The Inner Life of Comics
Paul Juhasz
(Author)
Description
There is a bone-deep weariness to this new collection of poems by Paul Juhasz. It's the
weariness we've all survived after a year and more of isolation during the pandemic, but Paul's
is deeper, his borne of a life fractured in middle age, of love found, then lost, of endings and
new, tentative beginnings. There is also something I think of as classic Paul humor, an ability to
face the worst that life throws at you and make a joke of it. Stare the hangman down, then make
him laugh, right before he pulls the lever.
But there's more. Though darkness, "the bear," always lurks (source, Paul reveals to us, of all
great comedy), he has discovered in this collection something much finer than that, the
mysterious thing we call poetry. There are lines in these poems, prose and lineated, of surpassing
beauty. There are moments in these lines, in these poems, when the comic rests and the poet
takes over, and we find ourselves mesmerized and lifted into a kind of peace that lets us know
Paul has travelled through the darkness and come out on the other side full of truths and beauties
that sustain long after the laughter fades.
--Hank Jones, author of Too Late for Manly Hands
Product Details
| Publisher | Turning Plow Press |
| Publish Date | September 30, 2022 |
| Pages | 122 |
| Language | English |
| Type |  Paperback / softback |
| EAN/UPC | 9781735576275 |
| Dimensions | 9.0 X 6.0 X 0.3 inches | 0.4 pounds |
About the Author
Reviews
Praise The Inner Life of Comics
What do Pagliacci, Shakespeare, Coltrane, and Thoreau have in common? Paul Juhasz knows. In
the Inner Life of Comics he unravels the tangled knot of moving through the world as a thinking,
feeling man. Like Shakespeare and Thoreau, his language is layered and profound. Like
Pagliacci, he is a court jester, a truth teller always among the crowd but rarely of it. And, like
Coltrane's music, his minor-key bebop finds a way to your heart.
Jeanetta Calhoun Mish
2017-2020 Oklahoma State Poet Laureate
Paul Juhasz's, The Inner Life of Comics was written in forced isolation, forced by his divorce, his
relocation to Oklahoma and then heightened by COVID. This isolation led the poet to grapple
with the essentials of human existence: what is love, family, manhood, and what is the fount of
humor. Although the subject matter is heady, since this book is authored by Paul Juhasz, there
are plenty laughs along the way. But, as we learn from his poem about Pagliacci, there is a cost
for these laughs, paid by the comic-a steep and dark one. Like a comic doing standup, or
magician doing sleight of hand, Juhasz often directs our gaze on the familiar. These set ups
include parking lots, a man playing hacky sack, a meal, a cup of coffee, but then to our
amazement comes the reveal, and, with it, a deeper meaning.
I whole heartedly invite you to come inside these covers and meet the comic, his dreams, fears
and aspirations. The trouble is well worth your while, and the dear cost has already been paid.
Alan Berecka
Author of A Living is Not a Life: A Working Title
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