Overview
The Three Paradoxes is an intricate and complex autobiographical comic by one of the most talented and innovative young cartoonists today. The story begins with a story inside the story: the cartoon character Paul Hornschemeier is trying to finish a story called "Paul and the Magic Pencil." Paul has been granted a magical implement, a pencil, and is trying to figure out what exactly it can do. He isn't coming up with much, but then we zoom out of this story to the creator,
Paul, whose father is about to go on a walk to turn off the lights in his law office in the center of the small town. Abandoning the comic strip temporarily, Paul leaves with his camera, in order to fulfill a promise to his girlfriend that he would take pictures of the places that affected him as a child. Each "chapter" of the story is drawn in a completely different style, with strikingly unique production and color themes, and yet, somehow, despite (or perhaps because of) this non-linear progression, it all comes together as one story: a story questioning change, progress, and worth within the author's life.
Synopsis
An intricate, complex autobiographical comic blending multiple threads of reality and fantasy, each drawn in a different style, coming together as one story questioning change, progress, and worth in the author's life.
Publishers Weekly
In Hornschemeier's third major work, the clearly inked panels of a framing story show the main character, a comics artist named Paul, on a walk with his father. The touchingly honest conversation between father and son is intercut with stories that include childhood memories and Zeno's presentation of his three paradoxes to a group of Athenian philosophers. The book's funniest moment comes when Socrates, upon hearing the paradoxes, interrupts to say, "Man, no offense, but are you guys retarded?" and then goes on to berate Zeno for his insistence on the impossibility of change. A young luminary of experimental comics, Hornschemeier offers a brilliant narrative demonstration of the paradoxes in this graphic personal essay, in which the protagonist simultaneously connects with his past, mulls over his present and anticipates the future. The book is formally brilliant as well, with a dust jacket that peels back to reveal preparatory sketches on the hard cover of the book and stories that are each told in a different, fully realized style. Childhood memories are shown in newsprint comic color-dot style while Zeno's story is presented as pages torn from old comics, their frayed edges laid out on the white pages of the book. (July)
Copyright 2007 Reed Business InformationEditorials
Publishers Weekly
In Hornschemeier's third major work, the clearly inked panels of a framing story show the main character, a comics artist named Paul, on a walk with his father. The touchingly honest conversation between father and son is intercut with stories that include childhood memories and Zeno's presentation of his three paradoxes to a group of Athenian philosophers. The book's funniest moment comes when Socrates, upon hearing the paradoxes, interrupts to say, "Man, no offense, but are you guys retarded?" and then goes on to berate Zeno for his insistence on the impossibility of change. A young luminary of experimental comics, Hornschemeier offers a brilliant narrative demonstration of the paradoxes in this graphic personal essay, in which the protagonist simultaneously connects with his past, mulls over his present and anticipates the future. The book is formally brilliant as well, with a dust jacket that peels back to reveal preparatory sketches on the hard cover of the book and stories that are each told in a different, fully realized style. Childhood memories are shown in newsprint comic color-dot style while Zeno's story is presented as pages torn from old comics, their frayed edges laid out on the white pages of the book. (July)
Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information