Miscellaneous Mondays: Happy 75th, Lois!

 As a fan of strong female characters, there are some women you know you should know. Just as an English major knows that they’re going to have to have a working knowledge of every book that Wishbone covered, the fan of awesome ladies knows that they must familiarize themselves with people like Princess Leia, Sarah Connor, and Ellen Ripley. It’s about respecting the classics, and no one is more classic than the characters who come to us from the Golden Age of comics.

So it’s with great trepidation that I admit to you that I don’t really know much about Lois Lane. I’ve seen the atrocious Superman Returns and read the fantastic New Frontier, but, as a fan of the Gotham side of the DCU, I’m woefully unversed in the history of a woman primarily known for being Superman’s girlfriend.

In my defense, seventy-five years is an awful lot of history to get through. Seventy-five years ago last week, Lois Lane made her first appearance alongside the Man of Steel in Action Comics #1 and, while the majority of the comics-loving corner of the Internet is celebrating his anniversary, blogs like DC Women Kicking Ass are paying tribute to the intrepid reporter who’s been with him through it all (setting aside those brief periods when she was dead).

This week’s recommended reading is one such tribute. Sue of DCWKA conducted a series of interviews with several creators and a historian who have written about Lois, and they serve as a perfect introduction to the character and her place within comics culture. If, like me, you’re using the release of the upcoming Man of Steel as an excuse to learn all about Lois, this may be the perfect place to start.