New Web Comic Revisits the Artists & Writers at the Bloody ’68 Convention: Jean Genet, William S. Burroughs & More

Draw­ing of William S. Bur­roughs by Nathan Gelgud/The Paris Review

Amer­i­ca’s polit­i­cal cir­cus will soon roll through Cleve­land and then Philadelphia–the sites of the Repub­li­can and Demo­c­ra­t­ic Nation­al Con­ven­tions. And, not with­out some mer­it, there’s con­cern that the car­ni­vals could turn vio­lent, as hap­pened in 1968, when Chicago’s may­or Richard Daley, backed by 23,000 police and Nation­al Guards­men, assault­ed pro­test­ers in the streets. A fed­er­al report lat­er called it a dis­play of “unre­strained and indis­crim­i­nate police vio­lence.”

This week, that tumul­tuous ’68 con­ven­tion is being com­mem­o­rat­ed in a com­ic over at The Paris Review. Issued in dai­ly install­ments by illus­tra­tor Nathan Gel­gud, the comic–simply titled “Uncon­ven­tion­al”–looks at the writ­ers, artists, and demon­stra­tors who attend­ed the con­ven­tion. Part 1 fea­tures poet, singer, activist Ed Sanders. Part 2 puts Jean Genet cen­ter stage (who knew he was there?). Part 3 focus­es on Nor­man Mail­er, who was always ready for a fight. Part 4 gives us the inim­itable William S. Bur­roughs, and Part 5, Ter­ry South­ern. You can fol­low the series here.

To learn more about what hap­pened at that his­toric con­ven­tion, you can read Bat­tle­ground Chica­go: The Police and the 1968 Demo­c­ra­t­ic Nation­al Con­ven­tion.

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