''The Playboy'' is a

graphic novel A graphic novel is a long-form, fictional work of sequential art. The term ''graphic novel'' is often applied broadly, including fiction, non-fiction, and anthologized work, though this practice is highly contested by comic scholars and industry ...

by the Canadian cartoonist

Chester Brown Chester William David Brown (born 16 May 1960) is a Canadian cartoonist. Brown has gone through several stylistic and thematic periods. He gained notice in alternative comics circles in the 1980s for the surreal, scatological ''Ed the Happy Clo ...

, serialized in 1990 in Brown's comic book '' Yummy Fur'' and collected in different revised book editions in 1992 and 2013. It deals with Brown's guilt and anxiety over his obsessive masturbation to ''Playboy'' Playmate models. The story begins with Brown's first purchase of an issue of ''Playboy'' as a teenager. His obsessive masturbation gives him great guilt and anxiety, and out of fear of being caught he repeatedly rids himself of copies of the magazine, only to retrieve them later. His conflicting emotions follow him into adulthood until he purges them by revealing himself through his comics. The free, organic arrangement of odd-shaped panels of simple, expressive artwork contrasts with Brown's more detailed grid-like pages in his 1980s work, such as ''

Ed the Happy Clown ''Ed the Happy Clown'' is a graphic novel by Canadian cartoonist Chester Brown. Its title character is a large-headed, childlike children's clown who undergoes one horrifying affliction after another. The story is a dark, humorous mix of gen ...

''. ''The Playboy'' forms part of Brown's early-1990s autobiographical period, and was the first book-length work he planned as a complete story. Brown conceived it as a longer work with what became his next graphic novel, '' I Never Liked You'' (1994), but found the larger story too complex to handle at once. The story has attracted praise for its revealing honesty, and criticism from those who saw it as glorifying pornography. The ''Playboy'' publisher

Hugh Hefner Hugh Marston Hefner (April 9, 1926 – September 27, 2017) was an American magazine publisher. He was the founder and editor-in-chief of ''Playboy'' magazine, a publication with revealing photographs and articles which provoked charges of obsc ...

wrote to Brown to express concern over Brown's sexual anxieties in a post-

sexual revolution The sexual revolution, also known as the sexual liberation, was a social movement that challenged traditional codes of behavior related to sexuality and interpersonal relationships throughout the United States and the developed world from the 1 ...

world.

Background

Chester Brown grew up in

Châteauguay Châteauguay ( , , ) is an off-island suburb of Montreal, in southwestern Quebec, located both on the Chateauguay River and Lac St-Louis, which is a section of the St. Lawrence River. The population of the city of Châteauguay at the 2021 Cens ...

, a Montreal suburb with a large English-speaking minority; he does not speak French. He described himself as a "nerdy teenager" attracted to

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 ...

s from a young age. He sought a career drawing

superhero comics Superhero comics are one of the most common genres of American comic books. The genre rose to prominence in the 1930s and became extremely popular in the 1940s and has remained the dominant form of comic book in North America since the 1960s. Su ...

, but was unsuccessful in finding work with

Marvel Marvel may refer to: Business * Marvel Entertainment, an American entertainment company ** Marvel Comics, the primary imprint of Marvel Entertainment ** Marvel Universe, a fictional shared universe ** Marvel Music, an imprint of Marvel Comics ...

or DC after graduating from high school. He moved to Toronto and discovered and the small-press community. He began to self-publish a

minicomic A minicomic is a creator-published comic book, often photocopied and stapled or with a handmade binding. In the United Kingdom and Europe the term small press comic is equivalent with minicomic, reserved for those publications measuring A6 (105& ...

in 1983 titled '' Yummy Fur''. Toronto-based

Vortex Comics Vortex Comics is a Canadian independent comic book publisher that began operation in 1982. Under the supervision of president, publisher, and editor Bill Marks, Vortex was known for such titles as Dean Motter's ''Mister X (Vortex), Mister X'', How ...

began publishing ''Yummy Fur'' in 1986. After making a name for himself in

alternative comics Alternative comics cover a range of American comics that have appeared since the 1980s, following the underground comix movement of the late 1960s and early 1970s. Alternative comics present an alternative to mainstream superhero comics which ...

with the surreal serial ''Ed the Happy Clown'', Brown turned to autobiography after reading such work by

Julie Doucet Julie Doucet (born December 31, 1965)
is a Canadian

Joe Matt Joe Matt (born September 3, 1963) is an American cartoonist, best known for his autobiographical work, ''Peepshow''. Early life Matt was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He started drawing comics in 1987. Career In his autobiographical com ...

. The work of his friend and fellow Toronto cartoonist

Seth Seth,; el, Σήθ ''Sḗth''; ; "placed", "appointed") in Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Mandaeism, and Sethianism, was the third son of Adam and Eve and brother of Cain and Abel, their only other child mentioned by name in the Hebrew Bible. A ...

inspired Brown to pare down his drawing style during the early 1990s. He tentatively began his autobiographical period with a pair of short tales, and gradually became freer with his panel layouts and simpler in his artwork.

Content

The autobiographical story takes place in Chester "Chet" Brown's hometown of Châteauguay in 1975, when Brown was 15. It details his obsession with the Playmates in ''

Playboy ''Playboy'' is an American men's lifestyle and entertainment magazine, formerly in print and currently online. It was founded in Chicago in 1953, by Hugh Hefner and his associates, and funded in part by a $1,000 loan from Hefner's mother. K ...

'' magazine. Brown's character obsessively masturbates in secret, terrified of being found out, but unable to resist the urge. Afterwards he feels guilty and sometimes rids himself of the magazines, only to retrieve them. As an adult, he sometimes repurchases copies of issues he had discarded. The story takes place primarily during Brown's adolescence and finishes at the time of the book's creation. Brown uses a bat-winged figure with his own face to narrate the story and goad Chet in a way similar to the trope of the angel and devil on the shoulders. Chet never acknowledges the narrator, who appears to be visible only to the reader. The narrator talks about Brown in the third person in the adolescent parts of the story, but in the first person in Brown's adult years.

Synopsis

The story opens in church, where the winged narrator cajoles the adolescent Chet to buy a ''Playboy'' magazine he had seen for sale. Chet works up the courage to buy it at a convenience store a considerable distance from his house, in the hope that no one will see him there. After bringing it home and masturbating to it, he disposes of the magazine by hiding it under a plank of wood in the woods near his house. His building obsession battles his guilt, and eventually he returns for it, a situation which repeats itself throughout the story. His obsession so overcomes him that, even when his mother dies while he is at camp, his first thought at returning home is to retrieve the ''Playboy'' he has hidden in the woods. As an adult, he hunts down back issues and memorizes dates and names of Playmate models, and disposes of them over the guilt he feels or his fear of being found out by a girlfriend. His obsession interferes with his relations with women: he relates that, while seeing one girlfriend, he could only maintain an erection for her by fantasizing about his favourite Playmates, and that he preferred masturbation to having sex with her. ''The Playboy'' finishes with Brown drawing the story in progress. Though he knows his friends shortly will read it, he still feels uncomfortable discussing it with them.

Style and analysis

By the end of the 1980s Brown had grown dissatisfied with his drawing style. He began simplifying it after bringing ''Ed the Happy Clown'' to an end, as he had been reading work by cartoonists with simpler styles such as John Stanley and Brown's friend Seth. He abandoned the grid layout that he had used and arranged panels on the page in a varied, organic manner. He made the drawings first and only afterwards laid down panel borders, which conform to the shapes of the pictures they enclose and are in a wobbly free-hand—much like those of the

Hernandez brothers The Hernandez brothers, also known as Los Bros Hernandez, are the three American cartoonist brothers Mario (b. 1953), Gilbert (b. 1957), and Jaime Hernandez (b. 1959). The three were born in a Mexican-American family and grew up i ...

Robert Crumb Robert Dennis Crumb (; born August 30, 1943) is an American cartoonist and musician who often signs his work R. Crumb. His work displays a nostalgia for American folk culture of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and satire of contem ...

. Brown distorted his images to convey emotion, but not in traditional cartoonish ways. For example, when the adolescent Brown encounters friends of his parents, he does not physically shrink with embarrassment, but does so through distortion of perspective. Chet is introverted and self-isolating, preferring pornography to communicating with others, such as his brother. Chet takes centre stage in the narrative, and supporting characters make but brief appearances. Brown depicts Chet's obsessive masturbation, and his uncommon masturbation style has drawn notice: he faces down and rubs his penis between the palms of both hands, a style MarcyR. Isabella likens to a pair of praying hands. The style has come to be called "the Chester" after a cartoon of it by

Peter Bagge Peter Bagge (pronounced , as in ''bag''; born December 11, 1957) is an American cartoonist whose best-known work includes the comics ''Hate'' and ''Neat Stuff''. His stories often use black humor and exaggerated cartooning to dramatize the reduced ...

. He feels terrified of being caught masturbating and his regret afterwards drives him continually to rid himself of the magazines, such as by hiding them in the woods near his house, but always returns for them. Brown's mother dies while he is at camp, which is mentioned only briefly, as when he returns from camp he immediately heads to the woods to dig up the ''Playboy'' he had buried there. Comics critic Darcy Sullivan sees Brown in this scene having "shunted aside his painful feelings for her, and for other women, in favor of this tatty fetish". Chet feels surprised at and repelled by a centrefold of a black Playmate he comes across, bringing about the realization of racist feelings he has. When finishing ''The Playboy'', Brown felt guilt over still looking at Playmates and credits having come out in print with helping him overcome his shame. While many have interpreted the book as a condemnation of pornography, to Brown it is about the guilt he was made to feel for using the media. Some interpretations, such as those of Sullivan and Darrel Epp, see ''The Playboy'' demonstrating how the idealized images in pornography distort societal norms and expectations of beauty; one example cited is a scene in which Brown says he could only maintain an erection with one girlfriend if he fantasized about his favourite Playmates. Brown has objected to this interpretation—rather, he sees it as a flaw in the work, in that it does not provide enough context for what he intended to communicate: that he had gotten into a relationship with a woman whom he did not find sexually attractive, and that if ''Playboy'' did not exist he would have fantasized about other images of women. Critic Darcy Sullivan saw the book as presenting how Brown's ''Playboy'' obsession affects his ability to relate to women. Sullivan called ''The Playboy'' stories " e most honest sex in comics" of the early 1990s, "and the most damning exposé of pornography" as it deals "with nothing more than Brown's relationship with ''Playboy''". He praises how quickly Brown matured as a storyteller over the course of ''The Playboy'', and for the believability of scenes which may or may not have happened as Brown depicted them. While seeming to acknowledge

feminist Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...

concerns, Brown depicts himself as "a victim of his urges", and that "''Playboy'' has kept him mentally separate". Sullivan asserts the book shows that pornography does not merely satisfy a need, but fosters an addiction. Brown's comics raise questions, rather than trying to answer them, an approach Sullivan compared favourably to that of Joe Matt's less subtle body of work, which also details a pornography obsession: he wrote that Matt's comics analyze and rationalize his obsession, while Brown's reveal.

Publication

Brown had run into problems doing autobiographical stories of his contemporary life, as his story interconnected with the stories of those around him—the friends he portrayed did not always agree with the way he pictured them. He portrays his friend Kris's negative reaction in " Showing Helder" to his depiction of her in " Helder". Brown turned to tales of his teenage years, as he had lost contact with most of those he knew from that time. Brown stated that he intended a longer story encompassing what ended up in ''The Playboy'' and the following graphic novel, '' I Never Liked You'' (1994), but when planning it he found it was too complex. He said he had a clear idea of the stories from his life that he would use, and the general shape of the narrative, but he had a "sense of improvising" as he did not script it out beforehand. The serialization appeared under the title ''Disgust'' in issues 21–23 of ''Yummy Fur'', at the time published by Vortex Comics. With the twenty-fifth issue of ''Yummy Fur'' in 1991, Brown switched publishers to the Montreal-based

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, ...

, who published a collected and revised edition of ''The Playboy'' in 1992; this was the first

from the publisher. Brown rescripted, relettered, and reformatted the book for an annotated edition in 2013, also from Drawn & Quarterly.

Reception and legacy

The story gained praise from fans, critics, and other cartoonists, and earned a

Harvey Award The Harvey Awards are given for achievement in comic books. Named for writer-artist Harvey Kurtzman, the Harvey Awards were founded by Gary Groth in 1988, president of the publisher Fantagraphics, to be the successor to the Kirby Awards that were ...

nomination in 1991 for Best Single Issue or Story. ''The Playboy'', ''I Never Liked You'', and several shorter pieces placed No.38 on ''

The Comics Journal ''The Comics Journal'', often abbreviated ''TCJ'', is an American magazine of news and criticism pertaining to comic books, comic strips and graphic novels. Known for its lengthy interviews with comic creators, pointed editorials and scathing re ...

''s list of the best 100 English-language comics of the 20th century as "The autobiographical comics from Yummy Fur". Cartoonist

Gilbert Hernandez Gilberto Hernández (born February 1, 1957), usually credited as Gilbert Hernandez and also by the nickname Beto (), is an American cartoonist. He is best known for his ''Palomar''/''Heartbreak Soup'' stories in '' Love and Rockets'', an alterna ...

asserted, "''The Playboy'' and ''I Never Liked You'' are probably the best graphic novels next to ''

Maus ''Maus'' is a graphic novel by American cartoonist Art Spiegelman, serialized from 1980 to 1991. It depicts Spiegelman interviewing his father about his experiences as a Polish Jew and Holocaust survivor. The work employs postmodern technique ...

''". Critic Frank Young called it a "pivotal work" in the autobiographical comics trend of the early 1990s. Critic Darcy Sullivan considered it required reading for those who are serious about comics and a "landmark look at an artist's growth", referring to the pace with which Brown's work matured over the course of the three issues of its serialization. Brown stated that several women took offense at the book, saying it glorified pornography.

sent Brown a letter after ''The Playboy''s publication, showing concern that someone who grew up during the

could still suffer such confusion and anxiety. Darcy Sullivan compared the pornography-obsessed autobiographical work of Joe Matt in ''

Peepshow A peep show or peepshow is a presentation of a live sex show or pornographic film which is viewed through a viewing slot. Several historical media provided voyeuristic entertainment through hidden erotic imagery. Before the development of the ci ...

'' unfavourably to ''The Playboy'' in an issue of ''The Comics Journal'', to which Brown responded with a defence of Matt's work in a later issue. Brown's attitudes towards pornography have since changed greatly. When he made ''The Playboy'' he was struggling with his embarrassment over buying pornography; two decades later he vocally advocated for the decriminalization of prostitution in ''

Paying for It ''Paying for It'', "a comic strip memoir about being a John (prostitution), john", is a 2011 graphic novel by Canada, Canadian cartoonist Chester Brown. A combination of memoir and polemic, the book explores Brown's decision to give up on roman ...

'' (2011).

References

Works cited

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

External links

*
PDF preview
at

's website {{DEFAULTSORT:Playboy 1992 graphic novels Fiction set in 1975 Comics set in the 1970s Autobiographical comics Autobiographical graphic novels Canadian graphic novels Drawn & Quarterly titles Books by Chester Brown Comics by Chester Brown Playboy Comics set in Canada Comics set in Quebec Non-fiction books about pornography Novels about pornography