A comic drawn by Bob Monkhouse in which a superhero battles giant penises? Yes, it’s all here

Fwoooosh! That, were someone to write a strip about it, would be the sound of a thousand comic books going up in flames. They used to do that, you know; burn comics. It was mostly in America, in the late 1940s, after these DayGlo fictions, with their monsters and superheroes and suggestive curves, were declared bad for children’s health. But it spread to Britain too. Parents and teachers would search drawers and desks. Any comics they found would be gathered in small piles outside. A responsible adult would pull out some matches. And then, like I said: fwoooosh!

Of course, comics are now treated with greater respect. Whether it’s the deluge of superhero movies or the magnificent awards bestowed upon graphic novels such as Dotter of Her Father’s Eyes, this is no longer an ars non grata. It has even got to the point where the British Library is hosting a summer-long exhibition entitled Comics Unmasked.