Comic Book Letter Column - Form and Content

Form and Content

As standardized by the big mainstream American companies, the letter column was typically overseen by one of the comic’s staff members, often the book’s editor (or later on, the assistant editor), and occasionally the book’s writer(s).

The letters page was often used as a soapbox, where in addition to responding to reader comments, the editor would provide behind-the-scenes details about the comics world, announce changes to the title or the creative team, plea for more (or better) letters, needle the competition, and otherwise communicate with readers.

Due to the monthly (or longer) lag between issues, a comic’s letter column usually featured reader responses to issues about three-to-five months prior to the current one. Occasionally, if a story ran too long one month, or there were printer-related problems, a comic's letters page would be omitted that issue. This would often produce an outcry from deprived readers in later letter columns, accompanied by the requisite apologies and explanations.

Until the late-1970s, letter columns were usually found in the middle of the book, when they mostly moved to the book’s second-to-last page (the last page tending to be an advertisement).

Toward the end of 1960 — thanks in no small part to the urging of motivated readers like Jerry Bails (later to be known as the '"father of comics fandom") and Roy Thomas — DC editor Julius Schwartz decided to print readers' home addresses in the letters, a custom of long standing in science fiction magazines and one which helped originate science fiction fandom (where Schwartz himself got his start in publishing). The first letters page with the letter writers' full addresses appeared in The Brave and the Bold #35 (May 1961). Because of this practice, many readers connected with each other, becoming penpals, and starting communities of fans and/or publishing fanzines. In a number of cases, readers (including future X-Men artist Dave Cockrum) "met" their future spouses via a comic book letter page.

Peter Sanderson writes of Schwartz's letter columns:

Similarly, under the guidance of editor-in-chief/publisher Stan Lee, Marvel Comics also decided to print readers' home addresses in the letters. Lee made it a priority to create a community of readers, giving them a sense of personal investment in Marvel and its titles. Lee's ambition to create a company aesthetic in this way was overwhelming successful; many Marvel fans would sign off their letters with the phrase, "Make Mine Marvel!"

For many fans, having a letter printed was a badge of honor — especially if it was in one of the more high-profile letters pages. The feeling was that if one wrote enough good letters, it was possible to influence the direction of the comic and/or one's favorite characters. And as letters pages became more collaborative in this way, many became forums for long-running discussions among the editors and readers, with topics ranging from what defined a "mutant" to real-world issues such as religion, racism, feminism, gay rights, and the rights of the disabled. Cerebus creator Dave Sim's comments about women, for example, became the source of a particularly long-running and bitter debate in the pages of "Aardvark Comment".

In certain circumstances, it was practice for Marvel and DC to solicit letters for titles which had trouble filling a letters page each month. While popular titles could receive up to 40 or more letters per month, other titles might not receive enough to even fill a page. In desperate circumstances, DC and Marvel lettercol assemblers were even known to write fake letters under assumed names, just to fill out the column.

For some time in the 1970s, Marvel editors (and assistant editors, like Mark Gruenwald) responded to readers' letters in the guise of a "friendly armadillo." Beginning in 1980, under new editor-in-chief Jim Shooter, Marvel instituted new letter column policies. One change was to let writers of certain titles (rather than the book's editor) manage the letters pages. The other was to eliminate the conceit of the "armadillo" and have the books' editors or writers respond to letters under the own names.

In later years, some DC Comics letters pages — like those in Lobo and Ambush Bug — used the humorous device of having the main character "respond" to letters. Marvel's Deadpool, as part of his regular practice of breaking the "fourth wall," also answered his own letters.

The letters page also functioned as another form of "house ad," a place to promote the book, other books in the same line, or the comic book publishing company in general. Some had additional purposes such as in the 1980s The Question series, written by Dennis O'Neil, whose letters pages included a reading recommendation with each issue to complement the philosophical points illustrated in the feature story.