KINGS IN DISGUISE
BY JAMES VANCE AND DAN BURR
Kings in Disguise is a black-and-white graphic novel set in California in 1933, during the Great Depression, written by James Vance and illustrated by Dan Burr with an introduction by Alan Moore. It was published by W. W. Norton in New York in 1988.
Presented here are a sequence of six pages, 23 to 28, including the only scene of Greek love interest: an encounter between a boy and some hobos. The common practice of Greek love amongst hobos was the subject of two studies: Homosexuality Among Tramps by Josiah Flynt (1897) and The Hobo by Nels Anderson (1923).
The main protagonist of Kings in Disguise is Freddie Bloch, a boy of thirteen, whose single acoholic father disappears. Effectively homeless, he sets out to try to find him, believing he has gone to Detroit. A few days later, he arrives at the top of a hill. Looking down, he sees a group of men, hobos in fact, but he does not know this, never having encountered hobos before.
