Hope in Ink: Why Comic Books Deserve a Place Beside the Classics

By Rihanna Ishola

For too long classics have been revered as the epitome of literature. People have inflated their importance in the book community because of their substantial and intricate content. There is nothing wrong with this. There is nothing wrong with simply enjoying classic novels, but reading these novels in the book community has become a way to signify, and even flaunt faux intelligence. The true purpose and joy of reading has now become so misconstrued by a group of people with an air of pretentious superiority who believe only classics can teach important lessons and enrich your life. This is deluded. Yet this train of thinking has festered, therefore causing others to not only feel like “dumb readers”, but also to overlook a true gem in the reading community: comic books. Comic books have been stereotyped as meager picture books for boys whose heads are stuck in an anti-social cloud, but comics teach so much more than what people think they do. They teach lessons that people--especially today– need to read and most importantly, comprehend. Lessons of empathy, kindness, and resilience in the face of evil, all showcased in a character who wears his underwear outside of his pants.

In the world we live in today, it’s become so normalized to see malnourished children begging for our attention then with a scroll we see someone trying to ‘put us on’ onto a new face cream that will absolutely ‘change your life’. This is an abnormality. How desensitized people are to inhumane tragedies is abnormal and moreover it’s saddening. Growing up, most of us were exposed to tales of superheroes who stood up to evil, who refused to let the evil horned monster destroy their cities with robot armies or pumpkin bombs. But when the monster has two eyes, two hands, and two legs just like the rest of us it becomes easier to separate reality from fiction. What we fail to realize is fiction is a reflection of reality.

So what’s the solution? The solution is emulating the empathy, kindness, and resilience we’ve seen nestled in polyester pages over and over again. It’s wearing our superhero costumes past halloween. Comic books allow access into a world that we could choose to make. They connect us to web slingers and men from Krypton with one thing: Our humanity. They showcase this not through convoluted philosophical passages, but through aphorisms and color splattered drawings. So while they may not look “challenging” enough at first glance, the state of the world today is more than enough proof of how important the lessons they carry truly are. So, do yourself a favor: Put the phone down, go to your nearest book store and pick up the classics of today.