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Title details for Wild Minds by Reid Mitenbuler - Available

Wild Minds

The Artists and Rivalries That Inspired the Golden Age of Animation

by Reid Mitenbuler
Kevin R. Free
Audiobook (Includes supplementary content)
1 of 1 copy available
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1 of 1 copy available
The vivid and untold story of the golden age of classic animation and the often larger-than-life artists who created some of the most iconic cartoon characters of the twentieth century
In 1911, the famed cartoonist Winsor McCay debuted an animated version of his popular newspaper strip, Little Nemo in Slumberland. Loosely inspired by Sigmund Freud's research on
dreams, the film was one of the very first of its kind and astonishing for its time. McCay is largely forgotten today, but his work helped unleash the creative energy of animators like Otto Messmer, Max
Fleischer, Walt Disney, and Chuck Jones. Their origin stories, rivalries, and sheer genius, as Reid Mitenbuler skillfully relates, were as colorful and subversive as their creations—from Felix the Cat to
Bugs Bunny to feature films such as Fantasia—which became an integral part of American culture over the next five decades.
Before television, animated cartoons were often "little hand grenades of social and political satire" aimed squarely at adults as preludes to movies. Early Betty Boop cartoons included nudity.
Popeye stories slyly criticized the injustices of unchecked capitalism. Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner were used to explore hidden depths of the American psyche. "During its first half-century,"
Mitenbuler writes, "animation was an important part of the culture wars about free speech, censorship, the appropriate boundaries of humor, and the influence of art and media on society." During WWII
it also played a significant role in propaganda. The golden age of animation ended with the advent of television when cartoons were sanitized to appeal to a growing demographic of children and help advertisers sell sugary breakfast cereals.
Alongside these stories, Mitenbuler incorporates the surprising contributions of Theodor Geisel (Dr. Seuss), voice artist Mel Blanc, composer Leopold Stokowski, and many others whose talents
enriched the world of animation. Wild Minds is an ode to our lively past and to the creative energy that would inspire The Simpsons, South Park, and BoJack Horseman today.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    December 1, 2020

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781705008539
      • File size: 395142 KB
      • Duration: 13:43:12

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • Publisher's Weekly

      Starred review from October 26, 2020
      Journalist Mitenbuler (Bourbon Empire) casts the creators of animated cartoons as characters themselves in this rollicking history of the first 50 years of animation. The author tracks animation as a medium and an industry from the early 20th century to the 1960s, when cartoons moved from the theater to televisions and animation “changed almost overnight.” The book begins with the “restless” Winsor McCay, a famous New York Journal cartoonist who had a lasting impact on better-known animators (Walt Disney among them), but was “all but forgotten by the time of his death.” Meanwhile, directors Bob Clampett (who “pushed the limits of absurdity and aggressiveness”) and Chuck Jones (“sly and mischievous with a dirty sense of humor”) made up a mid-century “pirate crew” that brought such characters as Bugs Bunny, Elmer Fudd, and Porky Pig to the silver screen. Household names like the Walt Disney Company get plenty of ink, but so do such edgier competitors as Fleischer Studios, formed before Disney and all but wiped out when legal trouble threatened its famed Betty Boop. In snappy prose, Mitenbuler writes a history rich with personalities. This Technicolor tour de force is impossible to put down. Agent: Michelle Brower, Aevitas Creative Management.

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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