If watching cartoons is my first passion (and it is), then reading about animation holds a very close second place in my heart. I'm an information junkie and have been collecting books and data about cartoons for over 25 years (yikes!). I have also been lucky enough to contribute to the animation information collective with some books of my own.

So, which ones are the absolute best books through which to explore the world of animation?

That's a common question at AWN and this piece is an attempt at an answer. Of course, it all depends on what kind of information you are seeking. Animation Histories or Encyclopedias? Animator Biographies? How to Animate?

Here are my picks for each:

Leonard Maltin's Of Mice & Magic is one-stop shopping for American animation history.

Animation History
Leonard Maltin's Of Mice & Magic (Plume) is one-stop shopping for American animation history. Twelve chapters covering each animation studio of Hollywood's golden age with complete filmographies will answer most of your basic questions of who did what and when in classic cartoons. To go a little further in depth on each studio, I highly recommend the following: Steve Schneider's That's All Folks! (Henry Holt) for a lavishly illustrated and closer look at Warner Bros. cartoons, Leslie Cabarga's The Fleischer Story (DaCapo) for the tale behind Betty Boop, Popeye, and Gulliver's Travels, and Maltin's own The Disney Films (Hyperion) and Kaufman & Merrit's Walt In Wonderland (John Hopkins University Press) for the complete story on the Disney studio.

The Simpsons: A Complete Guide to Our Favorite Family is an excellent episode guide.

Just the Facts, Ma'am
Encyclopedias are collections of factual data, and no library of animation is complete without them. My own Looney Tunes & Merrie Melodies: A Complete Illustrated Guide To The Warner Bros. Cartoons (Henry Holt), written with Will Friedwald, lists everything the Warner studio made from 1930-1989; Television Cartoon Shows, 1949-1993 (McFarland) by Hal Erickson is a well-written overview of TV cartoon history. George Woolery fills in another gap with Animated TV Specials 1962-87 (Scarecrow), while Dennis Gifford provides us two excellent reference volumes, American Animated Films: The Silent Era 1897-1929 (McFarland) and British Animated Films 1895-1985 (McFarland). Another good print reference is The Whole Toon Catalog (Facets) which lists almost every animation video tape & disc currently available. New reference books appear each year, and the recent The Simpsons: A Complete Guide to Our Favorite Family (HarperPerennial), Disney A to Z (Hyperion) by Dave Smith and The Enchanted World Of Rankin/Bass (Tiger Mountain Press) by Rick Goldschmidt are excellent additions to any animation library.