"The Adventures of Phoebe Zeit-Geist" was an American

comics a medium used to express ideas with images, often combined with text or other visual information. It typically the form of a sequence of panels of images. Textual devices such as speech balloons, captions, and onomatopoeia can indicate ...

series, written by

Michael O'Donoghue Michael O'Donoghue (January 5, 1940 – November 8, 1994) was an American writer and performer. He was known for his dark and destructive style of comedy and humor, was a major contributor to ''National Lampoon'' magazine, and was the ...

and drawn by

Frank Springer Frank Springer (December 6, 1929 – April 2, 2009) was an American comics artist best known for Marvel Comics' '' Dazzler'' and '' Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.''. As well, in collaboration with writer Michael O'Donoghue, Springer created one o ...

. From January 1965, it was serialized in the magazine ''

Evergreen Review ''The Evergreen Review'' is a U.S.-based literary magazine. Its publisher is John Oakes and its editor-in-chief is Dale Peck. The ''Evergreen Review'' was founded by Barney Rosset, publisher of Grove Press. It existed in print from 1957 until 19 ...

'', and later published in book form as a

Grove Press Grove Press is an United States of America, American Imprint (trade name), publishing imprint that was founded in 1947. Imprints include: Black Cat, Evergreen, Venus Library, and Zebra. Barney Rosset purchased the company in 1951 and turned it in ...

hardcover in 1968 and trade paperback in 1969. It was reissued as a trade paperback in 1986 (Ken Pierce Books, , ).

Plot

The comic detailed the adventures of

debutante A debutante, also spelled débutante, ( ; from french: débutante , "female beginner") or deb is a young woman of aristocratic or upper-class family background who has reached maturity and, as a new adult, is presented to society at a formal " ...

Phoebe Zeit-Geist as she was variously kidnapped and rescued by a series of bizarre characters, such as

Nazis 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 Na ...

, Chinese foot fetishists, and

lesbian A lesbian is a Homosexuality, homosexual woman.Zimmerman, p. 453. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate n ...

assassins.

Impact

Doonesbury ''Doonesbury'' is a comic strip by American cartoonist Garry Trudeau that chronicles the adventures and lives of an array of characters of various ages, professions, and backgrounds, from the President of the United States The president ...

'' comic-strip creator

Garry Trudeau Garretson Beekman Trudeau (born July 21, 1948) is an American cartoonist, best known for creating the ''Doonesbury'' comic strip. Trudeau is also the creator and executive producer of the Amazon Studios political comedy series ''Alpha House''. ...

cited the strip as an early inspiration, saying, " very heavy influence was a serial in the Sixties called 'Phoebe Zeitgeist' ... It was an absolutely brilliant, deadpan send-up of adventure comics, but with a very edgy modernist kind of approach. To this day, I hold virtually every panel in my brain. It's very hard not to steal from it."

References

American comic strips Adult comic strips Erotic comics Satirical comics 1965 comics debuts 1968 comics endings American comics characters Science fiction comics Comics about women Works originally published in American magazines Works originally published in literary magazines Works by Michael O'Donoghue Works originally published in Evergreen Review Debutantes {{comic-strip-stub