世新大學圖書館

Title from box cover.

"14 distinctively discrete books, booklets, magazines, newspapers and pamphlets."

Chris Ware's new graphic novel comes in a cardboard box, like BS Johnson's The Unfortunates, or an old-fashioned board game. Inside, are 14 "distinctively discrete" books and pamphlets of varying sizes. Each one of these stands alone, and since - in theory - they may be read in any order, several members of a comic-loving family could happily read Building Stories over the course of the same afternoon. But they work together, too, combining to depict, in rich and multifaceted fashion, the mostly unhappy lives of the inhabitants of a single Chicago apartment block. Ware's box, then, isn't a gimmick, but a sort of proxy. Like the crumbling building at his story's heart, it's a repository of misery, loneliness and misunderstandings.

Components consist of: 1 hardcover vol., 32 cm.; 1 hardcover vol., 24 cm.; 1 newspaper, 56 cm.; 1 booklet, 31 cm.; 2 booklets, 28 cm.; 1 booklet, 20 cm.; 1 booklet, 8 x 25 cm.; 5 printed sheets, ranging in size from 71 x 9 cm. to 56 x 81 cm., all folded; and 1 folded board, 41 x 107 cm., folded to 41 x 27 cm. All components are unpaged and are chiefly col. illustrations. None have titles.

[v. 1] 1 hardcover vol. (A) ([52] p. ; 32 cm.) -- [v. 2] 1 hardcover vol. (B) ([30] p. ; 24 cm.) -- [v. 3] 1 booklet (C) ([20] p. ; 56 cm. folded to 42 x 29 cm.) -- [v. 4] 1 booklet (D) ([16] p. ; 31 cm.) -- [v. 5, v. 6] 2 booklets (E and F) ([16] p. ; 28 cm.) -- [v. 7] 1 booklet (G) ([28] p. ; 20 cm.) -- [v. 8] 1 booklet (H) ([52] p. ; 8 x 25 cm.) -- 2 printed sheets (I and J) ([2] p. ; 9 x 71 cm. folded to 9 x 18 cm.) -- 2 printed sheets (K and L) ([2] p. ; 47 cm. folded to 32 x 24 cm.) -- 1 printed sheet (M) ([2] p. ; 56 x 81 cm. folded to 41 x 28 cm.) -- 1 folded board (N) (41 x 107 cm. folded to 41 x 27 cm.) All components are unpaged and are chiefly col. illustrations. None have titles

Tegneserie. 14 books and pamphlets of varying size, each one standing alone, but together also combining to depict the mostly unhappy lives of the inhabitants of a single apartment block in Chicago.