The Book of Genesis Illustrated

Studying early Judaism? Here’s an illustrated cartoon version of the Book of Genesis with literally everything, “from Eden to Egypt!”

The underground comic genius, R. Crumb, who wrote Mr. Natural, Angelfood McSpade and Fritz the Cat, illustrated every page of the Book of Genesis.

In the NPR clip below, Crumb notes that it’s  a “vicious story”  that includes violence, nastiness, with people in a position of power ruling elites who derive pleasure from inflicting pain and suffering on other humans.”

The illustrations show all that and Crumb even included a warning on the cover that the contents might not be suitable for all audiences.

The book was released six years ago and NPR reviewed it in the clip below.

Many museums exhibited the book including the Hammer Museum in Los Angles. The page for the exhibit includes a slideshow that takes you through some of the illustrated pages of the book.

The Los Angeles Times has an excellent story about the comic book called, The creation of R. Crumb’s ‘Genesis’ and the New York Times has a good  slide show of  some the pages as well a story about the book called God Gets Graphic.

Robert Alter has a good review in the New Republic called Scripture Picture in which he notes that “perhaps the most winning aspect of Crumb’s Genesis is its inventive playfulness.”

He writes that its fun to follow Crumb’s images and that “in some instances, the fun is a direct visual translation of what is conveyed in the narrative report.”