Books by Nicolas Mahler

A twist on the classic tale of Alice in Wonderland told through Nicolas Mahler's distinctive graphic novel style. Alice is back in Wonderland. Here she meets the White Rabbit, who leads her down into his rabbit hole in search of an illustrated edition of H. C. Artmann's Frankenstein in Sussex. Over the course of the novel, Alice repeatedly runs into the Rabbit, who quotes freely from other literary works by the likes of Herman Melville and E. M. Cioran. Unlike in Lewis Carroll's classic, Alice is not traveling the Wonderland we know. Rather, in Nicolas Mahler's whimsical graphic novel retelling, she is in a house deep beneath the ground. On subsequent floors, she encounters the famous creations of Lewis Carroll: the Hookah-Smoking Caterpillar, the Cheshire Cat, the Mock Turtle, and many others. One after the other, these creatures address the terrors of childhood and youth. It is only when Alice reaches the ground floor of the house that we arrive at the inevitable climax: face to face with Frankenstein's Monster.

Thousands upon thousands of books have been written about Immanuel Kant since his death. None, let's be clear, have been quite like what we have here. In Party Fun with Kant, Nicolas Mahler tells the story of Kant--and his fellow serious-minded figures from the history of philosophy--with a comic edge. With his witty visual style and clever wordplay, he delves into their lives and emerges with hitherto unknown scenes that show them in a new (and far less serious) light. We go to parties with Kant, visit an art exhibition with Hegel, shop at the supermarket with Nietzsche, and go to the cinema with Deleuze, and celebrate the dream wedding with de Beauvoir. In each case, we come away knowing more about the life, thoughts, and feelings of the philosopher--getting to know them as people rather than as stony-faced figures long since robbed of any existence beyond their ideas. The result is pure fun, but with plenty of insight, too.