Superman’s Origin Story with Dr. Valentino Zullo

Laura Maylene Walter:
...Superman Leaves, and he just turns and busts through the wall. And I kind of laughed cause it made me think of Kool-Aid Man.

Valentino Zullo:
Yeah. <Laugh> Like the greatest feat of strength would be to obviously not smash through some type of drywall, right? But rather brick. It's so great. Yeah.

Laura Maylene Walter:
Welcome to Page Count, presented by the Ohio Center for the Book at Cleveland Public Library. This podcast celebrates authors, illustrators, librarians, booksellers, literary advocates and readers in and from the state of Ohio.

Laura Maylene Walter:
Today, we're diving into the origins of one of the most beloved fictional characters in American history. Superman, who was dreamed up right here in Cleveland, to shed some light on Superman's cultural significance and origin story. We're joined by Dr. Valentino Zullo, the Anisfield-Wolf Post-Doctoral Fellow in English and Public Humanities at Ursuline College. Fun fact, he’s the former Ohio Center for the Book Scholar-in-Residence, and continues to co-lead our Get Graphic! Program. Valentino is also one of the organizers of Superman’s Cleveland, a city-wide celebration of the world’s first comic book superhero with programming held throughout September, October, and into November 2023. Valentino, welcome to the podcast. So excited to have you here today.

Valentino Zullo:
Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here.

Laura Maylene Walter:
Well, I should start by letting our listeners know that even though you are an expert, this conversation is not necessarily just for Superman super fans. I think like most Americans, Superman has become somewhat embedded in my cultural consciousness, but I wouldn't call myself a major fan. I should say back in 2017 when Cleveland Public Library did a big Superman exhibit, I helped a little bit with that. I helped process part of the collection, which was really fun. But I'm definitely not an expert. So I will be playing the role of the relative Superman neophyte today. But maybe Valentino, you could start by telling us a little bit about your relationship to Superman in particular, but also comics in general.

Valentino Zullo:
Yeah, no, that's great. I thinkI hope that this is useful to, you know, people that are both fans and those that just swim in the waters of Superman. Right. I mean, I think that being a Clevelander, we recognize Superman as a figure. I often say that he is Cleveland's greatest export at this point. We're not exporting steel, so not, not in the numbers that we were. So, you know, I often say that Superman is Cleveland's greatest export. So I think whether we're a fan or not, we all sort of, you know, see him as an icon of our city. I think we should celebrate that. Whether we're watching the movies and reading the books regularly or not. I'm interested in Superman for various reasons, but one, his immigrant story is so interesting to me. My parents are immigrants and so I am heir to that legacy of being, you know, another, another child of immigrants in the United States.

Valentino Zullo:
I have all the elements of it, the birthright citizenship, all of that that you know, we have as children of immigrants and Superman's story represents. He is not a child of immigrants though, you know, he's as close as can be having come here as a child, but he represents the best of the immigrant narrative. I think he shows us that when we allow people like Superman into our country, I mean it's for the better, right? He is a member of the fourth estate, you know, he's a journalist. He fights for truth, justice, and the American way and he really is sort of, I hesitate to say "model" because that verges on "model minority." But I mean it's an example of a character that is loved across the political spectrum I think. But that really gives us an idea of like what immigration means and how it can be such a beautiful thing in our country. And I think Superman is an icon for that immigrant history in the us.

Laura Maylene Walter:
Yeah, absolutely. Well I think that is also a good segue into the very first appearance of Superman in action comics number one. So let's turn to that. This was published in June 1938. Would you like to roughly summarize what happens in the very first ever appearance of Superman?

Valentino Zullo:
On the first page we get his origin story, which is what I'll focus on. But in the first issue we see him just sort of completing sort of just different feats of strength and ability. And I will say, I mean he's sort of running around the city in this first issue and you get to see him sort of jumping around leaping the tallest buildings and we see a little bit of him as a journalist in this issue and that famous cover scene of him holding the car. We see that image in here. But I think that what is super interesting for readers, more than the issue itself, which I don't think, not my favorite issue, but I will say that what I love about this issue is that first page. And I think that that's where we see the greatest strengths of Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster is their ability to concisely capture the elements of the superhero that will dominate the genre for the next 85 years.

Valentino Zullo:
In that first issue, we see the three elements of superhero comics, which are mission, power, and identity. Early on you see Superman demonstrating his feats of power. He's holding, you know, the sofa chair as a, as a child. You see him running and picking up steel. You see the beginning of the pro-social mission. He says here: "Early, Clark decided he must turn his titanic strength into channels that would benefit mankind and so was created Superman." And then we get to see the costume. But the compression there that they have is amazing that they draw out those elements of superhero comics that Peter Coogan and others have identified as the three basic elements, the mission, power, and identity. And I will add also origin story that isn't one of sort of like the tenets of a superhero comic, but for me it is that they give you the origin story there rooted in trauma, which most superhero comics are, but also just sort of outlining those elements that will dominate until today 85 years later. It is still those elements that you have a hero with a costume, they have a pro-social mission and they have usually one or more specialized powers and they do it all in one page. And I think that is the brilliance of that first issue. And to me that's why that issue succeeds is that first page they really show the best of the comics form showing how it can compress a narrative into one page and gets so much done.

Laura Maylene Walter:
It presents in just one page this really concise but fascinating look at a character that you might want to follow for many, many issues instead of just the story that appears in The first one isn't maybe the standout that I would remember in terms of all the Superman comics, but that first page really shows a lot. I particularly loved the almost attempt at a scientific rationalization comparing Superman to how ants in our world can carry hundreds of times their weight <laugh> and grasshoppers. I suppose if relative to us, if we could jump like a grasshopper, we could maybe jump over a building. So I thought that was really, really entertaining. I noticed there's no explanation for how he can fly without wings, but he is a superhero. We have to go with it. <Laugh>

Valentino Zullo:
<Laugh>. Yes. Yeah, I know, I love that. But yeah, I think like that's also brilliant. I mean they fit so much into that first page, right? I mean it's a brilliant page to study. If you are going to work on comics, they get that compression. There's a comics creator named Ken Krimstein who I like and he did a book called The Three Escapes of Hannah Arendt. It's a really cool comic about sort of biography of Hannah Arendt. And we interviewed him for the Journal of Graphic Novels and Comics and he talks about how this isn't about Siegel and Shuster, but another Jewish creator Stan Lee, he talks about how he links the comics creation to Yiddish and says that both of them rely upon compression in an interesting way. And so I've always been struck by that way in which comics do sort of compress information through the use of the gutter, the image of course. And then just sort of like the short quippy lines too. But it's a brilliant page to sort of think about because yeah, they outline what will be significant for 85 years. That's hard to do in one simple page.

Laura Maylene Walter:
And right there on the first page we have his character already crystallizing. It says "Superman, champion of the oppressed, the physical marvel who has sworn to devote his existence to helping those in need."

Valentino Zullo:
Absolutely. Yeah.

Laura Maylene Walter:
So right there, yeah, they've already had a formed idea of who this character will b e on a broader level.

Valentino Zullo:
Grant Morrison has a series called All-Star Superman, which is sort of a retelling, it's a 12 issue retelling of Superman's story. And the first page, if I'm remembering it correctly, it's just four panels and it aims to tell the story of Superman, like leaving Krypton, landing on Earth, Ma and Pa Kent finding him. I'm thinking, I can't remember now the exact panels, but it's just like four panels that tells his story very quickly because at this point it's so recognizable. But I, again, I love how they use the sort of simplified images and just very few to tell a big story. It's akin to Hemingway's six-word story. Right. the comics sort of relies on that model.

Laura Maylene Walter:
Well let's turn briefly to issue number three, which was published in August 1938. This one I had a particular interest in. It's about a corrupt coal baron. And I, years ago, worked for an occupational safety magazine where we would sometimes cover mine health and safety. And so I know how dangerous the job of coal mining is and really I had to think about it. I know MSHA, the Mine Safety and Health Administration, wasn't created in until the seventies. And this issue came out in '38 and already is painting a quite horrific view of what working in a coal mine could be without worker protections. Would you like to summarize this one for us?

Valentino Zullo:
Yeah. So this one's super interesting. So I love this issue and I love that bit of information. I didn't even know that there was such an organization. I knew that that would exist, but I didn't realize that it wasn't until after the publication of this issue and I had assumed it was like a concern that was developing. So the storyline essentially that Superman realizes, as you say, that there is a corrupt coal baron that is forcing his workers to work in unsafe conditions. One of them is hospitalized and Superman becomes interested in figuring out, you know, what's going on. He finds out who the miner is and he saves the, he ends up saving all the rest of the coal miners from this corrupt coal baron. But partly what he does is he makes the guy work in his own mine and forcing him to work in his own mine. He sort of tries to teach him a lesson. Right. And he eventually saves everybody saves the corrupt coal baron because Superman won't let anybody die.

Laura Maylene Walter:
Yeah. He traps them in the coal mine. He traps a party full of fancy rich people.

Valentino Zullo:
Which is great. Yeah. And so he does that and then yeah, eventually lets them out. It's an interesting theme, like the early themes of Superman comics still persist this question of would Superman harm somebody who's evil is really interesting. Mark Wade is writing a story called Superman, the last days of Lex Luthor. And in the story Luthor is dying and Luthor goes to Superman and says, you have to save me. And there's a conversation where Luthor says something like, you would never let anyone die. He would never even let me die. It's super interesting 'cause Luthor has tried to kill him so many times. Right. It's really interesting the Superman protects them that he will teach people lessons, but he wouldn't ever go so far as to actually harm them. But he will teach them lessons.

Laura Maylene Walter:
I also think this issue really shows the idealism present in some of Superman's stories. I thought a lot about this corrupt coal baron who, you know, one of his workers is severely injured and disabled on the job and he doesn't care to provide support for this worker or the worker's family. And by the end, when he's trapped in his own mine and doesn't have the lifesaving equipment, Superman does end up saving him. And he is so repentant and decides to make his mine safer. You know, my sort of cynical side didn't really believe that this man would do that unless he was forced to <laugh> financially or otherwise. But it does speak to an idealism of showing people the right path and Superman kind of paving the way for how the world should be, how an ideal world could be. And how we could treat people if we chose to. So I found that really interesting.

Valentino Zullo:
There is a certain idealism in all of these stories, which is really interesting. Yeah. I don't know that the guy would actually be persuaded, but what's interesting to me is I wonder what effect this had on the readership, which was there was quite a large readership. I wonder what they thought of these stories. I wonder if maybe the coal baron wouldn't have actually done that. But I wonder if there was any sort of influence in terms of actual sort of inspiration to workers at the time. And we don't know. It's pure speculation, but, but it doesn't mean that we should shy away from it at all. I often think that what's beautiful about these stories is that they do have that sort of hope and that vision for all of the darkness that we can document, you know, creating inspirational stories isn't a bad thing.

Valentino Zullo:
Right. I don't think anybody would say that, but I think in comics at least, there was a long period where sort of darker stories took over. And that's what I'm thinking of when I'm saying this. The darker stories took over and this was partly because of the success of certain writers like Alan Moore and Frank Miller who are brilliant in their own right. Who sort of tell really dark stories in the late eighties and because of the success of their stories, which would not just because they were colored with you know, all dark knights. Right. But sometimes that's what the publishers think. It's sort of like Barbie, right. Barbie's doing really well and I'm sure that the company's like, let's make more movies about toys. Right. <laugh> like they sort of miss the point sometimes I qualify that to say that that sort of hope and that mission I think was tempered for several years.

Valentino Zullo:
And I think it is part of comics right now. I would point to Tom Taylor's Superman comics in particular, he tells the story story of Superman's son Jon Kent. And I think that those stories, the first volume is called Truth and it's sort of like Jon trying to think about what truth means and I think there's a return to that. But I think for a while a lot of superhero comics especially we're so interested in like hero villain mashups and sort of like what can the villain do that is so extreme? And interestingly, you know, these comics are so successful with no villain up until issue 13, which we'll get to, but there's no real villain. Right. Let me clarify. No super villain <laugh>.

Laura Maylene Walter:
Right. There are bad human beings who are acting terribly but not someone with superpowers like Superman. And I mean along those lines of, if not idealism, but of social justice really, I mean this is who Superman is. He's trying to enact justice in these situations. In issue 10, he infiltrates a prison because he has heard about terrible conditions for the inmates at the prison. So I enjoyed this one as well. I mean, he's not afraid to put himself in that situation and and try to protect those who are vulnerable regardless of the fact that they might have done something wrong themselves to end up in prison. Would you like to either describe that or anything in particular about this issue that really jumps out at you?

Valentino Zullo:
The coal baron one really highlights the social justice, as you say. And I think the issue 10 again highlights the social justice. But what becomes really interesting is the role that journalism plays. Like Superman goes in as a journalist to document the experiences of these people that despite all of his powers, he recognizes the power of journalism. Which is super interesting in these stories that there are things that a superhero can't do, like journalists can do, places that a journalist can reach, where a journalist can be successful that maybe there isn't enough finesse for the superhero. But there is for a journalist in this situation, which I think is super interesting. Also, I think it's the beginnings, maybe not the beginnings, but it's an early example because I think others do this too. But it's an early example of comics as a documentary form. I think we see a lot of that now, like with Derf Backderf's work, for example, who I know you spoke to. I mean he's a great documentary comics creator and I think we start to see the way in which comics are very much interested in documentation. And that's definitely coming out here both in his sort of photographing the welts on the prisoners' bodies, but also just sort of as emphasizing the role of the journalist in this story. As well as, I often think of comics as a documentary form and I definitely think we're starting to see this as an early example of, you know, like what would become Derf'swork and many others.

Laura Maylene Walter:
Yeah. And I think the journalism angle is what I loved most about this issue as part of his overarching plan to get justice for the prisoners. Superman slash Clark gives up a source and everyone at The Daily Star, including Lois Lane, is absolutely furious with him. And they hate him. Lois Lane calls him a loathsome wretch <laugh> after he does this and he just, he takes it because he knows he has a larger plan to actually make things work out. But I love that. I love seeing, I don't know why, but seeing the abuse that he took all for the ultimate goal of making things right in the end. Yeah. It's, you know, it's a brave thing to do for sure.

Valentino Zullo:
It is really brave.

Laura Maylene Walter:
On an unrelated note, I did not know, maybe you already did. That flivver, F-L-I-V-V-E-R was slang for a car, for an old car. Did you know that? I was learning all sorts of new lingo.

Valentino Zullo:
I didn't. I think the first time I read it I looked it up, but I did not remember then. I didn't look it up this time. But that is super funny. The lingo in here is great. It really is.

Laura Maylene Walter:
It's wonderful. They call someone a loafer. This is great. It's really kind of a flashback in time. Let's move on to the last older issue that we'll discuss today. Issue 13, which is the first supervillain story. So let us know who is this supervillain and can you put it into context for us what this means, having this as the first supervillain and how that maybe paved the way for comics in the future?

Valentino Zullo:
So it's both an interesting one and sort of a lament of mine that Ultra-Humanite would be the first sort of supervillain identified, not as somebody within the society, but somebody that's trying to change something. Superman's goal will be to return society back to a sort of a status quo by stopping the supervillain. I think it's interesting, but it's also sad for me 'cause it'll be the beginning of many stories about super villains. And I think what I love about these early comics that sort of gets lost throughout the history of the Superior Comics is Superman is interested in changing society in these early, in these early issues. Whether it's about the corrupt coal barons or you know, prisoners who are being abused or even sort of the story about the cars that are killing people because they're not safe, right? People are dying in car crashes because the cars aren't safe.

Valentino Zullo:
And here we have the beginning of the first supervillain. And what's always struck me is that that sort of changing society model is not as much of a concern when super villains get involved. Indeed the idea becomes sort of returning society back to a status quo when the hero stops a villain, which is perhaps I'm overstating it, but I think what's so interesting about these golden age comics is how many of them are interested in reshaping society in some way. I think we see this in Wonder Woman a lot as well, William Moulton Marston who would come after this. So this isn't like, this is like the end of it, but I think a lot of the Golden Age comics are interested in sort of reshaping society. And William Moulton Marston will create Paradise Island, he'll create Reform Island, which is a prison reform system.

Valentino Zullo:
He'll look at sort of sexual abuse on college campuses and thinking about how that needs to be addressed by Wonder Woman. And all of that sort of societal interest I think fades away as the concern of a lot of superhero comics becomes hero and villain, right? Superman and lLex Luthor or Superman and Doomsday, you know, Batman and the Joker. And not to say that societal concerns aren't part of it, but the overarching focus becomes on hero and villain unless on restructuring of society. And so the Ultra-Humanite will sort of be the beginning of that shift away from, as you said, social justice or social change and more to framing the story about fight between hero and villain, which you know, is always fun. But I was so struck by what they're doing in those early issues that sort of falls into the background of the stories.

Laura Maylene Walter:
That's a good way of putting it. Instead of the dramatics of two super beings clashing things that are maybe just as dramatic in different ways in our real world of injustices and things that are wrong to highlight. So yeah, I found that really interesting too, going back and I haven't looked at these old issues in, in a long time. And it was also interesting though, how much they hold up and Oh yeah. And I would see things that reminded me of other cultural phenomena. I mean even just in this one, it's so small and silly, but Superman leaves and he just turns and busts through the wall. And I kind of laughed 'cause it made me think of Kool-Aid Man, and I thought I, didn't look up the history of Kool-Aid Man, but I assume that came way, way after this <laugh>. So, you know, like really Kool-aid man is more like Superman. And also when he's with the supervi, he's laid out on this table and tied down and a saw, a giant saw is going to come and chop him in half. That's the the plan anyway. And I just thought, oh, that's such a trope that I think we're also familiar with, of being tied down to the table by the villain and, and how will the hero get out? You know? And to see it back in the late thirties was really, really interesting.

Valentino Zullo:
I love the connection to the Kool-Aid Man, especially <laugh>. I love it. Like there's such an interesting sort of, I don't know, leftover element of culture too, because I think usually in the, probably a lot of the Kool-Aid ones too, he's breaking through brick, which we don't use that often anymore. We see that here as well with the brick. I think it's just like a little thing as as you're talking I was thinking about it. It's funny. Yeah. Like the greatest feat of strength would be to obviously not smash through some type of drywall. Right. But they're brick, right?

Laura Maylene Walter:
Like solid brick.

Valentino Zullo:
Yeah. Which is so, which is hardly seen anymore, but it's so great.

Laura Maylene Walter:
And it's just, it's inherently kind of funny too. Oh yeah. You know, <laugh> so I love it. Well, so thinking about these early issues and how a lot of them did have a focus on, you know, social justice issues or issues that could be maybe fixed or improved in society, it makes me think of the young men in Cleveland who were writing and illustrating these comics. So I would love to turn to the creators to Siegel and Shuster and talk about their origin story as well. We will be referring to the book Super Boys: the Amazing Adventures of Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, the creators of Superman by Brad Ricka, which is so, so good. So maybe you could start by painting the picture for us. Who were these creators of Superman and what were their lives like as this character was coming into being?

Valentino Zullo:
Yeah, so I think Brad does such an excellent job of giving us sort of a vision of what their world looked like. They're growing up as children of Jewish immigrants, Siegel's family being from Lithuania, Jewish immigrants from Lithuania and Shuster's family being Jewish immigrants from Russia and sort of growing up in depression era America. And I think he does this brilliant job especially with the opening describing these sort of like, you know, gray skies and thinking about the way that Superman was born in this world that is, was very gray, right? It was a very gray world. And I think the way he captures that is that, you know, bursts onto the scene is this this multicolored hero right in red, yellow, and blue outfit. It's such a, it's such a striking thing when Brad stresses the colors of the time.

Valentino Zullo:
I mean, we think of Depression era as so great. He stresses Cleveland's weather as you know, being overcast and here bursts onto this scene in 1938, this brilliantly colored hero who's going to save the day. And I think that it's beautiful that he tells this story about these two high school boys who will keep trying despite sort of their hurdles, I would say. 'cause I don't think they, neither of them truly fail in any regard. I mean, Jerry doesn't get a lot of his stories accepted, but I don't think they're so major that he keeps sending stuff, right. So they're almost just like hurdles to him and he just keeps sending out stories to science fiction magazines. They try to create their own science fiction magazine, but they try so hard to do this. And it's such a great story about I think the tenacity of the human spirit, which I think is the story of Superman too.

Valentino Zullo:
I'll say one more thing about what I think is so interesting about the way that Brad tells the story is rereading it. I was so struck by now, I think I was closer in age to, to their age when I read this the first time. I was so struck by how he makes two boys time in high school. So interesting. This is a storyteller. His way of telling stories is interesting because he's able to say that the elements of the story that they're just going to school and they're working for the school newspaper. Like that's important and that's significant and interesting. And yes, we're interested because we know where they go and we want every piece of information we can for these people who we know where they will end up. But it's really brilliant to say that, you know, this time is important. He values, again, sort of the local journalism aspect, like working for the school newspaper, like all of this built these people, right. Built Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, that they had these opportunities that we had sort of an interest in the local school newspaper. Had Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster not been part of that, who knows what would've happened. I'd think about it now in terms of like arts and humanities and being a professor of English, just having an opportunity to do that type of work led to Superman.

Laura Maylene Walter:
So they met of course at Glenville High School as high school students and began collaborating together on comics and stories and the torch, the newspaper that they worked for. I was thinking about that too. When I was in high school. I worked on the literary magazine at my school, you know, and I don't know if that still exists today because of budget cuts or who knows. And I think that kind of thing is so important. And I also thought, especially with Siegel, there are so many good lessons in their journey for aspiring writers and artists because they were just producing things, telling stories, making their art, sending things out to magazines and comics. And they were getting rejected as every writer or creator on the face of the planet gets rejected. And also there are excerpts in this book of Jerry Siegel, he would write letters to magazines and comment on what he was reading there. So he was a part of the discussion, he was reading work by other people and he was commenting on it. And I think that is all part of the development of an artist or writer is also absorbing other, other creations and thinking about them critically. And so that was just really interesting. And of course persisting through rejection because when they, they created Superman. Can you talk about that a bit? How Superman before Action Comics in 1938, how Superman developed and, and maybe changed over time?

Valentino Zullo:
So the original iteration of what they call The Superman, they create this character who is a villain. He's super powerful, has mental powers and he's almost nearly unrecognizable to the character, certainly in terms of his mission. He's unrecognizable with the Superman that we will know. But they create this character published in Science Fiction, right in their magazine, Science Fiction, not a major hit, but they start to revamp the character that they'll create. They try again to create this character. And it leads to, if I'm remembering correctly, it is not the story and the character not accepted by a publisher, which one of the companies, I don't remember which one it was, but it leads to supposedly Jerry destroying a lot of the material. I say supposedly because there's a story where he would've burned them. But Brad notes that they probably didn't have coal at the time of and like, yeah, it was sort of interesting.

Valentino Zullo:
He notes that that story is probably overstated based on when it would've been done and the likelihood of them actually having coal would've been very unlikely. So it would not have been burned. It was a sort of like interesting like fun fact. It's so interesting how the stories about the creation of Superman becomes myth becomes myth itself, right? And so even like sort of Jerry's burning these early...not manuscripts per se, but early scripts and early drawings of what would become the second iteration of Superman, even though that might not be the case. But then finally Major Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson will hire Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster to start writing comics. Notably for like Detective Comics. They'll write for Detective Comics, they'll write for Adventure Comics and eventually he will write to them and he will say, you know, "We're looking to launch a new series called Action Comics.

Valentino Zullo:
"We'll give you a longer story." Though the story, I think they were initially promised I think about 16 pages and they ended up with less than that. They cut it back a little bit. But that is where they finally revamped this Superman. I think for listeners, what's interesting to your point that we're talking about sort of rejection and failure also revision, right? Like they don't get it right the first time. They don't get it right the second time. It takes them years to revise this character, but they know that there's something about this character that's interesting. I think that's sort of what I take away is that these two kids knew, I mean they're still kids at this time. They're younger than I am now. And so, you know, they're young and they're saying though they're something about this story that if we can get it right, it will work. Like again, their story points to persistence through rejection and failure and also just the need to just revise and just like don't give up on this story. Like, you know, just maybe it needs a new context. Maybe certain elements aren't working, but when it works it will. And you really see that with Superman and their sort of path to success.

Laura Maylene Walter:
Yeah, it's such an important lesson for writers of all kinds, whether you're writing a novel or poetry or comics of following your instincts and it takes a measure of almost faith to keep working on something and developing it. You know, Superman wasn't Superman the first time they conceived of him, right? And so it is inspirational, I think, of what you can create if you just stay at it. So that is part of the creative side of creating Superman. I do want to turn to the business side because as a writer myself who assigned many contracts for my writing, when I came to in Super Boys the contract, the Action Comics contract for Superman that they signed, I was utterly horrified. For $130. Yeah. They gave all rights of Superman, the characters, they gave these rights away forever. Can you talk about that a bit? This is going to be a very fateful contract for them and you know what it meant that they signed this and maybe what lesson there is in it for other creators even today.

Valentino Zullo:
In the same way that I think the elements of the superhero comic are in the first issue of Superman, of Action Comics, rather. I think the elements of the fight for creative license and creative control is still there as seen in [the case of] Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. It's a major problem today. I mean a lot of comics creators fight this, that creator owned material is very hard to own your own work today. If you create a character for Marvel or DC they own it. And I won't say that you have to write Marvel or DC to get known if that's not the case, like obviously major, major comics creators have never touched them. Alison Bechdel, so many people have never gone there. But for a lot of people writing for Marvel or DC is a dream, right? And they want to do that.

Valentino Zullo:
And yet it's a really hard place to be in that if they do create something if they create a character that becomes a major success like Superman. You know, I can think of more recent characters that have just been breakouts like Deadpool Harley Quinn, right? They're not owned by the people that created them. Paul Dini doesn't own Harley Quinn. I'm sure at that point he might have had a better contract. But the case is that the contracts aren't great still. And fight for creative rights is still usually important. It's not far, often the writer strike and other places that like these writers are not getting paid enough. The companies have way more money than than <laugh> than you know, they need. And they can pay these writers a better wage and more importantly, they can also give them some type of credit for the characters they create.

Valentino Zullo:
Now, all of that is to say, I think most comics creators would say that the royalties are better than anything Siegel and Shuster saw. But I will say the fight that lasted far after Siegel and Shuster's death did change the landscape of how creators are paid and receive royalties. And I know that that is the case today that finally the Siegel family at least gets credit for Superman on every Superman issue. The issue of Action Comics, every issue of any Superman comic that the Siegel family gets credit, we don't know what the language is actually is, they don't own it, but they are credited in partnership or however the phrasing is that they're given credit finally. But for the longest time, I mean, Siegel and Shuster were not given credit and they've sued many times. When the original Action comics series ended in 1985, Julius Schwartz, who's a name you'll recognized from Super Boys, Jules or Julius Schwartz, wanted to have Jerry Siegel write the "final" Superman story quote-unquote final when the action comics ended in 1985.

Valentino Zullo:
And it ends up going to Alan Moore just because at that time, Siegel and Shuster were an legal battle. And so it affected them in so many ways, not allowing them to work on the character that they created. That I think as beautiful as Alan Moore's story, Whatever Happened to The Man of Tomorrow is I do think it would've been wonderful to see Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster sort of wrap up that original run of action comics. There's so many things that we miss out on that the creators have missed out on. They've missed out not because of legal battles, but because of the control, the control of these corporations, right? That we've missed out on beautiful stories that could have been told that creators have missed out on being able to tell stories that they're interested in. I think there's so many creators today that still have that problem, but sometimes they just love a character. It's hard, you, I mean there's a lot of people that want to write Superman. It's an honor and yet whatever you do is not yours.

Laura Maylene Walter:
That is very true. Yeah. And I suppose comics works quite differently from the world of writing fiction and novels, for example. So any listeners who are writing creatively outside of the comics genre, you usually do not sign away your copyright ever to give away all your rights in all media in all form. If someone is going to make a movie of your book, you should be getting money for that, et cetera. I'm always cautioning writers about looking at their contracts and making sure they understand them because as Super Boys documents, this is a decades long battle for Superman rights and it crosses generations. I mean it goes up until just not very long ago, just a few years ago really. So it is a fascinating part of the character's history. But another part of the history I do want to get to before we run out of time is the inspiration for Lois Lane, which I found really, really interesting how Lois Lane is sort of also a real life person. <Laugh>.

Valentino Zullo:
So I'll share a bit about that and I think there's a great article which I can send you to an interview with Samantha Baskin and Laura Siegel. I think what you're, what you're referring to is that Joanne I mean Joanne Siegel, but she went by different names. Uthe woman that would become Joanne Siegel, I can say that <laugh>, there you go. The woman that would become Joanne Siegel is sort of seen as the icon as sort of an icon that would inspire Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster's creation of Lois Lane.

Laura Maylene Walter:
Joanne is the one to place the modeling ad in the paper. Joanne shows up at, I believe, Jerry Siegel's house and doesn't even know when she's first talking to him. She's assuming his father's going to come out.

Valentino Zullo:
Yes. It's fascinating that, yeah, she answers this ad and she just shows up and she's like, Mr. Siegel. And she's thinking, yeah, she's thinking it is his father <laugh>. And then it ends up being Jerry and then Joe will eventually draw her and she'll become the inspiration for Lois Lane. And then she will years later, not immediately, which is super interesting years later will become Jerry Siegel's wife. It's not an immediate thing, which I think we want to be, at least in my like, you know, romantic mind, I think like, oh, they met and she became Lois Lane and they marry, it takes over a decade for them to actually get together and she will date Joe as well before that.

Laura Maylene Walter:
Right. It was in the early earliest meeting scenes when she is coming over to Pose as a model to become the image of Lois Lane. It's sort of endearing and funny that I got the sense from reading this that they just were so in awe of being in the room with a pretty girl. Yeah. You know, like, I can't believe we got a girl to come over here <laugh> and we get to talk to her. And they did become friends and, and they were all friendly together, but it's really funny that shows their youth and how naive they were and yeah, and just inexperienced in the world. But yes, she and Jerry Siegel eventually reunite and get married, although I do need to point out he already had a wife and a child. So there is a little bit of romantic drama for any listeners who might be interested in reading about that in this book as well. Yeah,

Valentino Zullo:
Yeah. There is some romantic drama and anybody who wants to hear more about the story, Laura Siegel has done a lot of interviews, the one with Samantha Baskin, who's a local distinguished professor of art history at Cleveland State University. It is a really interesting story and I'm really interested in hearing it from Laura's perspective simply because it's the closest we're gonna get to [Jerry] Siegel at this point. That's what I always think is so interesting. Like I love just talking to her because you know, unfortunately he's no longer alive, but she is, she has a lot of stories that have yet to be told.

Laura Maylene Walter:
I was just upstairs outside the Literature Department here at Cleveland Public Library looking at Jerry Siegel's former desk that Laura Siegel donated to the library. So if listeners come down to the library, hopefully, I don't know when in the future people will be listening to this, but the desk is available for view and, and that is all thanks to her. So we're really grateful for that among other things. Yeah. Is there anything you would like to share about Joe Shuster and Jerry Siegel's friendship and relationship over the years? Can you talk about their collaboration on Superman or their friendship, how that might have changed or, or not changed over the years?

Valentino Zullo:
Yeah, I think they have ups and downs, which Brad describes in Super Boys, but I was always struck by how it's the collaboration that makes this character, let's just say collaborative comics, not single author ones, but I think that's what makes sort of a lot of these comics so interesting. It's not one person or the other that together they create quite a few amazing characters that last the test of time. Clark Kent, Lois Lane, Jimmy Olsson, and so, so many of these characters. But it seems to me that it comes out of the collaboration again. I think, you know, thinking about your audience and who's listening that, you know, I think there's a beauty in sort of the community, right? I think that, you know, in the working together, maybe not always co-authoring in the case of these two co-authored this comic, but that there is something that comes out of collaboration that I think can be really lovely.

Valentino Zullo:
And I think that's what is so amazing about their work. And you see this at times with superhero comics. You'll see creators who will do good work independent of one another, and then two will get together and they just create such amazing work. One I can think about in particular that comes to mind for me is Chris Claremont and John Byrne who did X-Men and John Byrne is a brilliant artist and he will relaunch Superman in 1986 and he does great work independently, and Claremont will do many, many decades of beautiful work, but together they come up with stuff, you don't find it in their work individually, but it only comes out in the collaboration, which I think is super interesting.

Laura Maylene Walter:
I know we're running short on time, so very quickly before we wrap up, I did want to just touch on a larger Superman-related universe. So outside of just Superman himself, which I think Superman, you know, is a fairly male creation, right? And I think for other types of readers or comics lovers to see themselves reflected maybe in other characters. And the one that we took a quick look at for this episode was SUPERGIRL: Being Super by Mariko Tamaki and Joelle Jones. Which I had never read before this. And it was so fun. It's the origin story for Kara Danvers, Super Girl, she's in high school, she's 16, quote unquote 16 because who knows? She has a zit, you know, for example. And she's struggling with her own origins and her own abilities, which of course is a great metaphor for being a high schooler and going through so many changes. What can you share with us about this particular book?

Valentino Zullo:
I will say I love Mariko Tamaki as a writer. I think Joelle Jones is a beautiful artist. I love this story because as you're saying, yeah, it's the case that I think we don't see a lot of stories by women drawn by women written by women about women in superhero comics. I will say that that's changed in the last decade. I think there's been a push, and this is one example of that, but historically that's not been the case. And this is such a fun book. This whole line of DC graphic novels for young adults is so interesting to me. Sarah Kuhn has done several, Sina Grace has done some. But what I think is so interesting is that in all of them, and I've been reading a ton of them, is that they move the villain plot to sort of the background again.

Valentino Zullo:
Like this is very much about her coming into her own identity, very much about her being unsure of herself as a teenager and thinking about that and sort of the concerns of, she's not immortal, but her own, let's say immortality in the sense that she's not going to easily be killed in any way. And unfortunately she's dealing with the death of a friend here. And sort of questions about that. Like how do I as a person who has these abilities deal with loss? There's so many interesting questions and the villain story really doesn't come out until the fourth chapter. That really doesn't become a major concern. And I think a lot of these DC graphic novels really bring the concerns of the psychology of the character and the sort of the social issues to the forefront, again, which I've always been struck by. I think Mariko Tamaki does an excellent job with that.

Valentino Zullo:
And I think, again, there's sort of these beautiful messages. I think there's a lovely moment. It's a sad moment, but it's a lovely moment where Kara, like Clark, is sent here on a rocket, and the parents that take her in, they take her in without any questions. They just think, okay, we need to bring this young girl in. Unfortunately their parents, her grandparents, when they find out she has powers become very scared of her and they have to separate. But I think it's a beautiful moment of thinking about sort of the fear of what we don't understand, but how just because we don't understand doesn't mean we have to fear it, right? These lovely parents of hers take her. They don't know who she is, what she is, what she's going to be, but they realize that if they take her in, you know, they can help her. And that's all that matters. And I think that's just a lovely part of the story. There's so much of it too. But you know, she's thinking about this choice when you don't understand something, there's more than two choices, but you can close yourself off and you know, as they say, call the authorities the grandparents. Or you can open up and think about the possibilities as the two parents that take her into, and they say, let's see what happens if we raise this child and they raise a superhero <laugh>.

Laura Maylene Walter:
And it is also a testament to Siegel and Shuster that their original creation in the thirties has led to so much of what we have today. I mean, this character is a related offshoot. I think that speaks to the power of imagination too, what you're creating. You might never know how far it could go or how many different people will reach in many different iterations. So I think that's pretty amazing. Absolutely.

Valentino Zullo:
Yeah. Yeah.

Laura Maylene Walter:
Well, if listeners are hearing this within the fall of 2023, I just want to remind you that Superman's Cleveland is a program with events citywide. You can visit SupermansCleveland.com for more information. I will link to this in the show notes. Valentino, is there anything I didn't ask you about either Superman or the origin stories that you would like to share with us or anything aboutor comics in general, anything you would encourage listeners to read or explore?

Valentino Zullo:
You asked really wonderful questions. I think we covered so much I would say about comics in general. I hope that this discussion leads you to think about comics a little bit differently. And I hope that if you're not an avid comics reader, I hope that you find something that's interesting to you. We often mistake comics for being just superheroes. And so I often ask people like, what are the other genres you like to read? Because you'll find them in comics as well. And so I will just say that about comics that while we're talking about Superman, because you know, he's our hometown hero, I hope that we don't continue to think of comics and superheroes as synonymous, that this is just one area of comics, a very popular one, but that there's so many comics. If you're not into superheroes, I think there's plenty out there for you to read.

Laura Maylene Walter:
And of course, graphic novels. Now, a friend of mine was showing me the cover of a graphic novel of a Sweet Valley Twins book, which I read Sweet Valley Twins when I was a little kid. And so even older stories or newer stories are also being told in in graphic form. So there's so much out there today. We're really, really lucky to live in this time. Well, I thought I would wrap up by reading a quote from Super Boys because it encapsulates, I think, our conversation:

Laura Maylene Walter:
"The story of the creation of Superman is about many things. It is just as much about the beginnings of corporate America, and it's a relationship to popular culture as it is about artistic creation and familial relationships. It is a story about the haves and have nots, creators, a son, a father, the depression and companies and families trying to protect themselves, and those who come after them that a colorful pamphlet intended to be thrown away after reading has grown in value from 10 cents to several million dollars in 75 years is not because old paper has suddenly become more valuable. But because we as a culture have determined that the character itself has, that such a high value is assigned to a fictional character, speaks volumes about its readership, whether we want to admit it or not, we still like Superman." I think, on that note, we'll end Valentino, thank you so much for being here and sharing your knowledge with us. We appreciate it.

Valentino Zullo:
Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Laura Maylene Walter:
Page Count is presented by the Ohio Center for the book at Cleveland Public Library. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, rate and leave a review for Page Count wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more online or find a transcript of this episode at ohiocenterforthebook.org, follow us on Twitter @cplocfb, or find us on Facebook. If you'd like to get in touch, email ohiocenterforthebook@cpl.org and put "podcast" in the subject line. Finally, follow me on Twitter and Instagram @LauraMaylene. Thanks for listening, and we'll be back in two weeks for another chapter of Page Count.