person model of storytelling. The narrative moves through the decade of SDS history and then moves into the participant accounts, offering both a macro and a micro vision of the times. The artwork is mostly by frequent Pekar collaborator Gary Dumm, whose crisp, neutral realism may not be thrilling but does move the story along and does a fine job of conveying the various settings. As a whole, the book acts like a sophisticated handbook on an often misunderstood organization. It's good comics and excellent history. (Jan.)

Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information

School Library Journal

Gr 10 Up
Among the organizations agitating for social change in the 1960s, Students for a Democratic Society concentrated its efforts on young people. This graphic history uses black-and-white art to effectively document the group's history, from its founding to its split and eventual end. The first section recounts the origins of SDS in great detail and profiles early leaders. However, it would have been strengthened by inclusion of the Port Huron Statement, mentioned several times. A glossary or explanation of some political terms and introduction of prominent activists of the time is also lacking. Recollections of SDS programs, actions, and initiatives in the second section illustrate the range of activities in which individual members participated. Remembered most for spearheading the anti-Vietnam War movement on college campuses, SDS also promoted community outreach. Independent chapters sent members to Kentucky in support of a miners' strike and into neighborhoods around urban campuses to help tenants fight university takeovers of their buildings. Several women trace the beginnings of what became the women's liberation movement to their involvement in SDS. Students looking for background and details of the tumultuous social changes that happened in the 1960s will find plenty to satisfy them here.
—Ellie Goldstein-EricksonCopyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

The story of the legendary 1960s student-activist group, in words and pictures. With the acceptance of graphic novels and nonfiction into the mainstream, Pekar (Macedonia, 2007, etc.) seems to have more work than ever-you can almost hear his curmudgeonly grumbling about deadlines-and he has branched out beyond the autobiographical writings showcased in issues of American Splendor. As witness this graphic history of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS): written mostly by Pekar, supplemented by several former SDS members; edited by Buhle, founding editor of the SDS journal Radical America, who also wrote several sections; with effective art by frequent Splendor collaborator Dumm. Although he's never been shy about his angry leftist political leanings or about shoving himself into a narrative, Pekar keeps almost entirely in the background here as the book parses the minutiae of SDS's creation, rise to prominence, post-Nixon splintering and, very briefly, its resurgence in 2006. Founded in 1960 as an offshoot of various lefty-labor organizations that traced their lineage back to Upton Sinclair in 1905, SDS quickly alienated more staid elements of the Old Left with its emphasis on personal freedom, solidarity with the civil-rights movement and vehement antiwar stance. Throughout the mid and late '60s, SDS grew in numbers, leading demonstrations and publishing agitprop journals in cities and campuses across the nation, while it was simultaneously riven from within by agent provocateurs and fractious infighting among factions like the Weathermen and doctrinaire Marxists. Eschewing a standard time line, many of the book's later pages offer journal-like contributions from rank-and-file members,who provide snapshots of the life-altering struggle they were engaged in-often with a self-deprecating nod to its more naive aspects. Learned, passionate and accessible history of the first order, casting a critical but mostly benevolent eye on an often-contradictory movement.