Kim Thompson responds to R. Crumb article

Kim Thompson, co-founder of my favorite publishing company in the world, Fantagraphics, responded to Don Simpson's article about Robert Crumb's art opening in Pittsburgh, posted here on Boing Boing.

The day Don Simpson contributes one tenth of one percent to the world of comics what Robert Crumb has done (and continues to do) is the day one might — MIGHT — be tempted to take seriously rants like the ones Don's been hammering away at here.

Crumb is a private, quiet man whose prominence in the field of comics and art brings on massive, continuous, unwanted attention. He is under no goddamn obligation whatsoever to sign anyone's comics or chat with anyone, and which of his personal friends he chooses to see when and for how long is, emphatically, no one's goddamn business but his own. (Good grief!)

In fact, I would say that Don's supersonically shrill, nearly psychotic sense of entitlement vis-à-vis Crumb (carefully couched in sympathy for Crumb's jilted fans, although it's clear Simpson has just as much contempt for them as for Crumb) could be used as Exhibit A justifying Crumb's reticence.

In other words: Robert Crumb probably acts the way he does in large part to avoid assholes like Donald Simpson.