dirty laundry 02

dirty laundry #02

Cartoonists Co-Op/Last Gasp (1977)
Dirty Laundry Comics #2 was finally published by Last Gasp in January, 1978, by which time the Crumbs were soon to be married and well-settled in Winters, a small farm town in California’s Central Valley. The 30-page feature story covers three years in Robert and Aline’s life and is a masterpiece of autobiographical comics. It is funny, tragic and insightful, but above all searingly honest as it exposes the peculiar reality of Robert and Aline’s relationship.

To me, Dirty Laundry Comics #2 represents the beginning of their new life narrative and Robert’s evolving perspective, which would culminate with the simultaneous birthings of Weirdo magazine and Sophie Crumb in 1981. Robert and Aline were both innovators and veterans of the autobiographical comic story genre, but Dirty Laundry set a new standard in the way it shared scripting and artistic duties between two powerful voices.

Dirty Laundry only ran two issues as a comic book, but it became the launching point for three decades of collaborative, autobiographical comics produced by Robert and Aline. These comics appeared in Winds of Change (a local tabloid) in the ’70s, Weirdo in the ’80s, Self Loathing Comics in the ’90s (right after Dirty Laundry was anthologized in a trade paperback), and The New Yorker since the turn of the millenium. Ultimately, this extraordinary canon of remarkable comic collaborations will be deemed as one of Robert Crumb’s and Aline Kominsky’s greatest career achievements, which by default makes Dirty Laundry one of the greatest achievements in the history of comics.