Stan Mack’s Real Life Not-So-Funnies

For an artist who made his reputation working with material that was “100% Guaranteed Overheard,” Stan Mack has one of the most distinctive voices in American letters. Stan Mack’s Real Life Funnies, the strip he drew weekly for the Village Voice for more than 20 years, has had an outsize impact on the development of one of today’s most popular and culturally revered forms — the literary graphic novel.

These Days, the new occasional feature that Mack has begun contributing to the Independent, pushes off from the overheard street scenes of Manhattan into the bewildering, often isolated, always borderline absurd era of the current global pandemic. Using text derived from phone interviews, Mack delivers — this time in a single-frame format — trenchant, pitch-perfect snapshot/soundbites of contemporary life. The Indy is honored to host his remarkable talent in this latest, most timely manifestation.

Find These Days at independent.com/these-days and send your ideas to Mack at stan@independent.com.