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08/04/17 - BOSTON, MA. Hillary Chute poses for a portrait on Aug. 4, 2017. Photo by Adam Glanzman/Northeastern University

Professor Hillary Chute. Photo by Adam Glanzman/Northeastern University.

Hillary Chute, Professor of Art + Design for Northeastern’s College of Arts, Media and Design (CAMD) as well as the Department of English, has been named a comics and graphic novels columnist for The New York Times Book Review. She will be writing for a new monthly column, which launches in April, devoted to the world of graphic novels and comics, along with Ed Park, novelist and former Penguin Press executive editor. The two columnists will write both on children’s and adult graphic novels, and their columns will alternate monthly.

Professor Chute is a distinguished literary scholar and comics specialist, most recently recognized for her book Why Comics? From Underground to Everywhere, which was published in December 2017. Chute’s book earned high praise in the Book Review, and was highlighted again in one of the Book Review’s podcast episodes, where she talks about her book first-hand. Throughout her book, Chute discusses the recent widespread exposure of comics in current media, such as Wonder Woman and Ta-Nehisi Coates and Brian Stelfreeze’s Black Panther, while exploring the significant question she poses in her title: Why comics? To answer this question, Chute divides her approach into the “10 biggest themes in today’s comics and graphic novels,” with each one explored in its own chapter.

Read more about her book here.

“Both Hillary Chute and Ed Park have the authority, critical and curatorial eye, and a true love of the material to write about everything from Black Panther to Raina Telgemeier to Chris Ware,” said The New York Times Book Review editor, Pamela Paul; deputy editor, David Kelley; and editor, Gal Beckerman.

Professor Chute is excited about her new endeavor, and eager to share her thoughts and insights with her readers.

“I’m elated that The New York Times is increasing its coverage of comics, a literary and artistic form around which there is more excitement and energy now than ever before. It means something for the ‘newspaper of record’ to pay dedicated attention to comics on the pages of the Book Review, as it does already for other kinds of literature, like crime fiction and memoir,” said Professor Chute. “I could not be more thrilled to be sharing this role with Ed Park, who was my editor at the Village Voice and the Believer magazine, and encouraged me to write about comics back when I was still a graduate student working on my PhD. I look forward to helping to expand the purview of the Book Review, which I read religiously every Sunday, and whose influence as a standard-bearer of culture I have been observing for my entire adult life.”

Congratulations to Professor Chute and Ed Park!