Sean Collins (glad to see he’s still getting work) interviewed Mome anthology editor Eric Reynolds for CBR about the latest volume and how the series has developed over time:
In addition to the brand-new people, some established super stars of alternative comics have also been featured: David B., Lewis Trondheim, Al Columbia, and in volume nine, Jim Woodring. It kind of reminds me of how “Saturday Night Live” has its contract players, but they bring in a new big-name guest host every week.
Yeah, I’ll buy that! Al [Columbia] is an interesting example because he actually fits the mission of “Mome;” he doesn’t have a regular venue in which to be published. “Mome” is actually getting some work out of him that I don’t think would be published at all otherwise. I’d like for him to be in every single issue for that reason. The same thing goes for guys like R. Kikuo Johnson, whose work I just love so much. If I can get them to do a couple of pages here and there that they wouldn’t have done otherwise than that’s fucking great. It’s a crass commercial consideration on my part, I fully admit it, but if I can publish David B. or Jim Woodring and someone picks it up for that reason and then reads a Tom Kaczynski story for the first time, I can live with that.
The Woodring story was only published in Japan and I felt it needed to be seen by Western readers. I pitched the idea of it being published as a Fantagraphics book, but that was rejected. But I really wanted people to see it, so I suggested putting it in “Mome,” and that’s the sole reason that it came about. I just felt that it needed to be published somewhere, and if wasn’t going to be in “Mome,” it seemed like it wasn’t going to be anywhere.
