The Sweeter Side of R. Crumb

From title page, "Being a delightful collection of adorable, heart-warming and lovingly rendered drawings which, I promise, will not make you feel threatened in any way, and will put you in a state all warm and fuzzy and cuddly towards the artist and life in general."
Some of the portraits of his family are sweet and there are some cute comics with crumb and his daughter, but the landscapes, while nice, are kind of boring. I think this would have been more interesting and engaging if I had read anything else by Crumb first. It would open up another side of his personality, but looking at this was like looking at a stranger's sketch book, except boring. ( )

As Crumb admits in his introduction, sweet isn't what his work seems to be. Furthermore, he opines in so many words, sweetness is for gals. So, is this album of one-panel and one-page comics and many freestanding drawings somehow "Crumb for the ladies"? Well, none of Crumb's trademark raunch is on view; the closest he comes is a reminiscence of his then-preschooler daughter's curiosity about "poop." But Crumb remains in love with carnality. What he draws has weight, and what he admires he draws even heavier. Surely the girl-jock high-school classmates he lovingly recalls didn't have legs quite that massive; they were teenagers, after all. Such drawing doesn't have much of the delicacy considered especially appealing to women. It does have particularity (does this guy know shading or what?), which gives each portrait of an old or (seldom) new entertainer, each view of a favorite forest pathway, each rendering of a fantastic bit of French medieval architecture, visual tangibility. And it has affection, which is sweet, no? But not just for ladies. ( )