{"id":11662,"date":"2022-08-29T07:30:55","date_gmt":"2022-08-29T11:30:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stephenbarkley.com\/?p=11662"},"modified":"2022-07-14T20:04:59","modified_gmt":"2022-07-15T00:04:59","slug":"true-believer-abraham-riesman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stephenbarkley.com\/2022\/08\/29\/true-believer-abraham-riesman\/","title":{"rendered":"True Believer | Abraham Riesman"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/3Kecyhc\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-11663\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/stephenbarkley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/91g1X221inL-e1650854043832.jpg?resize=200%2C308&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"The cover of Riesman's True Believer\" width=\"200\" height=\"308\" \/><\/a>They say you should never meet your heroes.<\/p>\n<p>Stan Lee is a hero to many. Born Stanley Martin Lieber (1922\u20132018), he is most famous for creating the Marvel characters that populate the MCU\u2014Spider-Man, Hulk, Thor, and Iron Man, to name a few. He has endeared himself to fans through his ubiquitous cameos in MCU films.<\/p>\n<p>The problem is, no one is really sure to what extent Stan Lee actually created all those characters. Artists Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko actually drew the panels and, due to the \u201cMarvel Method,\u201d may actually have had a more substantial role in creating the characters than Stan Lee himself.<\/p>\n<p>In <em>True Believer<\/em>, Abraham Riesman takes an unflinching look at Stan Lee, revealing a man who excelled at self-promotion with few moral qualms. Lying was second nature, as Riesman\u2019s investigative works proves. In the end, Stan Lee drove away friends, was preyed upon by his family, and failed repeatedly in business. The second half of his life was consumed with lawsuits and investigations.<\/p>\n<p>With great power comes great responsibility\u2014but what if that power was generated through little more than self-aggrandizement and luck? Stan Lee\u2019s biography leads the reader to question the cost of fame.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p class=\"hangingindent\">Riesman, Abraham. <em>True Believer: The Rise and Fall of Stan Lee<\/em>. Crown, 2021.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>They say you should never meet your heroes. Stan Lee is a hero to many. Born Stanley Martin Lieber (1922\u20132018), he is most famous for creating the Marvel characters that populate the MCU\u2014Spider-Man, Hulk, Thor, and Iron Man, to name a few. He has endeared himself to fans through his ubiquitous cameos in MCU films. The problem is, no one is really sure to what extent Stan Lee actually created all those characters. Artists Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko actually drew the panels and, due to the \u201cMarvel Method,\u201d may actually have had a more substantial role in creating the characters than Stan Lee himself. In True Believer, Abraham Riesman takes an unflinching look at Stan Lee, revealing a man who excelled at self-promotion with few moral qualms. Lying was second nature, as Riesman\u2019s investigative works proves. In the end, Stan Lee drove away friends, was preyed upon by his [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11663,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[430,15],"tags":[3269,2504,3126,2601,2604,2602],"class_list":["post-11662","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-biography","category-books","tag-abraham-riesman","tag-comics","tag-crown","tag-marvel","tag-spider-man","tag-stan-lee"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>True Believer | Abraham Riesman - Stephen Barkley<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/stephenbarkley.com\/2022\/08\/29\/true-believer-abraham-riesman\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"True Believer | Abraham Riesman - Stephen Barkley\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"They say you should never meet your heroes. Stan Lee is a hero to many. Born Stanley Martin Lieber (1922\u20132018), he is most famous for creating the Marvel characters that populate the MCU\u2014Spider-Man, Hulk, Thor, and Iron Man, to name a few. He has endeared himself to fans through his ubiquitous cameos in MCU films. The problem is, no one is really sure to what extent Stan Lee actually created all those characters. Artists Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko actually drew the panels and, due to the \u201cMarvel Method,\u201d may actually have had a more substantial role in creating the characters than Stan Lee himself. In True Believer, Abraham Riesman takes an unflinching look at Stan Lee, revealing a man who excelled at self-promotion with few moral qualms. Lying was second nature, as Riesman\u2019s investigative works proves. In the end, Stan Lee drove away friends, was preyed upon by his [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/stephenbarkley.com\/2022\/08\/29\/true-believer-abraham-riesman\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Stephen Barkley\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/StephenDBarkley\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/StephenDBarkley\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2022-08-29T11:30:55+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-07-15T00:04:59+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/stephenbarkley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/91g1X221inL-e1650854043832.jpg?fit=200%2C308&ssl=1\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"308\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Stephen Barkley\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Stephen Barkley\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/stephenbarkley.com\/2022\/08\/29\/true-believer-abraham-riesman\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/stephenbarkley.com\/2022\/08\/29\/true-believer-abraham-riesman\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Stephen Barkley\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/stephenbarkley.com\/#\/schema\/person\/cbaba12b06deff97c6dce1f38d94201c\"},\"headline\":\"True Believer | Abraham Riesman\",\"datePublished\":\"2022-08-29T11:30:55+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2022-07-15T00:04:59+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/stephenbarkley.com\/2022\/08\/29\/true-believer-abraham-riesman\/\"},\"wordCount\":218,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/stephenbarkley.com\/#\/schema\/person\/cbaba12b06deff97c6dce1f38d94201c\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/stephenbarkley.com\/2022\/08\/29\/true-believer-abraham-riesman\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/stephenbarkley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/91g1X221inL-e1650854043832.jpg?fit=200%2C308&ssl=1\",\"keywords\":[\"Abraham Riesman\",\"comics\",\"Crown\",\"Marvel\",\"Spider-Man\",\"Stan Lee\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Biography\",\"Book Reviews\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/stephenbarkley.com\/2022\/08\/29\/true-believer-abraham-riesman\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/stephenbarkley.com\/2022\/08\/29\/true-believer-abraham-riesman\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/stephenbarkley.com\/2022\/08\/29\/true-believer-abraham-riesman\/\",\"name\":\"True Believer | Abraham Riesman - 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