Customer Reviews

The Complete Peanuts Volume 1: 1950-1952

5 star:		(34)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is the first in a series of books that will reprint every single "Peanuts" comic strip ever published, and Schulz was off to a great start. Some strips are just funny, some are downright hilarious, but it's an amazing, if somewhat dated, collection. (You might be confused by the word "druggist"; it's the manager of some sort of store.)The cast isn't as big as it will get later, and Lucy and Linus are not the characters they'll become. Overall, it's a great book, and if you get it, you won't have any regrets.

My grandmother is (still) a great collector of all things Snoopy. Back in the 70's, when I used to visit my grandmother's house, I remember spending a lot of time reading some of those early collections of Peanuts cartoon strips. They are one of the many great memories of my youth. Now, we have a collection of the very first Peanuts strips. Magnificent!

How many of us still remember the beginning? So many things would grow and change. Violet and Patty (not Peppermint Patty) were Charlie Brown's "girlfriends" whom he could torment as much as he was tormented by them. Violet was actually the first to pull the football away from Charlie Brown. Snoopy was still a dog with no words. Schroeder is very prominent as a child prodigy with his love of piano and growing love of Beethoven. Charlie Brown is the catcher for the baseball team. Lucy & Linus make there first appearances. And so much more. Still, we can see this wonderful world taking shape and we can see how it will become to be this most beloved of comics.

This volume also contains a nice introduction by Garrison Keillor and concludes with an interesting interview of Charles Schultz, enlightening us to some of his own feelings about his strip and what has become of the world of comics.

As the first of a projected twenty-five volumes collecting all the Peanuts strips to be released every six months for the next twelve years, all I can say is I can't wait for volume 2.

Finally, a way to enjoy Peanuts without going through all those dusty (and falling apart) paperbacks from years ago. A very well-presented collection, with quite a few of the panels never before in print.

For those unfamiliar with early Peanuts, it may seem a bit simplistic, but trust me, this is just the warm-up for the best of the strip in the 60s and 70s.

My only complaint: why is it taking the publishing company ten years (!) to get the entire strip into print??

Yes every time has a best comic and Peanuts was IT for a long time. The last few years were rather painful for fans but still on occasion funny. You could never count Shultz totally out. You always had to read Peanuts just in case. [ You are not going to believe this but Garfield was once great too. Then came Bloom County and now there are many good ones but Dilbert is now without question IT. ] I am glad they are rereleasing the early stuff so now maybe my friends will stop saying how LAME Peanuts is.

If all of the Complete Peanuts volumes are this good, then Fantagraphics will stay in business forever. This first book is beautifully packaged (by semi-famous Canadian cartoonist Seth), with three daily strips per page. Sunday strips fill an entire page. The introduction is short and to-the-point. The essay after the final strip is very good; it explains why Peanuts became the most successful newspaper strip of all time. The books ends with a lengthy interview with Charles Schulz that goes a long way toward explaining what kind of person could create such a wonderfully sweet and sad comic every day for 50 years. Schulz was both ordinary and extraordinary at the same time, and his work reflects that contradiction.

But the heart of the book is in the panels, of course. As you read, you get to see the Peanuts world grow. Schroeder and Linus are introduced as toddlers. Snoopy doesn't talk or think until the second year. (He doesn't do much except eat Charlie Brown's candy, either.) Violet pulls the football away from Charlie Brown before Lucy does. And so on. This book captures a comic strip world in its earliest stages, still forming. Even Schulz's drawing style grows from page to page, in very subtle ways.

It's going to be hard to top this first volume. The early strips have a lot of historical value, and the extras are great. Five stars.

This recommendation is from someone who loathes the "Peanuts" comic strip that most people are familiar with - the strip from the last couple of decades of its run. I doubt that I ever saw a "Peanuts" strip from that era that made me smile, let alone laugh. But this book is from the glorious days when the strip was actually fresh, clever and funny. If you think you hate "Peanuts," you should take a look at this book and discover that "Peanuts" was once acutally good.

Wonderful to have his early Peanuts all in one collection!

Charles Schulz embodied the heart and soul of every man and woman who read his strip. In Charlie Brown, the unbridaled optimism in the face of constant setbacks. In Linus, the expressions of simple faith and noncomformity. All the characters embodied a part of ourselves that we could all point to and relate with. His passing almost 4 years ago still strikes me as one of the saddest moments in my life. There are few people in this world that can touch so many with their gifts. Charles Schulz and his kind spirit will forever be a part of my life and when I have children of my own, Peanuts will one of the first things I will give to my child.

What can one even say about what's probably the best/most influential comic strip ever to hit newspapers? Peanuts was long overdue for this sort of treatment, and I'm glad that it was done in such a wonderful fashion. Yes, the Sundays aren't in color and the reprints of the dailies are smallish, but these are just minor quibbles. Having all of the comics he did from 1950 to 1952 in one book is an accomplishment in and of itself.

Now, to be honest, Peanuts wouldn't really become the Peanuts we know and love today until about the mid-1950s (or in other words, the next book or two), so what's on display here is Schulz trying to get the feel of the strip, and it's really fascinating to see the strip's evolution even through the course of the book. Not his best? Yes, but that hardly matters as Peanuts at its worst can still be lightyears ahead of many strips at their best.

The bonuses definitely take things to another level. Keillor's introduction is nice, but the real points of interest are David Michaelis' excellent biographical essay on Schulz (which is a real eye-opener to many who've grown up on Peanuts like myself) and an interview Charles Schulz gave in the late 1980s which provides a ton of insight into his personal character.

All in all, despite some of the presentation of the strips mentioned above, this book is a must-own, and I eagerly await the rest of the volumes in the series.

My one main beef with this collection is the size of the book. I don't know why they made it so small. The Peanuts Parade collection of books from the 1970's and 1980's were a full 8" X 10", and you could better appreciate Schulz's artwork.

Another comment is that the first volume of the Complete Peanuts, for those collecting all of them, should really be considered "Li'l Beginnings," which is available through the Charles M. Schulz Museum Bookstore. It contains the complete collection of Li'l Folks strips from 1947-1950, also in chronological order. From that book, you can better appreciate Schulz's minimalist style for Peanuts. He actually drew much fuller for Li'l Folks, but greatly simplified it as he began Peanuts.

Other than that, I agree with all the other 5 star reviews listed on this page. I am so thankful that they are releasing all of Schulz's work. It saves me having to find them all in some dusty old microfilm machine.