SotA Anthology 2015-16
comics take a long
time to read - that’s
why there’s a lot of text
in them, and there’s a
lot of stuff going on,
and then there are
articles in the back
usually; letters pages.
I want people to feel
like they’re getting
something
that’s
really, really worth their
money, as opposed
to a 20-page comic
that costs five dollars
that you read in two
minutes ...We don’t
include the articles in
the trade paperbacks.
The articles aren’t
related to the story.
They’re just some
extra stuff that’s cool,
that I’m interested in,
that I hope readers
are interested in....
We reward our early
adopters”
(Ching,
2015).
Backmatter in monthly
comics, when included,
often consists of letters
from readers to the creative
team. However, in the past
few years, and especially
at Image, backmatter has
become a space for the
authors to use with creative
freedom. Brian K Vaughan
and Fiona Staples, creators
of the space opera series
Saga (2012-ongoing), for
instance, run a traditional
letters column within its
back pages, but also do an
annual reader survey, asking
comics-related
personal
and whimsical questions
about their readers that
they then collate and share
in later issues. Ed Brubaker
and Sean Phillips, creators
of the historical Image
Hollywood noir comic The
Fade Out (2014-2016),
devote the backmatter of
each issue to an essay
about the era. This content
is excluded from collected
volumes, which serves as
an incentive for the reader to
buy single issues, a practise
that Brubaker considers
integral to keeping the
industry thriving:
“I always want every
comic to be worth
more than people are
paying for it. I try to
make sure all of our
Each issue of If On A Winter’s
Night contains a small
backmatter section, after
the narrative reaches its
cliffhanger ending, devoted
not to essays or reader
letters, but an inuniverse
collection of the letters from
the rogue translator Ermes
Manara to the publisher Mr
Cavedagna. The purpose
is both to fulfil the same
incentive as Brubaker, to
make each issue’s content
more dense, and to infuse
even the earliest issues with
the mysterious, complicated
presence of Manara, which
hangs over the novel
through his characteristic
style of prose. In the novel
his letters appear in a
cluster in Chapter 6, and