Will Eisner (1917–2005) considered himself "a graphic witness recording life, death, heartache, and the endless struggle to prevail." The publication of A Contract With God when Eisner was sixty-one proved to be pivotal for both him and comic literature. It marked the birth of the modern graphic novel and the beginning of an era where serious cartoonists could be liberated from the restrictive form of comics. More than four decades after the initial publication of A Contract With God, and in the final months of his life, Eisner chose to combine three fantastic works he had placed in 75 Hot Avenue, the mythical street of his youth in New York during the Great Depression. As the dramas unfold in A Contract With God, the first book of the new trilogy, it is at 75 Hot Avenue where Frimme Hersch, the devout Jew, initially loses his beloved daughter, then breaks his pact with his Creator, and ends up as a landlord. On this street, a street singer, favored by an elderly diva, is so addicted to drink that he fails to seize his chance for fame. And there, a cunning girl, Rossi, poisons the dog of a corrupt superintendent before harming him as well. In the second book, A Life Force, which R. Crumb declared "a masterpiece," Eisner recreates himself through his protagonist, Jacob Starkach, whose existential quest mirrors Eisner's ongoing struggle. Tracing not only the 1929 Crisis and the Great Depression but also the rise of Nazism and the spread of leftist politics, Eisner combines the minimalist sensitivity of Henry Roth with the grand social themes of novelists like Dos Passos and Steinbeck. Finally, in Hot Avenue: The Neighborhood, Eisner graphically tracks the social trajectory of this mythical avenue over four centuries, creating an extensive panorama of the city and the waves of new residents—Dutch, English, Irish, Jewish, African American, and Puerto Rican—whose faces changed, yet their lives presented an endless "story of life, death, and resurrection." The trilogy A Contract With God is a captivating, fantastic chronological record of a universal American experience and Eisner's most poignant and enduring literary legacy.

Pages: 528, Year of Publication: 0108, Dimensions: 18.8x18.8cm