Its All About The Story

Note: There have already been an overwhelming response to the DC comics announcement online...this is but another small one from someone who loves those books :)

I love a good story. Its why I love teaching English literature and reading strategies. My favorite types of stories, however, occur in monthly comics. Now I love a good Pynchon post-modern story, or an investigation of the human foibles constructed by a Hawthorne or Twain. But when a mix of incredible art work with a riveting story occurs in between the pages of that floppy, glossy folio, a child like excitement comes over to me to such a degree that I literally regress to that young boy who picked up his first comic, a Batman: Annual, on the rack of the Piggly Wiggly in my small southern hometown while hanging under the skirt of my mother as she waited patiently in the checkout line. Those beautiful books are magic--pure, simple, engrossing magic.

And those stories, the ones inside those magic books, have followed me to now. I'm older, a tad wiser, but still in love with those great stories. My own passions in life have led me to explore the art of stories: what are they, what do they mean to us, what allows them to ruffle our emotions? I am fortunate to be able to have conversations with a diverse body of persons both young and old, educated or full of imagination (or both), about the relational/contextual aspects of narratives to the individual. The stories that we love to a certain degree love us back because we share a living textual experience with them. Its a relationship; perhaps even a marriage of sorts.

So its understandable that from time to time our favorite stories need to go through a change. Society changes, we change--nothing is static forever, nor should it be.  This change is upsetting, like being in an intense relationship and then it suddenly ending because one realizes something has to give because growth is needed. While we may not connect again with those same stories and characters because you can never really go back again, change is an exciting time. And after a little while being enmeshed in that change, you reflect on that time and think about the good times-- the ones that made you happy, or sad, or elicited some type of emotion and made you call a friend and say "Did you read this?!?!". Its a great feeling. And it will continue.

So as DC comics makes massive changes its fine to be angry. Good. That is natural. You are angry that something that you love is changing and you are still the same person. Its not you, its them. But that is fine too. Love the memories and the special stories that now exist because you went through that period in your life. But also be able to embrace the new and move on. Your own development and change is just as important. But fear not boys and girls, you can always open your closet, or look on your bookshelf, or open up your comics app (wow, technology is really cool!) and visit those memories anytime you want. Those stories will still be there, and the new ones will be waiting for you to at least give them a chance. And that really makes me smile.