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Ed the Happy Clown
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Ed the Happy Clown
Ed the Happy Clown is a graphic novel by Canadian cartoonist Chester Brown. Its title character is a large-headed, childlike children's clown who undergoes one horrifying affliction after another. The story is a dark, humorous mix of genres and features scatological humour, sex, body horror, extreme graphic violence, and blasphemous religious imagery. Central to the plot are a man who cannot stop defecating; the head of a miniature, other-dimensional Ronald Reagan attached to the head of Ed's penis; and a female vampire who seeks revenge on her adulterous lover who had murdered her to escape his sins.
The surreal, largely improvised story began with a series of unrelated short strips that Brown went on to tie into a single narrative. Brown first serialized it in his comic book Yummy Fur, and the first, incomplete collected edition in 1989, titled Ed the Happy Clown: A Yummy Fur Book. Shortly after, Brown became unsatisfied with the direction of the serial; he brought it to an abrupt end in the eighteenth issue of Yummy Fur and turned to autobiography. A second edition titled Ed the Happy Clown: The Definitive Ed Book appeared in 1992 with an altered ending and most of the later parts of the series eliminated. The contents of this edition were re-serialized with extensive endnotes in 2005–2006 as a nine-issue Ed the Happy Clown series and collected as Ed the Happy Clown: A Graphic-Novel in 2012.
The story is seen by many critics as a highlight of the 1980s North American alternative comics scene. It has left an influence on contemporary alternative cartoonists such as Daniel Clowes, Seth, and Dave Sim, and has won a Harvey and other awards. Canadian film director Bruce McDonald has had the rights since 1991 to make an Ed film, but the project has struggled to find financial backing.
Brown grew up in Châteauguay, Quebec, a Montreal suburb with a large English-speaking minority. He was an introverted youth attracted to comic books from a young age. He aimed at a career drawing superhero comics, but was unsuccessful in getting work with Marvel or DC Comics after graduating from high school. He moved to Toronto and discovered underground comix and the small-press community.
By the early 1980s Marvel and DC had come to dominate comic-book publishing in North America, and comic shops became the main places of purchase, with a clientele of dedicated comics fans. During this time, a trend towards greater ambition and expressiveness was developing on the fringes, such as Dave Sim's long Cerebus series and the avant-garde graphics magazine Raw in which the serialization of Art Spiegelman's graphic novel Maus appeared. Brown was to find himself in the alternative comics scene that grew throughout the decade.
Brown was feeling himself in a creatively stagnant period when he came across a book on Surrealism: Wallace Fowlie's The Age of Surrealism (1950). The book motivated Brown to work on an improvised minicomic series which he called Yummy Fur and self-published from 1983.
Ed suffers one indignity after another as the plot gets grimmer and more surreal. His bizarre misfortunes include having the tip of his penis replaced by the head of a miniature, talking Ronald Reagan from another universe. Ed's adventures featured encounters with penis-worshipping pygmies, flesh-eating rats, Martians, Frankenstein's monster, and other characters from traditional genre fiction. The story unfolds with a black-comedic sensibility topped with Christian symbolism. Despite his ordeals—being imprisoned for a crime he did not commit, falling in love with a vampire—Ed remains a gentle, childlike innocent, with a Candide-like optimism. The story has had more than one ending and is a challenge to summarize.
The children's hospital Ed is about to visit burns down with all the children in it. A number of apparently unrelated short gag strips appear before Brown begins to tie the narrative together into one plot.
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Ed the Happy Clown
Ed the Happy Clown is a graphic novel by Canadian cartoonist Chester Brown. Its title character is a large-headed, childlike children's clown who undergoes one horrifying affliction after another. The story is a dark, humorous mix of genres and features scatological humour, sex, body horror, extreme graphic violence, and blasphemous religious imagery. Central to the plot are a man who cannot stop defecating; the head of a miniature, other-dimensional Ronald Reagan attached to the head of Ed's penis; and a female vampire who seeks revenge on her adulterous lover who had murdered her to escape his sins.
The surreal, largely improvised story began with a series of unrelated short strips that Brown went on to tie into a single narrative. Brown first serialized it in his comic book Yummy Fur, and the first, incomplete collected edition in 1989, titled Ed the Happy Clown: A Yummy Fur Book. Shortly after, Brown became unsatisfied with the direction of the serial; he brought it to an abrupt end in the eighteenth issue of Yummy Fur and turned to autobiography. A second edition titled Ed the Happy Clown: The Definitive Ed Book appeared in 1992 with an altered ending and most of the later parts of the series eliminated. The contents of this edition were re-serialized with extensive endnotes in 2005–2006 as a nine-issue Ed the Happy Clown series and collected as Ed the Happy Clown: A Graphic-Novel in 2012.
The story is seen by many critics as a highlight of the 1980s North American alternative comics scene. It has left an influence on contemporary alternative cartoonists such as Daniel Clowes, Seth, and Dave Sim, and has won a Harvey and other awards. Canadian film director Bruce McDonald has had the rights since 1991 to make an Ed film, but the project has struggled to find financial backing.
Brown grew up in Châteauguay, Quebec, a Montreal suburb with a large English-speaking minority. He was an introverted youth attracted to comic books from a young age. He aimed at a career drawing superhero comics, but was unsuccessful in getting work with Marvel or DC Comics after graduating from high school. He moved to Toronto and discovered underground comix and the small-press community.
By the early 1980s Marvel and DC had come to dominate comic-book publishing in North America, and comic shops became the main places of purchase, with a clientele of dedicated comics fans. During this time, a trend towards greater ambition and expressiveness was developing on the fringes, such as Dave Sim's long Cerebus series and the avant-garde graphics magazine Raw in which the serialization of Art Spiegelman's graphic novel Maus appeared. Brown was to find himself in the alternative comics scene that grew throughout the decade.
Brown was feeling himself in a creatively stagnant period when he came across a book on Surrealism: Wallace Fowlie's The Age of Surrealism (1950). The book motivated Brown to work on an improvised minicomic series which he called Yummy Fur and self-published from 1983.
Ed suffers one indignity after another as the plot gets grimmer and more surreal. His bizarre misfortunes include having the tip of his penis replaced by the head of a miniature, talking Ronald Reagan from another universe. Ed's adventures featured encounters with penis-worshipping pygmies, flesh-eating rats, Martians, Frankenstein's monster, and other characters from traditional genre fiction. The story unfolds with a black-comedic sensibility topped with Christian symbolism. Despite his ordeals—being imprisoned for a crime he did not commit, falling in love with a vampire—Ed remains a gentle, childlike innocent, with a Candide-like optimism. The story has had more than one ending and is a challenge to summarize.
The children's hospital Ed is about to visit burns down with all the children in it. A number of apparently unrelated short gag strips appear before Brown begins to tie the narrative together into one plot.