
The Ten-Cent Plague
The Great Comic-Book Scare and How It Changed America
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Narrated by:
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Stefan Rudnicki
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By:
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David Hajdu
About this listen
David Hajdu reveals how comics, years before the rock-and-roll revolution, brought on a clash between postwar children and their prewar parents. Created by outsiders from the tenements, garish, shameless, and often shocking, comics became the targets of a raging generational culture divide. They were burned in public bonfires, outlawed in certain cities, and nearly destroyed by a series of televised Congressional hearings. Yet their creativity, irreverence, and suspicion of authority would have a lasting influence.
©2008 David Hajdu (P)2008 Blackstone Audio, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
"This book tells an amazing story, with thrills and chills more extreme than the workings of a comic book's imagination." ( The New York Times)
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What listeners say about The Ten-Cent Plague
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- Nathan Massengill
- 03-20-22
Very Accurate History
Very readable history of a story so bizarre it won't seem entirely real. But it was all too real.
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- Donald Roberts
- 07-19-17
Comic Book Fans Rejoice
A thorough history of what went on after the publication of the book "Seduction Of The Innocent" as well as some history of the comics medium before the publication of the above mentioned book let's just say as a comic book fan I loved it. The reader was top notch.
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Overall
- Cather
- 07-21-08
Fascinating
The book itself is well written; I will have to look at the other book he has out on audible.
Rudnicki is a great narrator, but when he attempted a "New York" accent he sounded like one of the characters from his reading of ENDER'S GAME, whom I hadn't realised where supposed to be New Yorkers, and it's kind of jarring.
Other than that, no complaints.
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8 people found this helpful
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- Marco Yolo
- 03-25-16
Fascinating
Hadju's incredibly well researched examination of the censorship of comics offers a deeply contextualized narrative about the cultural and social impact and implications of the comics scare while also portraying of the rise and fall of the men and women who worked in the right industry at the wrong time.
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2 people found this helpful
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- wbiro
- 06-09-22
Engaging History with Lessons to Learn
Alternate Title: How Early Lurid Comics Failed to Defend Themselves or Adjust to External Pressures. Too bad I wasn't there. There are important lessons to be learned, first that banning or forbidding things is not the answer, that it only perpetuates a vapid status quo that is doomed to fail. Second is identifying what are causes and what are effects (the lurid comics being the effects of deeper societal problems), so you can solve the true problem.
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- Kimee Does
- 08-14-23
Outstanding!
Loved this wild, winding story of not only comic book history, but a slice of American history not often highlighted. Equal parts tragic and resilient, the stories of the men and women who fought to create the comic book medium is inspiring.
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- Mark
- 07-03-24
Relevant Again
Blue-noses have always been with us. The unthinking reactionaries have always assaulted non-conforming members of society. This is an important history of one of the times they won.
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Overall
- Eric
- 02-09-09
Great for the true comic book fan
I found this book enjoyable, but. . .
I think a comic book collector should and would cling to most of this book. It sort of got a little dry in the middle with historical information that I started to just want to work through.
Having said that, I really liked the book overall. I am a fan of Mad Magazine, and I particularly enjoyed reading about its history in this book. This book also does remind us that censorship has been around a long time--and will continue for a long time to come. I particularly love how we use blame and censorship to absolve us of blame for the behavior of our children. G(g)od forbid we should blame genes and poor parenting.
Enjoy this book and fast forward when it gets too dry. Many moments are quite entertaining.
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6 people found this helpful
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- karltonwrites
- 02-16-13
What Were Comics Doing to Our Children?
This is some pretty solid reporting of the Comic Book Scare of the late forties, early fifties. It may be a little long for its topic, but very informative and enjoyable nonetheless. It makes me wonder what comics would be like if the brakes hadn't been put on creativity for twenty to thirty years.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Timmy the G
- 11-10-17
Hidden History
I had no idea how big comics were or how much they were pilloried by the establishment of the 40's and 50's. Starts with a rather detailed history of comics, and moved to the comic book craze of the mid century. I have never been a big comic book reader, yet found the story fascinating especially the last half when people sought fame, fortune, and political power by trying to ban the comic book. The thread of Bill Gaines's story is most interesting. I used to love Mad magazine, and loved hearing the long version of how he came to publish it. The narration is fine, I appreciate his trying to capture a bit of each character's accent without going overboard. I'd recommend this to folks who like comics as well as anyone interested in First Amendment issues.
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