Will Eisner on his influences
YRONWODE: ...So your art has been variously described as cinematographic and your writing as short stories. Were you much influenced by films and literature?
EISNER: That's absolutely true. Both films and short stories- particularly the highly specialized short story writers like O. Henry and Bierce, de Maupassant -- here was a whole period in the 30s during which the short story was an art form unto itself. Today, people are still writing short stories, but it doesn't command the writing market as it did once before. I had only two... well, actually three major influences: the motion pictures I saw -- and I saw lots of 'em -- short stories I read, which nurtured my own imagination, and my own Life experience, which figured heavily in the things I did.
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YRONWODE: Your work has been compared to Fritz Lang...
EISNER: Yes, Feiffer's said that... people say that...
YRONWODE: ...and Orson Welles...
EISNER: I saw every one of those the early experimental Man Ray films and others. I felt a very strong kinship to Orson Welles in those days. The old Fritz Lang movies were around. I saw every movie I could. I didn't always catalogue them by director because in those days, with the exception of Orson Welles, I was not as conscious of directors as I am now. Movies were like our television -- we consumed 'em at about the same rate of speed that you consume television today. Movies became part of one's life experience. This is something which perhaps sociologists should someday explore -- Jules Feiffer touched on it in his writings and I think he's aware of it because he grew up in somewhat the same environment that I did. Movies were part of our life experiences just as television is for the people who stay home and watch it every day of the week. To many people, moving picture characters and television characters are real people -- when the actors die they get very upset.
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Well, movies were part of my life and so they had an influence. As far as ideas and so forth, movies were their medium and comics was my medium. I saw comics as an art form, legitimate within itself and, just as movies borrow from comics and are influenced by comics, so I was influenced by movies. And the theatre, by the way. I had strong interest in theatre and I often tell my students [at the School of Visual Arts] to see in terms of lighting and stage sets. Theatre was very strong; my father did stage sets when he first came to this country -- that is, scenery and backdrop paintings. Among my first experiences is the memory of visiting Second Avenue Jewish theatres where I could see the men working on backdrops. I have a feeling for theatrics. I did some in high school too -- some stage design. In fact I did a play with Adolph Green where I did all the stage sets in a very modern form and he did the music and the words.
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YRONWODE: What comics did you Like as a kid?
EISNER: There were lots of comic strips. Of course one of the comic strips I was influenced by was Popeye. That will probably surprise you.
YRONWODE: Really?!
EISNER: You know, a year ago I guess, somebody wrote a book showing all the early comic artwork of comic artists and I unearthed some stuff I did when I was 15 or 16 and it looks just like Popeye - a cold imitation of Segar's work. I was terribly influenced by that. was very fond of Alex Raymond's work, and Caniff's Terry and the Pirates. Fortunately, when I was a kid, strips proliferated in this city. We had tremendous numbers of 'em so I was exposed to wide range. There was Krazy Kat -- Herriman influenced me tremendously. I remember the tremendous impact his crazy backgrounds had on me. I recognized it as art, and that is exactly what it was. I don't think he even thought of it as art to the extent that I did.