The Lion's Den FAQ
Q:
Who are you?
A: My name is Avram Aryeh Green. I am an American-born Jew
who was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1974. I enjoy reading
comics and trying to write commentary on them. I also enjoy writing
about movies on occasion.
Q: Where do you live now?
A: I live in Jerusalem, Israel. My folks first moved here in 1983.
When we got here, we first lived in Kfar Adumim, out in the Judean
desert. Two years later, we moved to Jerusalem, where we have lived
ever since. I am the oldest in a family of four. I work as a
librarian in the city.
Q: What do you think of Jerusalem?
A: I enjoy living here very much. Jerusalem, built by King David
back in the ancient times, is also the only city in the world that
is not recognized as the capital city that it is. It is one of the
holiest cities in the world next to Hevron, the most ancient Jewish
city in the world because of the historical value Jerusalem has for
the Jewish people, with it’s Temple Mount which is right above the
Western Wall.
Q: Are you yourself religious?
A: Not really. I am only traditionally observant on Jewish customs
myself. However, my family did attend Conservative synagogues in
Philadelphia years ago, and today, whenever we go to synagogues, we
usually go to the more Orthodox ones. I do have a friend who is now
a Lubavicher Hasidic, and who got married in April 2001.
Q: When did you first start reading comics?
A: When I was about six or seven years of age. The first comic book
I read was a 1973 issue of the Fantastic Four. I also read a lot of
newspaper comic strips as well, including Peanuts, Garfield,
Blondie, For Better or for Worse, Wizard of Id, and
Doonesbury.
Q: How were you inspired to write about comics as well as reading
them?
A: From being a mailbag correspondent for Andrew Smith, who writes
the Captain Comics column for the Commercial Appeal
in Memphis, TN, and Scripps-Howard News Service, a career he has
been holding since 1993. I first started writing to him to discuss
various comics and pop culture related subjects in mid-2000, about a
year after I started to read his column.
Q: Did you ever draw yourself?
A: Yeah, I used to draw a bit myself. I drew all sorts of little
doodlings in some of my notebooks, such as swordfighters and
castles, and also houses and flowers.
Q: Are there any other companies besides DC and Marvel comics
whose publications you like to read?
A: Oh sure, there’s Top Cow, Zenescope, and even CrossGen, which
published circa 2000-2004.
Q: Are there any other comic book sources that you turn to
besides just Captain Comics for information on the subject and
industry?
A: Yes indeed, there’s Cinescape, The Comics Continuum, World
Famous, Sequential Tart, IGN's Comics section, and Hero Realm, the
latter on which I once had two guest columns and one guest review
published.
Q: And are there any other comic book columnists whose work you
read besides Andrew Smith?
A: Yep, there is Michael Sangiacomo, who is a staff writer
for the Cleveland Plain Dealer and Newhouse News
Service, and we could also count John Simcoe, who writes a
monthly column for the York Dispatch/Sunday News, although
the work of the latter I first began reading on Captain Comics site,
where he wrote at least three times a month. And I have written more
than plenty of letters to them as well. And best of all, there's Joseph Szadkowski, who writes
about comics, etc, for the Washington Times, one of the best
newspapers in the business.
Q: Do you still read the works of
any of these comics columnists?
A: As of today, I've quit reading the works of Smith, if anyone. I'd
been coming to the conclusion that he was simply too attached to the
media establishment and the Main-Stream Media's (MSM for short) way
of thinking, which is what some would call "politically correct."
It's a viewpoint and an approach that I simply cannot identify with,
certainly not any longer. As I came to realize, his columns were
little more than superficial fluff-writing that overlooked more than
a considerable amount of in-depth details and fawned over some
really bad items. But what really broke the camel's back was when
Smith went and fawned over a most shoddy miniseries from DC Comics,
and I simply couldn't let that go ignored. You could say that I did
what Clark Kent, Lois Lane, Peter Parker, Carol Danvers and even Ben
Urich would do - I stood up and said what I thought about what he
wrote in his column, and spoke out against it.
Q: Are there any other subjects that you like to deal with as
entertainment?
A: Of course, there is Star Trek and Tomb Raider, manga and anime,
some music and computer games (particularly puzzle games), and also
card and board games.
Q: How did you put together your web site?
A: With some help. My mother is the computer expert in the family.
And I owe her a lot of thanks for helping me out when I first began.
Q: What made you think of calling this site the Lion's Den?
A: Two things: first, Lion, or Aryeh, as it’s written in Hebrew, is
my middle name. Second, Lexicon Lion is the name I took for the roll
call on the Captain Comics site. It's meant to be humorous to some
extent, and it works out pretty well too.
Q: Do you really like comics?
A: Yep, I sure do.
All content TM & Copyright Avi Green. All
rights reserved.