Up Front by Bill Mauldin

[Forgotten Field]

I just picked up and read "Up Front" by Bill Mauldin. The book is a collection of his cartoons drawn during WWII, featuring Willie and Joe, and a description of what inspired him to draw them. If you have any interest in the infantry history of WWII, it is a great book. He doesn't hold back, and it was a great explanation of some of the cartoons that I have been seeing since I was first in the Army. There seem to be lots of copies of the book around- I found a 1945 first edition print for $11.00 at a gunshow, and a search of ebay turned up a bunch more at similar prices.

[Holedigger]

Great "editorial" cartoons. He could really say it all in his ink and just plain talk! It's the grunts in the foxhole who really know what's going on!!!

[b29flteng]

My favorite is the Cavalry sgt. shooting his jeep with a broken axle.

[p51]

There’s a new Mauldin WW2 cartoon collection out there now, edited by the same guy who just wrote the recent biography of Mauldin. It's a two-book box set (hardbound, no less). The second volume is the stuff Mauldin drew on the mainland after he got to the ETO, mostly stuff anyone has seen before. However, the first volume has stuff he did before the war and what I'm pretty sure is every cartoon he got into print before he went to the continent. I thought I'd seen it all, but just thumbing through both books, I see LOTs of cartoons I'd never even heard of before! Forget, "Bill Mauldin's Army," THIS is the set you want if you like Mauldin's WW2 work!
The cheapest place I've seen it is on amazon:
[url="http://www.amazon.com/Willie-Joe-Years-Bill-Mauldin/dp/1560978384/ref=wl_it_dp?ie=UTF8&coliid=I3W3QPJ908D2UP&colid=2WHSO88P0TKH4"]http://www.amazon.com/Willie-Joe-Years-Bil...d=2WHSO88P0TKH4[/url]
The best thing is Fantagraphics is planning a series of these, all the way to when Mauldin stopped drawing them in the 1990s!
I have been collecting Mauldin stuff for over ten years now, have written extensively on his life and work and have one of the most complete collections of his work and publications in private hands. I have been on "Mail Call" on History Channel on the subject in 2005 and have advised libraries, collections on the subject of WW2 cartoonists.
PM me if interested, I can send you a link to a place where I store my PDF file of my first magazine article I did on the subject which talks about all his books... I can always field general questions on Mauldin stuff.
FYI, I also belong to the only WW2 living history group ever to get Mauldin's personal endorsement (in 1995). The Friends of Willie and Joe are out of the Pacific NW. A few years back, we re-created one of Bill's more ironic cartoons, maybe you'll enjoy this, along with the original:

[jet1]

My favorite aunt had a first edition autographed. i must have looked through it a million times as a kid.

[Django]

I had a first edition that my great uncle brought back from Italy. I have no idea what ever became of it. I HOPE it is somewhere at my parent's house.