Peanuts: Good Grief, Charlie Schulz!

A collection focusing on the life and work of Charles M. Schulz including his famous Peanuts comic strips.

This collection is organized in the following sections:

• Meet Charlie Schulz, including a selection of books learn about the life and art of the creator of Peanuts.

• Peanuts Reprint Books, including Original Books, Fawcett Books, Peanuts Parade, Peanuts Classics, HRW Compilations, Peanuts Collector Series, Andrews McMeel Books, Peanuts Treasury, Ballantine Books Peanuts, and The Complete Peanuts.

• English-Language Non-U.S. Peanuts Books, including Snoopy Stars and Snoopy Features, Snoopy 2 in 1 Collection, Peanuts Philosophers, Snoopy and the Peanuts Gang, Snoopy Snaps, and Snoopy Annuals

• Other Books and Series, including Anniversary Specials, Charlie Brown's 'Cyclopedia: Super Book of Questions and Answers, The Charlie Brown Dictionary, Peanuts (KaBOOM!), Passionate Peanuts, Bilingual Editions, Spanish Editions, and Also in this Collection

You can read or borrow a book if the bar underneath the cover says "Borrow" or "Read." If a book says it is "Not in Library" or "Checked Out," a copy might still be available! Click on the book's cover to see if you can borrow one of the other editions. Enjoy!

This collection is under construction. Open librarians are working on it now.

Image credits: Pigby, mliu92, and Daniel Capilla (CC BY-SA 4.0), available on Internet Archive.

Meet Charlie Schulz

Charles M. Schulz (1922 - 2000) was an American cartoonist and creator of the Peanuts comic strip (featuring the characters Charlie Brown and Snoopy, among many others). He is considered one of the most influential cartoonists of all time, cited by cartoonists such as Jim Davis, Bill Watterson, Matt Groening and Dav Pilkey.

Schulz began publishing a daily Peanuts comic strip in seven nationally syndicated newspapers on October 2, 1950. It soon became an international hit. When he announced his retirement in December 1999, Peanuts was in more than 2,600 newspapers worldwide.

Peanuts Reprint Books

Schulz's Peanuts strips were reprinted in books as early as 1952. The original books were published initially by Rinehart & Co., Inc., and later by the merged entity it became part of in 1960, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc. (HRW). The content of these books was re-issued in different editions in later years.

Original Books

The original books were 13 cm x 20 cm paperbacks, mostly in portrait format, with 124 pages of strip content: two daily strips per page (each in a 2x2 panel grid layout) or one Sunday strip per page. The first three books that collected only the Sunday strips were originally in landscape format, in order to present the complete Sunday strips. The last two Sunday collections moved to a portrait format, like the daily collections, and each Sunday strip was presented in a modified tabloid layout, in which the top right panel of the strip was included, but a portion of the same size of the top level (usually the leftmost) containing the title was omitted, so that all of the story panels were included. After the publication of two such Sunday collections, the Sunday strips were mixed with the daily strips in individual volumes. In late 1967, the original three landscape volumes were reformatted into the new vertical layout. In the 1970s, HRW printed hardcover editions for Weekly Reader Books, a company that provided books for schools; these editions were either full or reduced (96- or 76-page) versions of the originals.

Fawcett Books

The Fawcett books, published beginning in 1962 by Fawcett under its Crest imprint, and later as Fawcett Crest, reissued each original book in paperback format and in two volumes, including exactly half of the original book's contents in each volume; thus, two Fawcetts were published from each original book. When the Peanuts Parade line subsequently replaced the original line for new volumes, Fawcetts were also published from it, as well as from its successor, the Topper line of books.

Peanuts Parade

The Peanuts Parade paperbacks, published by HRW beginning in 1975, reprinted the contents of the original books. The Parade line re-issued the contents of existing original books, as well as offering new volumes for subsequent years. Each reissued volume included a complete original book, plus half of a second original book; and was "paired" with a second Parade book that began with the second half of the previous incomplete original, followed by a third complete original. Three Fawcett books were later issued from each new-content Parade book.

Peanuts Classics

The Peanuts Classics were a line of paperback re-issues of the original books and new-content Parade books published in the 1990s by the same company (now known by the name of primary parent Henry Holt) after it was no longer the company issuing new volumes. In many cases they were direct reprints of the originals (although in some instances corrupted by editorial blunders). Those original books that had been issued whole in a Parade book were put out with the Parade title, like a shortened version of the Parade book. Originals split between two Parades were issued under their original title. Parades that had new content became literally shortened versions of their original selves; these were "paired" like Original-re-issue Parades, so that the one-third left off the end of a "first" one was matched with the first third of a "second", and issued with a brand-new title, while the remaining two-thirds of the "second" was also issued as a shortened version of the original Parade. Just as with Fawcetts issued from Parade books, the last two pages of an original Parade could not be accommodated in this arrangement. Every Classics volume sported new cover design and title-page art, regardless of what its original form was.

HRW Compilations

HRW published five large-format hardback compilations. (*) including content previously reprinted, although starting with the second volume there was a small percentage of strips not previously reprinted. Later, HRW, under the new Henry Holt designation, published a smaller baseball-themed compilation entitled Big League Peanuts, from which two Fawcett volumes were also reprinted.

(*) Note that Peanuts Classics compilation was not related to the similarly named series published by Henry Holt.

Peanuts Collector Series

The Topper Books imprint of Pharos Books, owned by Scripps-Howard, the company that also owned United Feature Syndicate, resumed Peanuts reprints beginning in 1985. They were called the Peanuts Collector Series. Each volume contained approximately three-fourths of an original book, so three Fawcett volumes were published for each pair of these volumes. These were the last Fawcett volumes to be published.

Andrews McMeel Books

Andrews McMeel were next to take up Peanuts reprints, issuing two volumes of Peanuts reprints beginning in 1989. In commemoration of the 45th anniversary, a third book was published, entitled Around the World in 45 Years, including a year-long reprint section of Peanuts comic strips from from May 31, 1993 to May 29, 1994, along with a relatively brief memoir by Schulz on doing 45 years of Peanuts.

Peanuts Treasury

Between 1991 and 1994, Harper Perennial published four-volume in a line called Peanuts Treasury (unrelated to the similarly named compilation published by HRW).

Ballantine Books Peanuts

Ballantine Books was responsible for the reprints of the later years of the Peanuts comic strips (1995-2000). Five volumes were published, while the "Big Books" collected several volumes together.

The Complete Peanuts

The Complete Peanuts is a series of twenty-six volumes published by Fantagraphics that reprints all the Peanuts comic strips in chronological order. Each volume contains two years of strips, except for the first volume which includes strips from 1950 to 1952. Publication of the series began in April 2004 and ended in 2016.

English-Language Non-U.S. Peanuts Books

Snoopy Stars and Snoopy Features

Snoopy Stars was a British series of black-and-white paperback books published by Ravette beginning in 1988 (Budget published Australian versions of some of the books using a different numbering scheme). Each book focused on Snoopy in each of his various facets. Several titles in the Snoopy Stars series were reprinted in 2000-2001 as part of the Snoopy Features series.

Snoopy 2 in 1 Collection

Ravette Publishing also published in the British market the Snoopy 2 in 1 collection including eight books. Each of the books reprints two volumes of the Snoopy Features series.

Peanuts Philosophers

Hallmark issued four sets of English-language minibooks in the Peanuts Philosophers series. Each set had four books which reprint a handful of strips at one panel per page. The first set of four was translated into three other languages.

Snoopy and the Peanuts Gang

Snoopy and the Peanuts Gang was a series of horizontally oriented color volumes with reprints of the Sunday strips, with the first panel complete and in color. This series is especially appreciated by the Peanuts fans, since the standard U.S. reprint books are not in color and rarely have the complete Sunday strips.

Snoopy Snaps

Snoopy Snaps was a numbered series of Australian strip reprints published by Budget.

Snoopy Annuals

The British Snoopy annuals published by Ravette include comics mixed with articles, colored daily strips, puzzles and prose stories.

Other Books and Series

Anniversary Specials

Charlie Brown's 'Cyclopedia: Super Book of Questions and Answers

Charlie Brown's Super Book of Questions and Answers was a series of five educational books series published from 1976 to 1981. The books feature answers to questions about general knowledge featuring original comic strips based on the topic. The books were later divided into 15 shorter books by Funk & Wagnalls as Charlie Brown's 'Cyclopedia during the early 1980s, and reprinted again in 1990.

The Charlie Brown Dictionary

Inspired by The Rainbow Dictionary, World Publishing released The Charlie Brown Dictionary based on the Peanuts character including more than 2,400 entries on the basis of frequency of use by children from five to eight years old.

Peanuts (KaBOOM!)

Passionate Peanuts

Bilingual Editions

RM Enterprises published two series of Peanuts reprints in bilingual Chinese-English editions, Super Snoopy Book and Snoopy Classics series.

Spanish Editions

Carlitos (Charlie) was a series started by Ediciones Junior in 1983 with translations of the Peanuts comic strips into Spanish. When in 1999 Editorial Grijalbo (owner of Ediciones Junior) disappeared, Norma Editorial continued publishing the series with a slight variation in the title, which became Snoopy y Carlitos.

Also in this Collection

LINKS (outside Open Library)

• Charles M. Schulz Museum. Located in Santa Rosa, California, the Charles M. Schulz Museum is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that is dedicated to the preservation, display, and interpretation of the life and art of Peanuts comic strip creator, Charles M. Schulz.
  
• Peanuts Wiki. A collaborative encyclopedia for everything related to the lovable characters created by Charles M. Schulz, with sister wikis in Chinese, German, Italian, Polish and Spanish.
  
• Peanuts Book Collector Guide. An organized listing of the wide variety of Peanuts and Schulz books published in the United States, published in English in other countries, and some books from other countries.

Want to donate a physical book to make it borrowable? See the Internet Archive Book Drive.

Curated by Open Librarians. Includes content from *Peanuts Wiki* published under CC BY-SA.