Congressman John Lewis has a dramatic life story: Born the son of Alabama sharecroppers, he joined the Civil Rights Movement, became one of the original Freedom Riders, marched with Martin Luther King Jr. in Selma and spoke at the 1963 March on Washington before King's famous "I Have a Dream" speech. Now, the last living member of the legendary Big Six civil rights leaders is sharing his story with the next generation through a trilogy of graphic novels titled March.
Comics have played an important role in communicating the message of the Civil Rights Movement to young people before—including Lewis himself. When he was 18, Lewis read a comic book titled Martin Luther King Jr. and the Montgomery Story published by the civil rights group Fellowship for Reconciliation, something that he says changed his life. The comic was not only a biography of King, but a blueprint for putting his principles of direct action and nonviolence into practice.
The events of March, the second volume of which is out today, feel particularly resonant in the midst of the ongoing national conversation about race and police brutality inspired by the deaths of numerous unarmed black men at the hands of law enforcement, as well as the militaristic response to the protests inspired by them. Lewis hopes that young people—especially young people inspired to activism by these events—will read his books to educate themselves about the history of the Civil Rights Movement and the non-violent principles that guided them.
"We were committed to the philosophy of nonviolence, even in the face of angry mobs during the Freedom Rides in Montgomery, Alabama at the Greyhound bus stations," says Lewis. "We never struck back. We were willing to suffer the beatings, to be arrested, to go to jail for what we believed in. I'm hopeful that young people who are thinking about what happened in Ferguson and New York can see another generation that acted in a peaceful, non-violent fashion and never gave up."
Lewis never considered making comics himself until he got a push from his senior aide, Andrew Aydin, a lifelong comics fan who had written his graduate thesis on Martin Luther King Jr. and the Montgomery Story. Once the Georgia congressman agreed, Aydin helped him co-write the March graphic novels, which are illustrated by award-winning artist Nate Powell and published by Top Shelf Productions.
Although Lewis had also written a more traditional memoir about his life, Walking with the Wind, he wanted to make March because he hoped it would allow his message to reach audiences in ways that a more traditional format might not, much like the King comic grabbed his attention as a young man.
"It tells the story in such a dramatic way—it's not just the words. It's the dramatic images," Lewis says. "Nate Powell is so gifted. He has the ability to make the words sing and jump off the pages. It's another way of reaching people who might not ordinarily pick up a regular book to read the story and be inspired by the story."
Lewis and Aydin have worked to get their message out through modern channels not only by selling the March graphic novels digitally, but making them DRM-free so readers can download the files directly—a decision they made while Congress was in the midst of debating the controversial SOPA bill. Aydin says it's a decision in line with a more progressive view of the Internet, as well as a recognition of how important digital freedom is to activism.
"Spreading information is greater than profit from that information. That's why we've been excited to participate in things like Humble Bundle [sales] where people can pay what they want," says Ayudin. "We don't want [access] to March to be limited by someone's ability to pay a few dollars. We designed it to be inexpensive to begin with, and digitally we've tried everything we can to make sure that it's readily available and inexpensive to people. ... Our goal was never explicit commercial success. Our goal was to use this to teach and inspire another generation. That guides every action that we take."
Lewis, who speaks glowingly of his visits to Facebook and Google, agrees that technology and activism go hand in hand. "I wonder sometimes if we had the technology back then that we have today, what we could have accomplished," he says. "We didn't have cell phones back in the '60s. Social media can be a very powerful tool to communicate, to get the word out. In seconds, you can call for some type of protest in a non-violent fashion and get people all around the world speaking up and speaking out. That's a blessing."
In the first volume of March, we see Lewis hand-making mimeograph copies of the dos and don'ts for protesting, a reminder of how much has changed for activists who want to get their message to the public. "You don't have to do that today. You just have to type it out," says Aydin. "A good, concrete message can spread further and wider than it ever has before. This is why net neutrality is so important to social movements and activists being free of inappropriate government surveillance is also incredibly necessary."
The topic of social media comes up often when Lewis and Aydin travel to schools and libraries to speak about March. "The question I like to pose to students is, 'What would Martin Luther King tweet? What would Gandhi post?'" says Aydin. "'What would this look like? How would we engage with them? How many followers would they have?'" While the idea of King tweeting might seem odd to some people, for Aydin it isn't strange at all. "I mean, you're talking to a guy who's handling John Lewis's social media account," he says.
March: Book One, which became a New York Times bestseller, followed Lewis from his boyhood in Alabama to his first meeting with King and his early involvement with sit-ins at segregated lunch counters.
That first volume has already become a teaching tool at schools and universities in over 40 states, something Aydin says is important as the history of the Civil Rights Movement grows more distant—and when many schools are doing a less than comprehensive job of teaching it to students. In a 2014 report by the Southern Poverty Law Center's Teaching Tolerance project examining state standards and curriculum requirements, 34 states received either a 'D' or 'F' rating when it came to educating students about civil rights.
The second volume of March continues Lewis' journey as he becomes one of the original Freedom Riders and a founding member—and later chairman—of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). It culminates with his speech at the March on Washington. Aydin says that one of the most important lessons of March is that young people—like Lewis himself, in his day—need to be put at the forefront of activist movements and allowed to take the lead.
"You can't have leaders clinging to their post. You have to allow the young people to lead. They will make the biggest difference. They're the most free," Aydin says. "Particularly at this moment in time, young people are also more qualified to utilize the tools available to them than the generations ahead of them. Social media has such power to organize people."
Lewis emphasizes, however, that it's important to have both social media activism and boots on the ground, and Aydin warns we have to be careful not to become "armchair activists."
"We have to realize that social media is a tool to organize people to show up," Aydin says. "People need to put their bodies on the line. Social media has the ability to bring everyone together, to organize, to have a national or international conversation, but in the end we have to make our presence be our voice."
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Both Lewis and Aydin say the most satisfying part of publishing March is not just meeting young readers but hearing from them weeks and months later about how the book affected them and inspired them to take action, sometimes by starting activist organizations of their own.
Shortly after the grand jury in Ferguson, Missouri declined to indict Officer Darren Wilson for the shooting of Michael Brown, Lewis and Aydin received an email from several students who had seen them speak at Louisiana State University. They told the congressman and his aide they'd formed an activist group called Baton Rouge Organizing, using March and its depictions of the national student movement of the '60s as a blueprint.
"They invited me to be on their Facebook group, and now I get to see all their direct action and watch it grow," says Aydin. "They've already engaged in direct actions and civil disobedience. They've been covered by numerous media outlets in Louisiana protesting both the decision as well as police brutality in and of itself, and they're already trying to find ways to organize around voting rights. They formed a central committee, they meet, they plan actions, and they act. That's when you're like, 'OK, this is working.'"
