The Way of the Editor:

Wonder Woman: Big and Beautiful

Proof that big can be beautiful, and have a pretty damned good sense of humor to boot.

Alright, some people might consider this just wrong, wrong, wrong, but in as far as online art memes go (see That Meme Thing ), I find this irrepressibly amusing:

FatWonderWoman.com

It’s an online blog devoted to *ahem* expanding the range of Wonder Woman interpretations. Big, Large, Fleshy interpretations. Jamar Nicholas, runs the site with posts made up of scans of drawings from Jamar’s many art friends, usually accompanied by a short description about each. In declaring his motives, Jamar says:

I have always felt like for someone who’s supposed to be an amazon, she’s pretty thin. I don’t know a lot of amazons, but I'm assuming they wouldn't be wafer-thin.

Wonder Woman was originally created in 1941 by noted “psychologist, feminist theorist, inventor,” and polyamorist Dr. William Moulton Marston. She first appeared in All Star Comics #8 (January, 1942).

Interesting tidbit: Marston, who is also the inventor of the famed polygraph lie detector machine, became convinced during the course of his research that women were by nature inherently more honest and reliable than men. In addition to the obvious influences of this research on the creation of an Amazonian society, the Marston may also have used the polygraph as a basis for Wonder Woman’s Lasso of Truth.

Intended as a new role model for a new generation, Marston modeled Wonder Woman on his own wife, Elizabeth Marston, a woman who pursued a law degree at a time when it was not yet socially acceptable for women to work, and who supported her extensive family of 7 on a single income for many years. In a 1943 issue of The American Scholar, Marston wrote:

Not even girls want to be girls so long as our feminine archetype lacks force, strength, and power. Not wanting to be girls, they don't want to be tender, submissive, peace-loving as good women are. Women’s strong qualities have become despised because of their weakness. The obvious remedy is to create a feminine character with all the strength of Superman plus all the allure of a good and beautiful woman.

Intended to change the way society thought about women by using comics as a tool of influencing the next generation, Marston employed bondage artist H. G. Peter to deliberately capture the attention of young men. In the recently published Clean Cartoonists, Dirty Drawings, Scott Tipton speculates:

Marston’s intention was to subtly infuse the comic with highly suggestive imagery, so as to keep the attention of male readers, particularly young adolescent males, who might otherwise hesitate to buy what could be seen as a girlS comic book.

So, in a society where women work, study, and support their families, if not on par with men, then at least in a far more socially acceptable world, perhaps it is a fitting tribute that “Hip-Hop Cartoonist” Jamar Nicholas is now reinterpreting the Amazonian Princess’s appeal on a grand new scale to fit the new generation: as a new woman warrior who fights self esteem and body issues.

Relevant Links

Who Was Wonder Woman?
Wonder Woman on Wikipedia