King Aroo, Vol. 1: 1951-1952

King Aroo #1

by Jack Kent

-The Library of American Comics is the world's #1 publisher of classic newspaper comic strips, with 14 Eisner Award nominations and three wins for best book. LOAC has become "the gold standard for archival comic strip reprints...The research and articles provide insight and context, and most importantly the glorious reproduction of the material has preserved these strips for those who knew them and offers a new gateway to adventure for those discovering them for the first time.” - Scoop

Genres: Comics, Comic Strips, Humor

360 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2000

About the author

John Wellington "Jack" Kent (1920 – 1985) was an American cartoonist and prolific author-illustrator of children's books. He is perhaps best known as the creator of the comic strip King Aroo. In addition to his own books, he illustrated more than twenty books by other authors.

Reviews

[Regan MacArthur · Rating 5 out of 5]

Here's a taste of the humor one can expect from this book: Two characters, King Aroo and Yupyop, get taken away far from home(it involves a camel with a rocket tied to its tail). Our heroes draw a map to facilitate their return journey. Soon, King Aroo spies a mountain in the distance. He's excited. "It's just like the mountain on our map!" he says. Yupyop, however, is less impressed. He can't help pointing out that the mountain is located on the other side of the road on their map. King Aroo wastes no time; he grabs a shovel and starts scooping up dirt. He's going to move the mountain so that it conforms to the map...

Okay, maybe you had to be there but my five-your-old son and I laughed our heads off over that joke. King Aroo is a delight and I'm glad I coughed up the dough for this visit to the tiny Kingdom of Myopia. Jack Kent could draw well and he could write good gags. Almost any of the strips featuring Mr. Elephant, a pachyderm with a faulty memory, seems to be funny.

[Freder · Rating 5 out of 5]

A joy and a delight -- but best consumed slowly, a bite at a time. Wistful, charming, clever, with delightful and loveable characters. A real forgotten gem. Highly recommended.

[Steve · Rating 5 out of 5]

"King Aroo" ran in newspapers well before I was reading newspapers so I had only seen one sequence of reprinted strips until I purchased this. I'm very glad I did. I find this quite funny and the drawing is both unusual and effective.

King Aroo is set in the tiny kingdom of Myopia. The only humans living in Myopia are King Aroo and his major-domo Yupyop. The rest of the inhabitants are animals of many kinds, all of whom can speak.

There are other humans around outside of Myopia and the King and Yupyop run into them frequently. They do a fair amount of traveling; for example, they go to England to attend the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II (not to attend the coronation itself really; but they do get to join the crowd outside).

The Goodreads introductory description of King Aroo says in part:

Lauded by critics in the pantheon of great strips such as Krazy Kat, Pogo, and Barnaby, Jack Kent's brilliantly conceived world brought smiles to young and old alike with its fanciful array of clever puns, visual humor, and good old slapstick.

I suspect that not all critics would regard King Aroo as being as great a comic as Krazy Kat, Pogo, and Barnaby but it was certainly an excellent comic strip. It deserves to be remembered.

[Ben · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don't know how these Jack Kent comics went under my radar for so long, but they have a gently humorous charm, feature a fun cast of characters, and superbly exhibit Kent's endearing, deceptively simple illustrations.

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

The dailies were much more enjoyable than the Sundays for some reason. More clever and witty than hilarious. Relies on wordplay, scenario gimmicks and one-off novelty characters more than character-driven humor.

[Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sweet, innocent, child-like. Sunday strips begin on page 236.