Seth Kushner’s Schmuck really stands out in how it blends self-deprecating humor with a raw, honest look at relationships and personal growth; and how strategically he employs 22 artists to illustrate each of the 22 chapters. Schmuck follows the Pekar tradition of deeply personal, often unflattering self-examination, while also carrying the neurotic, self-deprecating humor that defines much of Woody Allen’s work. The comparison to Harvey Pekar and Woody Allen makes sense because there’s that mix of neurotic introspection and observational comedy, all wrapped in a deeply Jewish, Brooklyn-centric sensibility.
Pekar’s American Splendor often delves into his awkwardness in relationships and social settings, particularly in his early stories about dating and marriage. His willingness to depict himself as neurotic, insecure, and occasionally self-sabotaging feels like a direct influence on Kushner.
From Woody Allen’s Annie Hall there’s a similar presentation of romance as a series of fumbling missteps told with wry self-awareness. Allen’s persona, much like Kushner’s in Schmuck, often portrays the Jewish intellectual as both endearing and insufferable, full of anxious over-analysis and romantic mishaps.
While Allen relies on a singular, consistent visual style, Kushner’s use of multiple artists to depict himself across chapters adds a unique layer. It visually represents the shifting perspectives on the same man—his self-image versus how he’s perceived by others. This technique arguably takes the self-critical humor a step further, as it forces readers to constantly reassess and reframe the protagonist with each chapter.
Pekar also worked with a variety of artists, but the difference with Kushner is that it wasn't central to the storytelling in the way it is for Schmuck. With American Splendor, the rotating artists reflected the nature of the comic’s production rather than being a deliberate structural device to represent the protagonist's shifting self-perception. Kushner, on the other hand, seems to have built this variation into the core of his narrative, making it an intentional part of the reading experience. Pekar's collaborations created multiple interpretations of his life but weren’t necessarily designed to emphasize personal transformation, whereas Kushner’s approach uses the changing artistic styles to reflect different facets of his identity and relationships.
Schmuck reflects the evolution of autobiographical comics, especially given Kushner’s background in fumetti and photography. His approach was already visual, and it's interesting how that translated into comics. The multi-artist approach not only reinforces the fragmented, shifting nature of identity but also plays with the idea of memory—how we see ourselves versus how others see us.
A central theme in Schmuck is the protagonist’s immersion in a heavily masculinist environment and his gradual evolution beyond it. Kushner presents his younger self as insecure and awkward, caught up in a world where male social dynamics and expectations shape his approach to relationships. His self-deprecating humor, much like Pekar’s, allows him to be brutally honest about his own shortcomings without losing the reader’s sympathy. While Pekar often depicted himself as frustrated by social conventions and professional limitations, he also grew increasingly self-aware in his later work, reflecting on marriage, class struggles, and aging with greater depth. Kushner’s arc follows a similar trajectory, though condensed into a single book rather than a lifetime of comics.
Will Eisner, in contrast, often reflected on Jewish male identity in a more sentimental or historical framework. His autobiographical works, like To the Heart of the Storm and The Dreamer, explored the pressures placed on Jewish men by both their communities and the larger American society. Where Eisner’s characters often grappled with generational expectations and assimilation, Kushner’s protagonist struggles more with contemporary masculinity—dating, emotional vulnerability, and self-perception in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Yet, all three—Eisner, Pekar, and Kushner—capture the ways in which Jewish men navigate identity and self-worth, whether through nostalgia, gritty realism, or humorous self-reflection. Kushner’s protagonist ultimately matures by the book’s conclusion, breaking away from the narrow definitions of masculinity that initially constrained him, in a way that echoes both Pekar’s and Eisner’s evolving portrayals of Jewish male identity.
The protagonist’s journey out of a masculinist environment is a crucial point, especially in contrast to the strong wave of Jewish women’s confessional memoirs by artists like Miriam Katin, Leela Corman, Amy Kurzweil, and Sarah Lightman. Schmuck reflects a particular kind of male self-examination—neurotic but ultimately still centered in male experience—while these women’s memoirs often engage with gender, family, and Jewish identity in more expansive and intersectional ways.
Liana Finck, for example, often interrogates relationships and self-perception in a way that overlaps with Kushner’s work, but her approach is more abstract and internal rather than externalized through multiple artistic perspectives.
Amy Kurzweil’s Flying Couch is a graphic memoir that weaves together personal and generational narratives, exploring her relationship with her mother and grandmother, a Holocaust survivor. The book examines Jewish identity, trauma, and memory through a deeply introspective and psychologically rich lens, contrasting with the more externalized, self-deprecating humor of Schmuck. Kurzweil’s approach aligns with the broader trend of Jewish women’s autobiographical comics, which often center on family legacies and personal growth rather than the romantic misadventures and masculinity-focused introspection that define Kushner’s work.
Schmuck’s place in the Jewish Comics Library of Seattle collection is well-earned, not only because of its deep engagement with Jewish identity and humor but also because it exemplifies a key strand of Jewish graphic storytelling—the self-exploratory, confessional memoir. Kushner’s work, alongside Pekar and Eisner, extends the tradition of Jewish men using comics to dissect their anxieties, relationships, and evolving identities. At the same time, it stands as a counterpart to the growing wave of Jewish women’s autobiographical comics, offering a perspective that is deeply gendered yet equally self-reflective. By incorporating multiple artists, Schmuck uniquely embodies the fragmented, shifting nature of self-perception, making it a fascinating addition to the broader landscape of Jewish graphic memoirs. It is precisely this mix of personal narrative, formal experimentation, and cultural specificity that makes Schmuck a compelling and necessary inclusion in the Jewish Comics Library.