It gives me great pleasure to introduce feminist and artist Kate Beaton – the sparkling mind behind Hark! A Vagrant. Kate’s brand of humour is wry, dry and packs a sassy punch while she makes a point in the face of beefy, brawny super-men. Her special super power is the ability to find humour in the gross imbalance in the way women have been represented in literature and history through the ages and it makes for some caustic reading material.
For instance her interpretation of Lois Lane is not intrigued by Clark Kent or fazed by Superman. In Kate Beaton’s vivid imagination Lois is a busy woman of no nonsense, has a lot of work to get done and no time to be a simpering mess.
Kate’s take on Batman is absolutely delightful – she strips the big bat off his broody mask, and his glorified masculinity and reveals within him a saucy, skanky guy, and who ever knew, a sense of humour!
Then there is Wonder Woman and her soul crushing ennui. Her disinterest is stark against the enthusiasm of her friends, fans and well-wishers. And that makes for some dark comedy that strikes a chord with anyone who has been at the receiving end of sexism.
There’s no stopping Kate, which is good because we cannot have enough of her bite. See what she makes of Spiderman:
All the works shown here have been borrowed from Kate’s blog which can be found here. Follow it and you will find there is more where all this awesome came from.
And in closing I leave you with Strong Female Characters!