Book review: A New History of Animation

The last decade has been a good one for global animation historiography: 2011 saw the release of The World History of Animation, Stephen Cavalier’s lavishly illustrated and informative global survey; Giannalberto Bendazzi’s updated, expanded three-volume edition of his seminal work Animation: A World History came out in 2016; and Maureen Furniss’s A New History of Animation (2016) marks another exciting addition to the field while offering a distinct and valuable contribution to the existing literature.

Cavalier’s and Bendazzi’s volumes are encyclopedic in writing style and thematic scope. Both works follow what Bendazzi himself describes as ‘a traditional approach’, namely a ‘linear narrative, chronologically structured in ages, and furthermore, divided up into nations and authors’ (p. 1). While Furniss’s account is also loosely chronological, A New History of Animation is designed as an introductory textbook. In the book’s preface, Furniss, who has taught animation history for the past 20 years, writes that she ‘looked to [her] lecture notes as the basis of the chapters that eventually formed the book’ (p. 9). This attention to pedagogy comes through in both form and content. The hefty volume is a comprehensive and well-organized overview that assumes no prior knowledge of animation history. Thanks to its numerous illustrations, streamlined layout, and elegant design, it is also a visually appealing reference text.

The book contains six sections, titled as follows: ‘Origins of Animation’, ‘Early Animation’, ‘Wartime and Midcentury’, ‘Experimental Modes’, ‘New Contexts and Voices’, and ‘Animation Worldwide’. These sections are further subdivided into chapters, all of which follow the same structure. Thus, each chapter offers an outline pointing to the main subtopics discussed therein and their respective page numbers, as well as a section entitled ‘global storylines’, which highlights important global developments. On the last page, a brief conclusion, endnotes, and a list of ‘key terms’ help underline the chapter’s main concepts.

Page-long ‘box’ inserts often provide industrial and historical context, draw broader connections, and explore the lineage of certain animation practices and technologies. For example, Furniss’s chapter on ‘Style and the Fleischer Studio’ includes a section dedicated to the rise of unions in the American animation industry (p. 121) and a separate insert dealing with ‘Censorship’ (specifically, the ‘Hays Code’). In other cases, these inserts serve to further contextualize or historicize contemporary phenomena. In a chapter devoted to computer-generated animation, Furniss briefly touches upon the history of the illusion of depth in film and media, framing virtual reality within a discussion of the ways in which cinema has previously attempted to ‘achieve the look of real-life perspective, using such processes as multiplane cameras and stereoscopy’ (p. 381).

The volume covers such key topics as the development of animation as art and industry, the impact and history of major studios, global animation (notably Japan and Eastern Europe), animation genres and audiences, and animation techniques. Scholars and fans of TV animation will also note the inclusion of a chapter on early television animation and a separate chapter on ‘television as a creative space’, which deals with recent commercial broadcast and cable animation.

A crucial strength of this book is its willingness to move beyond commercial and theatrical animation. While prominent animation powerhouses such as Disney and Ghibli receive due attention (separate chapters are devoted to Disney’s ‘New Aesthetic’ as defined in the 1930s, and to the studio’s ‘Renaissance’ of the 1990s), chapters such as ‘Authorship in Animated Shorts’ (p. 315) are notable in their dedication to showcasing the work of independent artists such as Bill Plympton, Sheila Sofian, and Torrill Kove. Other standout chapters in this vein include ‘Animation as Modern Art’ (pp. 70–91) and ‘Postwar Experimentation’ (pp. 240–257). The former summarizes the development of modern art, ties Lotte Reiniger’s work to it, and provides an overview of visual music and modernist animation of the 1920s and 1930s in the USSR, UK, and the US. The latter introduces students to the avant-garde works of Harry Smith, Larry Jordan, Robert Breer, Stan Brakhage, as well as the oscilloscope experiments of Mary Ellen Bute, and the beginnings of animated computer art by John and James Whitney, Larry Cuba, and Peter Foldes.

In keeping with recent developments in the field, Furniss emphasizes an expanded definition of animation which allows her to go beyond cinema and television, and touch upon other media forms and exhibition contexts, including gallery and museum installations, projection mapping, and large-scale outdoor installations such as a British graffiti artist Banksy’s 2015 Dismaland Bemusement Park (p. 435). In particular, the inclusion of a chapter on the ‘Emergence of Electronic Games’ in this volume is significant for pedagogical purposes. While some may take issue with Furniss’s theoretically problematic redefinition of video games as ‘animated games’, the chapter’s value lies in introducing the shared history of digital animation and video games, and the common aesthetic and theoretical questions they raise. This historical overview is complemented by ‘Heroes and Damsels in Distress’ (p. 294), a chapter dedicated to unpacking the gender stereotypes embedded in mainstream games, as well as the sexism of male-dominated online gaming communities and the gaming industry at large. This chapter touches upon topical issues such as the misogynistic discourse surrounding feminist video game criticism and activism, pointing to the recent ‘Gamergate’ online movement, whose members actively targeted and harassed prominent female video game bloggers and developers.

This emphasis on questions of gender equality is indicative of the book’s attention to female animators’ labor. Women’s contributions to animation history, so often sidelined or downright neglected in both scholarly and popular literature, are seamlessly incorporated into relevant chapters. Some sections of the book explicitly bring attention to the topic. For instance, a section entitled ‘Women and Authorship’ highlights the work of female animators such as Faith Hubley, Sally Cruikshank, Caroline Leaf, Nina Paley, and Signe Baumane (pp. 324–329). Elsewhere, Furniss’s discussion of the rise of modernist animation in America highlights the work of visual music pioneer Mary Ellen Bute (p. 89), while her section on machinima singles out Margaret ‘Peggy’ Ahwesh’s 2001 work She Puppet, a feminist critique of Tomb Raider’s Lara Croft (p. 293). A New History of Animation incorporates not only well-studied animators such as Lotte Reiniger, but also lesser-known historical figures such as silent-era clay animator Helena Smith Dayton (none of whose films survive), opening up avenues for further study of these women’s place in animation history.

Race and racial representation are predominantly addressed in relation to cartoons from the 1930s and 1940s. The ‘Comedy and the Dominance of American Animation’ chapter (pp. 126–137) touches upon the stereotyping of Asian and African American characters in mainstream animation, introducing Coal Black and de Sebben Dwarfs (1942) as an example of ‘the extremes of stereotyping and caricature’. In another chapter, ‘Animation in World War II’ (pp. 144–157), xenophobic and racist visual tropes are examined in the context of wartime propaganda. Subsequent editions of this volume would benefit from an extended discussion of this subject. Given the persistence of racial and ethnic stereotypes, misrepresentation, and erasure, particularly in Western studio animation, it would be beneficial for students to engage with these issues beyond the historical context emphasized here. This discussion could perhaps be complemented by a dedicated section highlighting activist animation and other creative responses and interventions by non-Western artists and persons of color. Finally, given the introductory nature of this text, any future editions’ pedagogical mission would be greatly enhanced by the inclusion of a chapter specifically aimed at exploring issues of sexuality and queer representation in animation history and aesthetics, as this important area of discourse remains both understudied and rarely taught in the field.

Despite leaving some room for expansion and thematic additions, Furniss’s book remains an outstanding achievement. Students of animation history, practitioners, and cartoon aficionados would all benefit greatly from the wealth of information contained in this volume. Its merits as an exhaustive, well organized, and engagingly presented pedagogical text suggest that A New History of Animation has the potential to become as foundational to introductory level and survey animation courses as Film Art: An Introduction (Bordwell et al., 2017) has been to Film Studies.