The American Graphic Novel: Materials Elsewhere

The Comic Art Collection holds over 200,000 items. Most of these items are American comic books, but also included are over 1,000 books of collected newspaper comic strips, nearly 45,000 foreign comic books, and several thousand books and periodicals about comics. Although some archival materials are held, the focus of the collection is on published work, in an effort to present a complete picture of what the American comics readership has seen, especially since the middle of the twentieth century.

Current holdings include more than 300,000 original cartoons, 45,000 books, 67,000 serials (including comic books), 3,000 linear feet of manuscript materials, and 2.5 million comic strip clippings and newspaper pages

The Special Collections Research Center is home to over 200 manuscript collections consisting primarily of original artwork used for daily comic strips and editorial cartoons. In addition to printed materials that document particular cartoon titles, we hold a few collections of sports cartoons and magazine cartoons, as well as histories of cartooning and cartoonists.

Duke offers archives such as the Edwin and Terry Murray Comic Book Collection, containing over 67,000 comic books ranging from the 1930s to the present, and the Comic Book and Graphic Novel Collection that holds thousands more items, particularly international comics and work created by women.

Begun in the 1970s, the Comic Arts Collection includes more than 40,000 comic books; the papers and drawings of political cartoonists and related manuscript collections; many reference books and journals; science fiction, fantasy and comics-related fanzines; and original newspaper comic strip art. VCU Libraries also serves as the repository for the Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards Archives.

The largest collection of comics books in the United States is housed in the Serial and Government Publications Division. The collection includes U.S. and foreign comic books—over 5,000 titles in all, totaling more than 100,000 issues. Primarily composed of the original print books, the collection includes color microfiche of a handful of the early comic books (such as Wonder Woman, Superman, and Action Comics) and special reprints. Although the collection is most comprehensive from 1950, scattered issues from numerous titles date back to the 1930s. A small number of comic books make up the Underground Comic Book collection of titles “recommended for mature readers.”

A long-lasting stalwart in the East Village (Manhattan)

An outpost of pop culture in Greenwich Village (Manhattan)

Comics, gaming, and more, in Midtown (Manhattan)

A massive enterprise with 5 locations (Manhattan)

A small, elegant comics shop with an emphasis on graphic novels and minicomics (Brooklyn)

A strongly indie/alternative comics shop, that also sponsors the festival "Comic Arts Brooklyn" (Brooklyn)

A selection of comics, memorabilia, trading cards, and more (Queens)

Create an account to be able to download free public domain Golden Age comics.

The premiere platform for purchasing digital comics and graphic novels.

An open-publishing subscription-based platform offering a wide variety of titles from major publishers.