Barnaby Volume Five

[Barnaby] radiates human warmth and whimsy … [T]he artist’s brilliantly written characters … keep their feet planted in the all-too-real world of 1940s America while flying off on pink wings into one of the greatest fantasy strips ever made.–Art SpiegelmanHighly verbal and quietly unexpected, the strip is a clear antecedent of the sort of comic situations experienced by Calvin and Hobbes – and the visuals predict Johnson’s own Harold with his purple crayon. Cleverly absurd.– “School Library Journal”

Crockett Johnson was the pen name of cartoonist and children’s book illustrator David Johnson Leisk (October 20,1906-July 11, 1975). He is best known for the Harold series of books, which began with Harold and the Purple Crayon, and for the comic strip Barnaby. He was married to the children’s book author Ruth Krauss, with whom he collaborated on several books, including The Carrot Seed.

Philip W. Nel is a scholar of children’s literature and comics. He is best-known for work on radical and anti-racist children’s literature, Crockett Johnson, and Dr. Seuss - especially Was the Cat in the Hat Black?

Ron Howard is an American director, producer, screenwriter, and actor. Howard started his career as a child actor before transitioning to directing films. Over his six decade career, Howard has received two Academy Awards, four Emmy Awards, two Golden Globe Awards, and a Grammy Award.

Daniel Clowes is a Harvey, Eisner, Ignatz, and PEN America Literary Award Winner whose comics and graphic novels have been translated into over 20 languages worldwide. He is also an Academy Award nominated screenwriter (for Ghost World), and retrospectives of his work have appeared at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, the Oakland Museum, and the Wexner Center in Columbus, OH. He lives in Oakland, California, with his wife and son.