I read R. Crumb's illustrated version of Genesis, at the beach last week, while waiting for the rain to stop. Being neither a fan of the Torah or the Bible or of comic books, I'm a little amazed I was motivated to buy and read it. But I did, and now I'm smarter, I guess - at least I know what's in Genesis besides the creation stories!

There's a whole lot of genealogy, rape, incest and murder. God kills people right and left; he drowns them, takes their livestock, torments them, tricks them, then promises huge families as reward for putting up with it all. There are stories which make no sense without knowing long-lost traditions and rules of society, ex.: men keep telling people, when they come into a strange land, that their wife is really their sister, and claiming that this will stop the local ruler from assaulting them - it happens three times, to people with similar names and under similar circumstances. Why? Beats me! But Crumb thankfully gives stuff like that some explanation in his chapter summaries at the end of the book. And then there's also Noah and Lot and a whole lot of stuff about a rather, IMO, unpleasant guy named Joseph and his Egyptian adventures.

But that's Genesis: old news. And illustrated Bible books have been around forever, too. What's new about this is the illustrator, R. Crumb. And this is classic Crumb: lumpy, big-legged women, frizzy-haired men, wild eyes and heaving bosoms, all drawn with that round and wriggly style that Crumb's famous for. Plus, he shows the sex and the murder, the weeping and the fighting and the crying, and doesn't hold back in deference to religious sensitivities. "Nothing left out!", the cover proclaims. And, besides being fun to look at (though it's in no way a parody or an attempt to make Genesis seem funny or silly), the illustrations actually help the stories flow (even those which don't make any sense, or are just listings of birth records - the "begats"), and that helped me to actually get through all 50 chapters! So, thanks Mr. Crumb! I won't ask you to bother with any of the other books, though.

Of course, some Christians are mad at him for drawing pictures of the things the authors of Genesis described.