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Learn about the life and work of Will Eisner, one of the earliest and most influential creators of comic books and graphic novels. Explore his early struggles, his iconic series The Spirit, his innovations in form and content, and his legacy in the comics industry.
- Overview
- Early life
- Career in comics and graphic novels
- Partnership with Iger and the Wonder Man lawsuit
- The Spirit and Joe Dope
- A Contract with God, teaching, and later work
- Tributes and legacy
- GeneratedCaptionsTabForHeroSec
Will Eisner (born March 6, 1917, Brooklyn, New York, U.S.—died January 3, 2005, Fort Lauderdale, Florida) American comics artist who was a pioneer of the American comic book industry. Eisner is best remembered for creating the series The Spirit, featuring the titular crime-fighting superhero, which was published from 1940 to 1952. Eisner’s book A C...
Will Eisner was born in Brooklyn, New York, on March 6, 1917. He was the eldest of three children born to Jewish immigrants from eastern Europe. His family moved frequently within New York City during his childhood. As a child and adolescent, Eisner avidly read pulp magazines. At age 13, he started selling newspapers at street corners to supplement the family income.
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While a student at the all-boys DeWitt Clinton High School in the Bronx, Eisner drew art that was published in the school’s newspaper and literary magazine as well as its yearbook. Eisner also worked on scenic designs for the school’s theatre. After graduating from high school in 1935, Eisner studied art at the Art Students League of New York in Manhattan.
Eisner’s first job was as an advertising writer-cartoonist for the newspaper New York American; he also started illustrating pulp magazines to supplement his income. In 1936 Bob Kane, cocreator of Batman and Eisner’s high-school friend, suggested that he try selling art for comic books. His first sale was to Jerry Iger, the editor of Wow, What a Ma...
Eisner and Iger then formed a business partnership, an art studio packaging original content to comic book publishers. Eisner, often in collaboration with others, created characters such as Sheena, the Queen of the Jungle; Doll Man, a size-changing superhero; and the fighter pilot Blackhawk.
In 1939 Eisner created Wonder Man for the Fox Feature Syndicate. Wonder Man was, uniquely, powered by a magic ring but had many similarities to the then-popular DC Comics character Superman. DC Comics (known as Detective Comics, Inc.) sued and won what is considered the first lawsuit in the comic book industry alleging copyright infringement.
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Eisner and Iger dissolved their partnership in 1939, and Eisner started working on comic book inserts for Sunday newspapers. This phase included his characters Lady Luck, Mr. Mystic, and, most notably, the Spirit. The Spirit soon became the weekly insert’s main series and was, at its peak, published in 20 newspapers with a total circulation of five million copies during the period 1940 to 1952.
The Spirit was a crime fighter dressed in a blue domino mask, a fedora, and a business suit. He was the alter ego of Denny Colt, a criminologist presumed dead, and his headquarters were under his own tombstone. The series was heavily influenced by film noir, with the action taking place in urban settings and featuring a succession of femme fatales. The Spirit did not have superpowers, and his very human strengths and weaknesses endeared him to audiences.
In the early 1940s Eisner was drafted into the army. His comics were used during World War II as training material for U.S. troops: the character Joe Dope was a soldier whose stories demonstrated the importance of preventive maintenance. Eisner also provided material to military magazines while continuing to supervise publication of The Spirit.
After the war, in 1948, Eisner formed American Visuals Corporation, which created instructional material for the government as well as for businesses. He continued to work on publications distributed by the U.S. Army, which was his primary customer, until the 1970s.
In 1978, with the goal of creating a more mature version of comics, Eisner published A Contract with God, and Other Tenement Stories, a series of connected short stories about poor Jewish characters in a New York City tenement. Many of the stories included were inspired by his own youth, and he used sepia ink to evoke an old-fashioned feeling. This was his first “graphic novel”; though Eisner was not the first person to use this term, he used it to conceptualize A Contract with God, and it made its way onto the cover of an edition of the book. (He also often used the term sequential art to describe his work.) A Contract with God is considered key to helping comics break out of the superhero and “funny” molds. It also popularized the term graphic novel and defined the genre for decades afterward.
In his later life, Eisner taught cartooning at New York’s School of Visual Arts, and he wrote the instructional books Comics and Sequential Art, which was first published in 1985, and Graphic Storytelling and Visual Narrative, which was first published in 1996.
The Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards were established in his name in 1988. The Eisners, which are considered the Academy Awards of the American comic book industry, are presented annually at the San Diego Comic-Con.
Eisner was inducted into the Academy of Comic Book Arts Hall of Fame in 1971, the Shazam Award Hall of Fame in the same year, the Jack Kirby Hall of Fame in 1987, and, posthumously, the Society of Illustrators Hall of Fame in 2015. His works also won multiple prizes over the years. In 2002 the National Foundation for Jewish Culture presented Eisner with a Lifetime Achievement Award.
Learn about Will Eisner, an American comics artist who created The Spirit and popularized the term graphic novel. Explore his early life, career, influences, and legacy in this article from Britannica.
Sep 15, 2024 · Welcome to the official online home of Will Eisner, the 'father of the Graphic Novel'.
Jan 5, 2005 · Will Eisner, an innovative comic-book artist who created the Spirit, a hero without superpowers, and the first modern graphic novel, "A Contract With God," died on...
Learn about Will Eisner, one of the pioneers of American comic books and graphic novels. Explore his early life, career, influences, themes and achievements in this comprehensive article.
Jan 6, 2005 · Will Eisner, the artist who revolutionized comic books, helped popularize the graphic novel and taught generations of soldiers how to maintain their equipment with the "Joe Dope" series, died...
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WILL EISNER was born William Erwin Eisner on March 6, 1917 in Brooklyn, New York. By the time of his death on January 3, 2005, following complications from open heart surgery, Eisner was recognized internationally as one of the giants in the field of sequential art, a term he coined.
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