''Berlin'' is a

comic book A comic book, also called comicbook, comic magazine or (in the United Kingdom and Ireland) simply comic, is a publication that consists of comics art in the form of sequential juxtaposed panels that represent individual scenes. Panels are of ...

series Series may refer to: People with the name * Caroline Series (born 1951), English mathematician, daughter of George Series * George Series (1920–1995), English physicist Arts, entertainment, and media Music * Series, the ordered sets used in ...

Jason Lutes Jason Lutes (born December 7, 1967)
at Comic Creator is an American

Black Eye Productions Black Eye Books (formerly called Black Eye Productions) is a small but influential Canadian comic book publishing company founded by Michel Vrana. Under the auspices of Vrana, Black Eye was known as a publisher of artfully designed alternative com ...

and then

Drawn & Quarterly Drawn & Quarterly is a publishing company based in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, specializing in comics. It publishes primarily comic books, graphic novels and comic strip collections. The books it publishes are noted for their artistic content, a ...

. Planned as a series of 24 magazines, since reduced to 22, INTERVIEW: Jason Lutes Talks the Final Days of "Berlin"

Comic Book Resources ''Comic Book Resources'', also known by the initialism CBR, is a website dedicated to the coverage of comic book–related news and discussion. History Comic Book Resources was founded by Jonah Weiland in 1995 as a development of the Kingdom Co ...

, July 28, 2015 then re-released in book form, it describes life in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and List of cities in Germany by population, largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European Union by population within ci ...

from 1928 to 1933, during the decline of the

Weimar Republic The Weimar Republic (german: link=no, Weimarer Republik ), officially named the German Reich, was the government of Germany from 1918 to 1933, during which it was a constitutional federal republic for the first time in history; hence it is ...

Plot

Book One

The first eight issues were compiled into a

book A book is a medium for recording information in the form of writing or images, typically composed of many pages (made of papyrus, parchment, vellum, or paper) bound together and protected by a cover. The technical term for this physi ...

titled ''Berlin: City of Stones'', published in 2000. It starts with Marthe Müller, an art student, arriving in Berlin. One story arc details the start of her life in Berlin, focusing on her relationship to journalist Kurt Severing. A second storyline describes a working-class family which breaks up due to differing political views, the mother, Gudrun, eventually joining the communists with her daughters Elga and Silvia, while the father takes his son Heinz to the

Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...

s. The book ends with the massacre of 1 May 1929, the

International Workers Day International Workers' Day, also known as Labour Day in some countries and often referred to as May Day, is a celebration of labourers and the working classes that is promoted by the international labour movement and occurs every year on 1 May, ...

(known in German as ''

Blutmai Blutmai (, ) refers to several days of police brutality against KPD supporters in early May 1929 that led to violence between the communist demonstrators and members of the Berlin Police which was under the control of the Social Democratic Pa ...

'').

Book Two

Issues 9–16 have been compiled into ''Berlin'' Book Two: ''City of Smoke'', published in 2008. In this second volume, the relationship between Marthe and Kurt disintegrates, partly due to the influence of Kurt's former lover, the socialite Margarethe. Marthe develops a lesbian relationship with her fellow art student Anna. Gudrun's daughter Silvia struggles to survive in the streets of Berlin, partly with the help of a Jewish junk collector. Another major subplot involves a group of African-American jazz musicians who perform at a Berlin nightclub, but slowly begin to believe they are being ripped-off by their local manager. The volume concludes with the electoral victory of the

Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported t ...

in September 1930.

Book Three

The final volume was published by Drawn and Quarterly in 2018, and comprises issues 17–22. The title of this final part is Berlin: ''City of Light''. With the Nazi party now in power, the tensions between the factions erupt all over the country. The Communists prepare themselves for being attacked by the police and the followers of Hitler. Marthe and Anne are now living together, while Severing plunges into depression after his editor is arrested by the government. As the situation around them becomes increasingly violent, the characters slowly give up trying to change their own destiny and start planning for the future.

Collected editions

The series has been collected into trade paperback: * ''Berlin: City of Stones'' (collects ''Berlin'' #1–8, Drawn & Quarterly, 1 June 2000, ) * ''Berlin: City of Smoke'' (collects ''Berlin'' #9–16, Drawn & Quarterly, 19 August 2008, ) * ''Berlin Book Three: City of Light'' (collects ''Berlin'' #17-22, Drawn & Quarterly, 4 September 2018, ) ...and into a single hardcover, The first two collected volumes had more than 100,000 copies printed, while the hardcover edition had a first run of 20,000 copies.

Reviews

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first known for its ...

listed the series at #48 in their list of "50 Best Non-Superhero Graphic Novels". *

Tributes

In homage to Lutes's work, 157 cartoonists (primarily past and present students at the

Center for Cartoon Studies The Center for Cartoon Studies (CCS) is a two-year institution focusing on sequential art, specifically comics and graphic novels

Historical references

''Berlin'' features a number of historical events, organizations, and figures, listed in end materials. The book ends with a contemporary (2017) photograph of

Potsdamer Platz Potsdamer Platz (, ''Potsdam Square'') is a public square and traffic intersection in the center of Berlin, Germany, lying about south of the Brandenburg Gate and the Reichstag (German Parliament Building), and close to the southeast corn ...

, echoing the drawing on page 18 of the place in 1928, and then with the

coat of arms of Berlin The coat of arms of Berlin is used by the German city state as well as the city itself. Introduced in 1954 for West Berlin, it shows a black bear on a white shield. On top of the shield is a special crown, created by the amalgamation of the ...

from 1280.

Paragraph 175 Paragraph 175 (known formally a§175 StGB also known as Section 175 in English) was a provision of the German Criminal Code from 15 May 1871 to 10 March 1994. It made homosexual acts between males a crime, and in early revisions the provisio ...

(section of the German Criminal Code making homosexuality illegal) is mentioned on page 453, and elaborated in endnotes. Organizations: * ''A-I-Z:'' ''

Arbeiter-Illustrierte-Zeitung ''Arbeiter-Illustrierte-Zeitung'' or ''AIZ'' (in English, ''The Workers Pictorial Newspaper'') was a German illustrated magazine published between 1924 and March 1933 in Berlin, and afterward in Prague and finally Paris until 1938. Anti-Fascism a ...

'' (''The Workers Pictorial Newspaper'') * ''

Die Weltbühne ''Die Weltbühne'' (‘The World Stage’) was a German weekly magazine for politics, art and the economy. It was founded in Berlin in 1905 as (‘The Theater’) by Siegfried Jacobsohn and was originally a theater magazine only. In 1913 it be ...

'' (The World Stage), weekly magazine for which Kurt writes. *

Hitler Jugend The Hitler Youth (german: Hitlerjugend , often abbreviated as HJ, ) was the youth organisation of the Nazi Party in Germany. Its origins date back to 1922 and it received the name ("Hitler Youth, League of German Worker Youth") in July 1926 ...

(Hitler Youth) * KJVD: Kommunistischer Jugendverband Deutschlands (

Young Communist League of Germany The Young Communist League of Germany (, abbreviated KJVD) was a political youth organization in Germany. History The KJVD was formed in 1920 from the Free Socialist Youth () of the Communist Party of Germany, A prior youth wing had been forme ...

) * KPD:

Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands The Communist Party of Germany (german: Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands, , KPD ) was a major political party in the Weimar Republic between 1918 and 1933, an underground resistance movement in Nazi Germany, and a minor party in West German ...

(Communist Party of Germany) * NSDAP:

Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that crea ...

(National Socialist German Workers' Party, Nazi Party) *

Schutzpolizei The ''Schutzpolizei'' (), or ''Schupo'' () for short, is a uniform-wearing branch of the ''Landespolizei'', the state (''Land'') level police of the states of Germany. ''Schutzpolizei'' literally means security or protection police, but it is b ...

("Schupo", Protection Police) * SA: Sturmabteilung (Storm Detachment, "stormtroopers", "brownshirts") Historical figures (in order of appearance):

Joachim Ringelnatz Joachim Ringelnatz is the pen name of the German author and painter Hans Bötticher (7 August 1883, Wurzen, Saxony – 17 November 1934, Berlin). His pen name ''Ringelnatz'' is usually explained as a dialect expression for an animal, possibly a ...

Carl von Ossietzky Carl von Ossietzky (; 3 October 1889 – 4 May 1938) was a German journalist and pacifist. He was the recipient of the 1935 Nobel Peace Prize for his work in exposing the clandestine German re-armament. As editor-in-chief of the magazine ''Die ...

Ernst Thälmann Ernst Johannes Fritz Thälmann (; 16 April 1886 – 18 August 1944) was a German communist politician, and leader of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) from 1925 to 1933. A committed Marxist-Leninist and Stalinist, Thälmann played a major r ...

, Joseph Goebbels,

Josephine Baker Josephine Baker (born Freda Josephine McDonald; naturalised French Joséphine Baker; 3 June 1906 – 12 April 1975) was an American-born French dancer, singer and actress. Her career was centered primarily in Europe, mostly in her adopted Fran ...

Horst Wessel Horst Ludwig Georg Erich Wessel (9 October 1907 – 23 February 1930) was a Berlin ''Sturmführer'' ("Assault Leader", the lowest commissioned officer rank) of the ''Sturmabteilung'' (SA), the Nazi Party's stormtroopers. After his killing in 1 ...

, and

Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...

. Other terms used include ''

Gauleiter A ''Gauleiter'' () was a regional leader of the Nazi Party (NSDAP) who served as the head of a '' Gau'' or '' Reichsgau''. ''Gauleiter'' was the third-highest rank in the Nazi political leadership, subordinate only to '' Reichsleiter'' and to ...

'' (roughly "Shire leader").

Notes

References

* *

External links

*
Drawn & Quarterly (publisher) author info page

Berlin: City of Stones, Book One, PopMatters Comic Book Review

City of Smoke info
{{Drawn & Quarterly 1996 comics debuts Comics set in the 1920s Comics set in the 1930s Berlin in fiction Comics by Jason Lutes Comics about Nazi Germany Cultural depictions of Josephine Baker Cultural depictions of Adolf Hitler