GROPPER, William – Alay-oop 1930

Gropper’s only wordless novel, Alay-oop, reproduces drawings done in pen and ink, crayon, and brush. It deals with failed dreams of success and jealousy. Although the mood appears light-hearted, Gropper illustrates the squalor of inner-city living.

William Victor “Bill” Gropper (Dec. 3, 1897 – Jan. 3, 1977) was a U.S. cartoonist, painter, lithographer, and muralist.

Throughout the 1920s he worked for a number of socialist magazines and in 1927 travelled to the USSR in celebration of the tenth anniversary of the Russian Revolution. Following the Second World War, US censors suppressed books with socialist views such as Gropper’s.

Alay-oop (1930)

Title: Alay-oop
Author and Illustrator: William Gropper
Date: 1930
Publisher: Coward-McCann, Inc.
Place of publication: New York
Printer: ?
Copyright: Coward-McCann, Inc.
Size: 8 x 5.5”
Dust jacket: Yes- designed by the artist
slipcase: ?, doubtful
Binding: red cloth binding
Cover: dust jacket.
Language: English titles, etc
Unpaginated
Printed: mostly printed on rectos; some images spread across both verso and recto
Edition: Trade only ??
References:
Description: 92 unnumbered plates
- This story has a dream sequence.
This wordless novel was done in crayon, pen and ink, brush, as well as a splattering effect, rather than woodcuts.