What's your secret identity?

Just re-reading an article by Michael Chabon in the New Yorker. Similar to Tolkien's notion of the usefulness of 'fairy stories,' Chabon does an excellent job of arguing for the use of superheroes in particular and stories in general, as they relate to our own lives and sense of ourselves. I've heard that during times of economic downturn, comic books flourish -- though as Chabon argues, perhaps this 'escapism' is more a form of self-renewal...