Ed the Happy Clown (A Yummy Fur Book) by Chester Brown

Ed the Happy Clown (A Yummy Fur Book) Reviews

• 
  Drew Canole

  One of my favorite comics. It starts as a series of short improvisational stories, but Chester Brown eventually brings all of these elements together and creates a fascinating narrative.
  
  The extensive notes that Brown makes on the text give a lot of interesting context to the stories. I especially like his criticism of certain parts that he now finds immature or offensive.
  
  I had forgotten just how well the story is developed. He does a great job of tying all the silly beginnings together in a way that (almost) seems like it was all planned from the very start.
• 
  Sam Quixote

  Ed is a happy clown because he’s heading to the hospital to entertain sick kids... That’s how one of the zaniest comic books you’ll ever read begins. From there, Ed the unfortunate clown gets beaten up by anarchists, sent to prison where a man who can’t stop pooping might drown Ed in poop, and pursued by pygmies. Oh and his penis becomes Ronald Reagan.
  
  If you’ve read Chester Brown before you’ll know he’s best known for memoir type comic books like “I’ve Never Liked You”, “The Playboy” and last year’s excellent “Paying For It”, or the award-winning biography “Louis Riel”. “Ed the Happy Clown” is Brown’s first book and a long out-of-print masterpiece of bizarre and improvised plotting.
  
  Brown includes an extensive notes section at the back which is almost as good as reading the book itself. It provides background details to how the book was conceived and written/drawn along with biographical details of the author and the reaction to his work as it was released in his bi-monthly comic “Yummy Fur”. Brown admits that because he didn’t have anything to say in his early twenties he just threw together random storylines, whatever was on his mind, straight onto the page. It definitely reads that way but after a certain point the various story threads begin intersecting and make a strange kind of sense.
  
  The murderous religious janitor connects to the vampire Josie who leads to the pygmies who leads to Ronald Reagan penis who leads to the man who can’t stop pooping who leads to Dimension X. This book is a must-read just for that summary - you’ll never read a book like this. And it’s really funny too. Granted, you need a dark sense of humour to find this stuff hilarious but if insane doctors beating patients with bats, homophobic TV scientists shooting midgets and housewife bounty hunters shooting pygmies is your bag, you’ll get a lot out of this. There’s also Dimension X and where it is... I can’t give it away, it’s too funny.
  
  I’ve waited a long time to see this book back in print and reading it now, it still holds up 25+ years down the line. This may be Brown’s first attempt at comics but it shows a young talent - immature yes, but the talent is undeniable. And it’s a fantastic read. Funny, clever, hugely imaginative and creative, “Ed the Happy Clown” is a must-read.
• 
  Esther

  Me ha gustado tan poco que si digo que no me ha gustado NADA estoy diciendo más de lo que espero y siento sobre este comic.
• 
  Anthony Vacca

  Sure, the drawing is crude, the plotting nonsensical, the humor juvenile and the characters have as many dimensions as the page they're printed on, but this shit's just too punk rock not to be fun! Ed the Happy Clown (which has very little clowning at all - poor woe-besotted Ed loses his make-up and orange hair only a few page in) is Brown's graphic debut, and is packed with sex, vampires, penises with Ronald Reagan's head, homophobic scientists, portals to other dimensions located in some unlucky son of a bitch's asshole, violent cops, pygmies, divine miracles, demons, ghosts, unethical surgeons and more penises. This comic is comparable to Alex Cox's Repo Man, in that, like that particular movie, this comic bounds with youthfulness, attitude and bad taste. Brown's expansive notes at book's back make for an interesting issue-by-issue commentary, as the author riffs on subjects like how he got into the comic-making biz, and how unhappy he was with most of this comic, and also about his post-break-up suicidal thoughts. This was my first lick of Chester Brown and I'll be sure to have another taste soon.
• 
  Gina

  Ed the Happy Clown is a satire of contemporary western culture that encapsulates far more than just the Regan era in in which it was written. Like a true piece of cultural satire, it uses absurdity to its full extent by reflecting back our collectively irrational thoughts and actions—our insanity. From vampires to alternate universes to talking penises, Brown blends literary genres with guttural imagery to create a tale that is as soulful and entertaining as it is nauseating. The reader, with each twist and turn and absurdist leap, gradually finds a haunting criteque of human nature, focusing in large part on males' obsessive fear of their own penises.
  
  If I could recommend just one graphic/comic piece of fiction to anyone, it would be this one. Unfortunately, the collection of all the issues is currently out-of-print. Though you can buy each individual issue at
  Drawn and Quarterly, which is worth any additional cost. As would buying a out-of-print copy of the 1989
  Yummy Fur collection with a foreword by Harvey Pekar.
  
  I should put the usual disclaimer that I have seen other reviewers add: Ed the Happy Clown is not for everyone. It’s disturbing at times (unless you’ve already honed your macabre sense of humor). But so what? It will disturb you. Because oddly enough, it all makes sense.
  
  Dude, I say go for it.
• 
  Vir

  Bueno, a ver, las ilustraciones sin meh, tiene bastante plot twist but full of no sense, it's not a masterpiece peeero, se le pueden encontrar elementos de valor, entretenidos.
  Es una lectura corta y llevadera, aunque muy bizarra.
• 
  Keith

  Ed the Happy Clown reaches into the depths of depravity like no other comic I can really think of...and this is in a world where
  Prison Pit and
  The Squirrel Machine both comfortably exist. There were many times during the book when I looked up from what I was reading to talk to my girlfriend and then turned back to the page I was on, only to realize that I was, for example, in the middle of a scene where Ronald Reagan had become the vomiting head of someone else's penis, or a dead man's asshole was the shit-filled entrance to another dimension. And like, it took breaking my concentration to realize this was even happening, that this wasn't totally normal. Ed the Happy Clown is the reason that the phrase "what the actual fuck" was invented. It couldn't be described without these words.
  
  What makes Ed stand out from a lot of other exploitation/horror comics is that on top of being insane, it is also very very sad. Painfully, tragically so. It starts bad and gets worse so quickly, so completely, that the despair of it is almost numbing.
  
  On the one hand, it's yet another comic that makes me wish I could reincarnate backward so that I could have been a burgeoning comic book artist myself in the early 1980's. On the other hand, Chester Brown is apparently a libertarian, so at the end of the day it's just another weird comic drawn by a dumbass white guy.
• 
  Shazia

  Despite my feelings on Chester Brown after reading
  Paying for It, I can't deny the fact that I really do like his artwork and his comics. Ed the Happy Clown was kind of all over the place but oddly enough it worked. The bits with the Ronald Reagan character was kind of boring/not my favorite part of the story but I still enjoyed the graphic novel as a whole. Again, I really enjoy the notes that Brown includes after his comics, which explain certain panels/pages and helps me understand not only his artwork, but him as an individual and a creator.
  
  I'm still looking forward to reading more of his work, and I think
  Mary Wept Over the Feet of Jesus is my next read.
• 
  Mikayla

  I don't know what to say about this book other than it's weird, slightly disturbing (in a good interesting way and doesn't take long to read.
  
  It's better than other graphic novels I've tried to pick up as I actually managed to stay interested and only took and hour to read.
• 
  Raisu

  Well. That was weird.
• 
  Billie Tyrell

  
  My first foray into Chester Brown comics. I found out about this graphic novel the other day on the Cartoonist Kayfabe Youtube Channel, and I just knew I had to read it. Unfortunately I could only read a free pdf copy online; but I'm definitely going to spend some cash on his graphic novels so I think it'll balance itself out in his favour.
  
  Honestly, I don't know if I totally understand what I just read... it's hilariously disgusting, at first seemingly random but then it keeps coming together. It's got ghosts, pygmies, Ronald Reagan, other dimensions. It's mad. Totally blew my socks off reading it in one night, and it made me realise I need to quit reading dopey old DC/Marvel comics and go totally independent.
  
  "ANNIE! WATCH OUT FOR THAT MAGAZINE!"
• 
  Joey Shapiro

  I read this years ago and it is truly one of my faves!!! Dark and surreal and very very very incredibly funny.
• 
  Christopher

  Along with Alan Moore's 80's work (Swamp Thing, Miracle Man and
  Watchmen) Brown's "ED The Happy Clown" in its collected form is/was and probably always be a great source of creative energy for me.
  The best way I can sum Ed up is that a book that may very well have been and still is ahead of its time. Pure creative genius.
• 
  Jonnie

  I'd like to describe this book like a person who goes to a cafe and orders a cappuccino with three sugars, and instead they get a long black without cream. Different tastes for different people, I suppose. Because it's not horrible, it's incredibly well written and illustrated, it's just too weird for my tastes. Guess I missed the Yummy Fur cult classic train.
• 
  Sooraya Evans

  This is weird for the sake of just being weird. Lets see. A guy who can’t stop pooping. Another guy whose hand just randomly fall off. A talking penis. Eww! A bunch of alien pygmies worshiping said penis. In the midst of it all, some vampires are hunting these pygmies. Nothing makes sense.
• 
  StrictlySequential

  What a mess in a cesspool of fools- this is a FILTHY book that shines in its squalor and loses no translation to the American dollar!
  
  It's rife with an unctuous splattering of topics that offend "the masses" which ooze with quality in the tragedy and/or comedy that he imparts with such incendiary artillery.
  
  I've previously found Chess Moreno over-zealous AND tiresome- the type who is frustrating in his compulsion to "stir the pot" of society's rot and silly whatnot but it seems that he fresher flair when he wore Michael Bolton hair.
  
  This is the kind of collection that NEEDS a good introduction* to give readers faith in the risk-taking and provocative writer who -as the best are wont to do- had faith to present it in the manner they chose despite fears of misinterpretation.
  
  -_I NEED TO SAVE THIS AND COME BACK LATER - THIS DESERVES THE TIME IT TAKES FOR A COMPLETE REVIEW_-
  
  
  *In two short pages Steve Solomos gives NOTHING away and stands firmly as the best introduction that I can recall without doing some clicking in my lists but is probably the BEST example of the angle he took for his intended purpose.
  
  He delves into the various classifications attributed by others to the material within then deftly expounds upon them in contrast to widely known works to arrive at his own summation which firmly accomplishes what the best achieve- it makes you excited about the book and stimulates an interest to read it in a profound "scholarly" manner due to the artistic/literary ethos he successfully injects!
  
  
  On the inside cover of my copy:
  
  "Hola Morwenacita!
  
  Here's a little Psychotic Canadianism to remind you of the little people.
  
  Yours Truly,
  Chiquita Bonita
  Juanita Bonita
  Mama Guava
• 
  Jesús

  An unfortunate clown finds himself the victim of a number of unlikely events.
  
  Chester Brown has disowned much of his later run on the character, so this volume is the result of Brown’s strong editorial hand. Not having read Yummy Fur when it was serialized in zine form, I can’t say if that’s for the better. But what’s here is disappointingly cut short, leaving only to our imaginations what might be next for this odd cast.
  
  The real selling point are the notes that Chester Brown added for this edition. In his lengthy notes that follow each of the nine issues/chapters, he’s honest and candid about his process, techniques, and even his politics.
• 
  Hannamari

  This absurd, crude, unorthodox book wasn’t my cup of tea. Interdimensional portal in a random dude’s butthole? A very unlucky clown that finds the president’s face being transported to his penis? Ratt-eating pygmis and a pygmi-eating man? Yeah, not what I normally go for.
  
  However, I have to give a second star to this album for sheer twisted creativity and some surprisingly witty plot twists. I also think it’s really interesting that Chester Brown improvised this with no scripting or drafting with a Freudian surreal mindset unwilling to censure himself. I get why this is a cult classic. My mom would have been worried sick had she caught me reading this.
• 
  Javier Alcalde

  Surrealismo y pesadillas en viñetas.
• 
  Derek Royal

  It's been awhile since I last read Ed the Happy Clown, and the main reason I picked this one up again was because I was also reading Brian Evenson's new book, Ed Vs. Yummy Fur: Or, What Happens When a Serial Comic Becomes a Graphic Novel. So I re-read Ed while going through Evenson's analysis -- very good, by the way -- and I'm glad I did. Not only was it useful to re-familiarize myself with the narrative, but this is just a damn fun (and surreal and wacky) story. I love Chester Brown's work, and reading this again has got me wanting to re-read his other works...perhaps go on a Chester Brown binge. I also want to go through all of the issues of Yummy Fur and Underwater, as well...especially the former, where I can see the Ed comics that were never collected in any "definitive" edition. Plus, you can never have too many pairings of Ronald Reagan with penises.
  
  Update 4/29/16- rereading, yet again, and this time for our interview with Chester Brown on The Comics Alternative:
  http://comicsalternative.com/comics-a....
• 
  MariNaomi

  This went against a lot of my rules for liking a graphic novel--the storyline was developed on the fly, the art is inconsistent, and the writing was self-conscious. Basically, he was learning how to be a cartoonist as he did these, and it seems like his editor was very hands-off. Yet once I got into it, I was mesmerized by his dark humor and the surreal world he created. The cartoonist in me really appreciated the notes at the end, which was pretty much a memoir about his process and all that was going on in his life while he was writing this book. As a standalone book, it's got a lot of flaws but was a decent read. However, as a study on how a young man became a master at comics, this book was fantastic.
• 
  Nickolas

  A guy at work lent this book to me and “wow” was the text message I sent him later that night. I had been reading some pretty heavy stuff lately and this was such a needed relief. It’s best not to know anything about this going into it but it is a delightfully easy read that progresses and then progresses some more from silly, to horrible, to really horrible to uncontrolled laughter. It’s a book by a Canadian in the 1980’s who’s taking such a brilliantly immature and ridiculously ‘out there’ dump on America that you have to step back and give him a round of applause for imagination. I thoroughly enjoyed this trash.
• 
  Kelly

  Finally got around to reading ED a full two decades after my first encounter with the work of Chester Brown. The early publication date and cute title led me to believe that this collection would be rather innocuous, but it turns out that ED is in fact a revolting surrealistic land mine. Brown's ability to shock and repulse with his careful images turns out to be his greatest strength in this book, to my further surprise. His ability to navigate surrealism, on the other hand, is a bit clunky, and Brown seems much more at home with the traditional structure found in his subsequent books. Grateful to the author for the experiment, but happy that it was only one stage in his development.
• 
  Ryan

  I'm realizing that, for the most part, I need to ignore positive reviews of indie comics - I almost consistently find them uninspired. I find more to praise in the well received mainstream ... somewhat similar to my feeling that "video art" is almost invariably more pretentious and hollow than great cinema. In many ways, there's nothing really independent about it (or video art); they hew to a very narrow set of themes and stylistic markers. I give this 2 stars instead of 1 because I'm an easy target for lowbrow humor and it did make me laugh a few times ... though far too few.
• 
  Xandra

  Not a complete disaster, but still crap. Amusingly, it does a good job at summarizing itself.
  
  
  
  I enjoyed some of its absurdity - never going as far as deeming it smart - and I have to appreciate this guy's imagination. However, given my ability to stupidly laugh at basically anything even remotely resembling a joke, the fact that I reluctantly smiled a few times while reading this isn't exactly complimentary. Or maybe, distinct possibility, I'm just too stupid to "get it".
• 
  Holly Lindquist

  Disturbing, unique, and hilarious comic. Only book I know that asks: What if your bum was a doorway to an alternate dimension? This is an important question, and kudos to Mr. Brown for tackling it.
  
  The story also contains a vampire, a fellow who is not a werewolf, religious wackery, roving tribes of cannibalistic sewer pygmies, and a very presidential talking phallus. Oh, by the way, about Ed.. he ain't too happy. Poor little clown..
• 
  Adan

  I'm a pretty big fan of Chester Brown's autobiographical stuff (especially Paying For It), but this was a totally different thing. At first it felt like a bunch of disjointed and unconnected strips, but then it became apparent that everything was in fact connected, and everything was in fact totally fucking weird.
  
  And I totally feel for the Man Who Couldn't Stop.
• 
  Paul

  I learned that you shouldn't stick your head into a black hole.