Also, before all of those Internet matchmaking sites there were lonely hearts and penpal clubs (usually advertised in the back pages of magazines) for those looking for someone to share their life. I never participated in any of that, because as with modern digital versions, there are too many things than can go wrong. Like for Cindy, who rolls up calendars and puts them in mailing tubes, and decides to enclose a personal note with her address to maybe meet someone “wonderful in my life.” It’s a long shot, fraught with potential problems. And since this is a love comic, there are problems.
Before you launch into this short story from All True Romance #3 (1951), written and drawn by the Iger Studio, please notice the splash panel. That scene does not appear in the story. It looks as if Cindy is in imminent danger. Her sleeve is torn. Uh-oh. Luckily in the story the “danger” is more the rejection by the guy with whom she has had a correspondence. He is a cad, but thankfully no rapist.
Gah.
ReplyDeleteEven as love fantasies go, this one entails an extraordinary amount of magical thinking. The woman who cannot find love locally is strikingly physically beautiful. Taking a huge risk for love pays-off even though the man for whom she takes that risk is a rotter. She finds true love in a matter of what amount at most to a very few hours, if one subtracts the time that she spends fleeing or sleeping.
Of course, I'm back to wondering who were reading this story. It seems as if the story might really be for guys imagining themselves as Bill, rather than gals imagining themselves as Cindy. (But, yes, I know that some of the audience were just looking for pin-up art.)
Daniel, if not for magical thinking, many people would do no thinking at all. I believe that is what love comics provide. My youthful magical thinking days reading superhero comics provided a fantasy of being endowed with special powers, big enough and strong enough to beat the crap out of bullies.
ReplyDelete