“The mind of man is not unlike a rubber band.”

Splash page for "The Rubber Band," originally published in the Spirit Section, June 23, 1946. Reprinted in The Spirit Coloring Book, 1974

I’ve had the above metaphorical image of a head exploding due to excess stress in my own head since receiving The Spirit Coloring Book for Christmas in 1974. (Is my head the only one filled with exploding heads? I’ll probably never be able to erase from my mind the image of John Cassavetes’ head exploding in De Palma’s The Fury, not to mention the exploding head  from Croenberg’s Scanners. Whose head is next?)

I might have added Eisner’s image to my page of favorite quotes, but perhaps you will agree with me that the image is so strong it deserves its own page.

Interestingly, three years after “The Rubber Band” was published, a film was released that begins with a prologue that is strikingly similar to Eisner’s splash page.

"Tension" (1949) Directed by John Berry; written by Allen Rivkin, John D. Klorer and John Berry; produced by Robert Sisk at MGM.

Let’s hope that our own heads will not be exploding anytime soon.