GOTHAM BY GASLIGHT 261
Gloeckner attended the University of Texas in Dallas, where she studied medical
illustration, which has been her primary employment for over two decades. Th e
infl uence of her medical illustration training is evident in her comics, which are
suff used with highly detailed drawings of anatomy and corporeality, particularly in
evidence in her illustrations for J. G. Ballard’s Th e Atrocity Exhibition (1990, RE/
Search Publications). Her work is highly detailed, anatomically precise, and very
forthright. Th is precision has drawn fi re in some cases, in that her narratives are
often frank about sex and sexuality, and do not shy away from explicit depictions of
this subject matter.
Gloeckner’s shorter comics work initially appeared in a number of underground
anthologies, including Twisted Sisters , We i r d o , and Wimmen’s Comix. In 1998, Frog
Books, a division of North Atlantic Books, published her controversial A Child’s Life
and Other Stories , leading her work to be seen within a larger context, as did Th e Diary
of a Teenage Girl , released in 2002. Th e former, very explicit and blunt in its explora-
tion of sex, drug use, and childhood trauma, was made all the more powerful by the
precision of the drawings. In 2004, A Child’s Life was banned from a library in Stock-
ton, California, and was condemned by the town’s mayor for its graphic depictions of
the main character, 15-year-old Minnie Goetze, in sexual situations tantamount to
child abuse. Her infl uences, most notably Crumb , are highly visible in her work, and
the comparisons are apt.
Diary revisits these characters and fi lls in some of the narrative gaps from Child’s Life
through a series of written entries, drawings, notes, poems, and other diff erent forms; it
truly looks and reads like a diary. However, it is important to note that Gloeckner does
not describe her work as autobiographical despite numerous commonalities between
her life and Minnie’s: she refers to her work as fi ction.
She continues to produce a substantial body of work. In addition to her comics,
Gloeckner has worked on a number of books intended for children, including We i r d
Th ings You Can Grow (Random House, 1994) and a number of titles in a HarperCollins
series including Tales Too Funny To Be True , Tales too Gross to Be True (about urban
legends) and Tales Too Scary to Be True (for babysitters). Gloeckner is currently teaching
at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor in the School of Art and Design, and was
awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2008.
Anne Th alheimer
GOLDEN AGE. See Ages of Comics
GOTHAM BY GASLIGHT. Gotham by Gaslight is a graphic novel published by DC
Comics in 1989. Written by Brian Augustyn and illustrated by Mike Mignola (artist)
and P. Craig Russell (inker), it holds the distinction of being considered the fi rst work
to be part of DC Comics’ Elseworlds imprint. Th e story places Batman and several
of his key supporting cast in the 1880s as the serial killer Jack the Ripper comes to
Gotham City. Th e success of this graphic novel spawned a 1991 sequel, Batman: Master
