Escaping slavery in the Americas, maroons made miracles in the mountains, summoned new societies in the swamps, and forged new freedoms in the forests. They didn’t just escape and steal from plantations—they also planted and harvested polycultures. They not only fought slavery but proved its opposite, and for generations they defended it with blood and brilliance.
Maroon Comix is a fire on the mountain where maroon words and images meet to tell stories together. Stories of escape and homecoming, exile and belonging. Stories that converge on the summits of the human spirit, where the most dreadful degradation is overcome by the most daring dignity. Stories of the damned who consecrate their own salvation.
With selections and citations from the writings of Russell Maroon Shoatz, Herbert Aptheker, C.L.R. James, and many more, accompanied by comics and illustrations from Songe Riddle, Mac McGill, Seth Tobocman, and others, Maroon Comix is an invitation to never go back, to join hands and hearts across space and time with the maroons and the mountains that await their return.
About the Contributors
Quincy Saul is the author of Truth and Dare: A Comic Book Curriculum for the End and the Beginning of the World, and the coeditor of Maroon the Implacable: The Collected Writings of Russell Maroon Shoatz. He is a musician and a cofounder of Ecosocialist Horizons.
Seth Tobocman is the cofounder of World War 3 Illustrated. He is the author and illustrator of several graphic books, including You Don’t Have to Fuck People Over to Survive and Understanding the Crash. He has participated in exhibitions at ABC No Rio, Exit Art, the Museum of Modern Art, and the New Museum of Contemporary Art. His illustrations have appeared in the New York Times among many other publications.
Mac McGill is one of the leading pen and ink artists of NYC. His drawings are known internationally for their formal density and their affective impact. His previous art books include IX XI MI.
Songe Riddle has worked on a number of award-winning film and television productions providing motion graphics and animation as well as script illustrations and storyboards. His illustrations can be found in magazines as well as on book and record covers.
What People Are Saying
“The activist artists of Maroon Comix have combined and presented struggles past and present in a vivid, creative, graphic form, pointing a way toward an emancipated future.” Marcus Rediker, coauthor of The Many-Headed Hydra: Sailors, Slaves, Commoners, and the Hidden History of the Revolutionary Atlantic
“With bold graphics and urgent prose, Maroon Comix provides a powerful antidote to toxic historical narratives. By showing us what was, Quincy Saul and his talented team allow us to see what’s possible.” James Sturm, author of The Golem’s Mighty Swing
“The history and stories that the Maroons personified should inspire a whole new generation of abolitionists. This comic illustration can motivate all those looking to resist modern capitalism’s twenty-first-century slavery and the neofascism we are facing today.” Dhoruba Bin Wahad, Black Panther Party, New York Chapter, executive director of Community Change Africa
“This fine comic book (‘comic’ because it’s not tragic) should be infiltrated into every schoolhouse and factory in Capitalist Modernity!” Hakim Bey, author of TAZ
“Maroon Comix is breathtaking! I say that after decades of study and practice in that arena. One who is serious about resisting the dragons that threaten our very existence will use Maroon Comix to help fashion or reinforce their place within the hydra of twenty-first-century Maroons.” Russell Maroon Shoatz, author of Maroon the Implacable