comic bookn.
/ˈkɒmɪk bʊk/, U.S. /ˈkɑmɪk ˌbʊk/ Chiefly U.S.
A publication in book or magazine format containing a story or collection of stories in the form of comic strips; originally one with chiefly humorous or action-based content intended for children, often containing collections of newspaper comic strips, later also one dealing with a broad range of subjects and intended for adults.See also comic n. 4b, comic strip n., graphic novel at graphic adj. and n. Additions 7.
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society > communication > journalism > journal > periodical > [noun] > comic
comic1892
comic book1904
love comic1948
horror comic1954
manhwa1988
the mind > emotion > pleasure > laughter > causing laughter > [noun] > jest or pleasantry > a jest or joke > comic or joke book
jest-book1750
comic book1904
gag-book1909
1904 Bookseller Aug. 270/1 Mr. Cupples offered buyers a series of comic books to which two new titles have been added this season, in Lulu and Leander, drawn and designed by F. M. Howarth; and The Adventures of Mr. Jack, by James Swinnerton.
1940 San Antonio (Texas) Light 25 Apr. 1 b/1 President Franklin Delano Roosevelt has shown up in one of those Superhero comic books.
1955 Times 3 May 8/7 Mr. Averell Harriman has approved a Bill making it a misdemeanour to publish or distribute ‘comic books’ devoted to sex or crime to persons under 18.
1987 Spin Apr. 19/1 Manga artists carry the comic book to an aesthetic level far beyond that of most of their American peers.
1991 D. McBain Art Roebuck 89 A saran-wrapped comicbook of The Incredible Hulk.
2010 R. Duncan in M. K. Booker Encycl. Comic Bks. & Graphic Novels I. 205 The 1930s pulp magazine stories of Robert E. Howard are the wellspring of heroic fantasy in comic books.
Compounds
attributive. C1. Of, relating to, or from comic books.
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1909 Publishers' Weekly 11 Sept. 599/1 There will also be in the Comic Book Series a new volume of the ever-increasing popular ‘Buster Brown and Little Nemo’.
1941 Amer. Jrnl. Orthopsychiatry 11 541 A Christmas display featuring a comic book hero.
1977 Newsweek (Nexis) 11 July (Arts section) 49 A former comicbook illustrator..named Frank Frazetta.
1989 K. Green Night Angel vi. 65 Scruffy students staring into the window of a comic-book store.
2009 Financial Times 7 Mar. 17/5 Warner Brothers is once again betting that a comic-book adaptation will pull in the punters at the box office.
C2. Resembling or evocative of the characters, situations, etc. in comic books; characterized by lack of realism; hyperreal.
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1947 N.Y. Times 12 Oct. X11/1 Where Twain so skillfully stayed this side of incredulity, the Ford Theatre plunged beyond, only to draw back with a comic-book hero.
1979 Newsweek (Nexis) 23 Apr. 94 Because no novelist could make him credible..Hughes's life must be read as the comicbook version of the American dream.
2004 Nation (N.Y.) 13 Sept. 37/1 After 9/11, Bush said repeatedly that Al Qaeda had attacked the United States because ‘they hate our freedoms.’ But this was a comic book rendition of the conflict at hand.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2015; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1904