Reading faster than a speeding bullet (well, almost - at least it felt that way) I finished Loeb & Sale's Superman For All Seasons, in between marking commentaries. Not being a major fan of Superman I didn't expect to enjoy it as much as I did, which was a lot. I wouldn't actually go on and buy it, but I'm glad I read it. I've always felt that the strongest part of the Superman mythos was the boyhood in Smallville (and I'm not talking about the tv series, which I've never seen) and Loeb's story focuses on this to great effect. There's not a chunk of kryptonite in sight. Superman's vulnerability here is wholly and convincingly human - the question of his motivation. In fact, the concentration on the question of why Superman chooses to devote his powers to doing good in a corrupt world struck me as both stunningly obvious and original. I'd certainly never thought of it before. The comic deals with the idea of nobility without slipping into cliché, and it's a relief to be in this world after the claustrophobia of Miller's distinctly 'un-noble' vision of things.
Another kind of nobility celebrated at work today: we had Custodians' Day, and for once the cleaners got some of the limelight. As far as I understand it the idea for this came from the Student Council and it is an excellent one. When I first arrived in Singapore school cleaners were referred to as 'servants'. We've, thankfully, come a long way. I just hope they get decently paid.
3 comments:
I would recommend Kurt Busiek's Astro City series, beginning with Life in the Big City, except that this might interfere too much with your working life...
The First Student Council came up with it, I believe.
Hmmm. The Kurt Busiek interests me strangely. And as for interfering with working life - bring it on, I say.
And as for the first Student Council coming up with Custodians' Day, I'd venture that that idea alone justified their existence. I don't know if other schools do anything like it, but they should.
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