Redartz: Hello again, folks! Like you, I've spent many years reading innumerable books, magazines, and comic books. In the case of comics, my younger years were spent with newsprint adventures of Spider-Man, Batman, Archie, and many others. But during those years, I never really thought of comics as more than (very enjoyable, and at times very literate) entertainment. In 1978, however, something quite new got my attention: that something was a 'graphic novel'. Not a collection of comic books or strips, but a single ,self-contained 'novel' of comic art and story. Comics icon Will Eisner, in that year, released a book called "A Contract With God"; representing a fundamental shift in the way comics art could be viewed.A brief digression: what I'm referring to today are graphic novels created initially in that specific format, as opposed to those comprised of the collected contents of previously-published material. No disrespect to those, of course. Among them are some of the greatest comic novels ever published: Maus, Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Watchmen, Bone, and so on...
So having read, and loved, Eisner's "Spirit" stories, I decided to give this new storytelling venture of his a look. It turned out to be a good decision; the book was phenomenal. A powerful, at times painful, at times hilarious, set of tales; blending Eisner's masterful storytelling with his ground-breaking artwork. As a reader, I was gobsmacked: here were all the familiar elements of comic books, put to a serious, adult format. Eisner had long discussed the concept of comics as art, and here was that concept in concrete form (indeed, Eisner preferred the term "sequential art" to "comics").
In subsequent years, I grabbed up many other 'graphic novels', including Marvel's first entry into the field: Jim Starlin's "Death of Captain Marvel". And though the subject matter was superheroic, the
story itself was much deeper. Again, the 'graphic novel' format allowed for an expansion of theme, and the opportunity for creators such as Starlin to explore some meatier fare than standard four color comics generally allowed. Not tied into the continuity of monthly comics, a graphic novel could present powerful stand-alone stories with familiar characters (X-Men: God Loves, Man Kills) or material from totally divergent genre (say, DC's Science Fiction Graphic Novels). The graphic novel format has , over the last three decades, expanded the potential audience for comics art and has included biographies, humor stories, horror, history, and any genre you could name. Looking over my bookshelf, I am certain that Eisner was right; comics can be as potent, and effective, as any other medium for artistic and social expression.
Which brings us to the discussion for today: when did you discover the Graphic Novel? What was your first; your favorite? Do you agree with Eisner regarding the creative potential of the medium? If not, what is your assessment of comics as graphic novels? Pull your best ones 'off the bookshelf' and tell us about them...
9 comments:
I've read two English graphic novels: Maus and one that Edo recommended on the Balkan Wars. Both were quite good. But in my mind what distinguishes them from comic books was simply that they did not involve costumed characters and were about real life.
The question I would have though is whether a character like Tin Tin would be considered a graphic novel or comic or something else? IT was published in an oversize format in hard and then eventually soft cover. If you consider it a graphic novel, then I've read a ton of French graphic novels like Tin Tin, Asterix, and a slew of one-offs. That particular type of book is/was highly prized and widely read in France. Were you to walk into a department store you would easily find a good hundred on sale.
Actually, now that I think about it, on one of my vacations in France there was a Graphic Novel convention taking place and the guest of honor was Jacque Chirac, the President of France! Talk about legitimizing the comic form!
Yes, as a German, I really admire and envy the French for their comic culture. The mainstream German culture has still a problem accepting comics as an art form. My first comics were actually Asterix and Tintin, years before I read a Marvel Comic. Asterix is probably the only "accepted" comic art in Germany, even though the "art" is really not that impressing. But Asterix is educational and that is what counts and what makes it a "good" comic in Germany I think.
Yeah, the French take their BD very seriously, and there's lots to choose from: Tintin, Asterix, Blueberry (if you like Westerns), Adele Blanc-Sec, Blake and Mortimer, Corto Maltese ... plus sci-fi, fantasy, war, roman policier, and pretty much every other genre you can think of.
I was aware of the Marvel Graphic Novels as a kid, but my local drugstore didn't sell them so it was years before I read one. Some are great (Death of Captain Marvel, Parallel Lives), some are mediocre, and some are just plain boring.
Even stuff like Maus was originally serialized (in its case in RAW) so even stuff we think of as a graphic novel (i.e. self-contained) isn't. Also, despite being drawn with anthropomorphized mice and other animals, it is based on a real life retelling and thus is not a "novel" at all, since novels are fiction.
In fact, Contract with God is really a collection of graphic novellas!
Some very popular "graphic novels" like Persepolis and Fun Home are also not novels at all, but memoirs!
Though it breaks the "rules" of this post, the first graphic novel I can remember reading is Dark Knight Returns. Sure it was a collected serialized series, but I only ever read it in that form, and it (like Dickens, considered a novelist, despite writing in serial format) self-contained and fiction.
If we must stick to the rules, then um. . . shit. I don't know which was my first (if I discount Maus on that account). Maybe "God Loves Man Kills" or Stuck Rubber Baby.
As for the "graphic novel" nomenclature, as you can probably tell, I am not a huge fan because it is used with too little precision and often used in that way in a misguided attempt to lend legitimacy to comics. They are ALL comics. "Graphic novel" is just a kind of comic.
My first Graphic Novel was "The Death of Captain Marvel" and after that I was hooked on the concept of comics as "real" novels. I bought pretty much all the other Marvel graphic novels that came out around that time like "God Loves, Man Kills", "New Mutants", "Spider-Man: Spirits of the Earth", and etc.. Comics are pretty much my favorite medium (even over movies) and I love the idea of novels presented in that format. Nowadays, pretty much any compiled TPB or HC collection of a run of comic issues is dubbed a graphic novel, which is fine with me. Anything that gets "comics" more mainstream exposure is a good thing, IMO.
One of my personal favorite non-superhero themed graphic novels is a book called "Pyongyang: A Journey in North Korea" by Guy Delisle. It's a first hand account by a French cartoonist working in North Korea in the 1990's, and his observations of the extremely odd and eccentric way of life he observed while in the country. It's a humorous, fascinating and sometimes unbelievable read, and it's especially poignant in this day and age. I highly recommend it.
Thank you for joining in today, everyone!
Charlie- as William noted, these days any collection of comic story and art as labelled a 'graphic novel', so I'd say Tintin and Asterix certainly qualify in that regard. And Chirac at a convention? I'd love to have attended that one...
Chim- thanks for your comments on the German view. I too salute the French for their enthusiasm for the medium. Granted, I'm sadly ill-informed on specifics regarding the status of comics in various cultures and societies, thus I'm always gratified to hear from those of you who can shed some light on that subject.
Mike W.- you raise a good point about the accessibility of graphic novels in the early days. Outside of comics specialty shops, and some bookstores,their availability was limited. Thankfully that's not so much the case now. Our local public library has an amazing graphic novel section.
Dr.O- fear not, we don't adhere too strictly to 'rules' here, especially regarding labeling books such as "Maus" as graphic novels. In that case, the original stories appearing in "Raw" were so challenging to acquire, many of us would never have had the chance to read them all had they not been collected. The same goes for "Bone", and for "Y:The Last Man", and many others. Perhaps presenting such serialized stories in one (or a series of) volumes is a case of the result being greater than the sum of it's parts...
William- you mention that comics are your favorite medium; I couldn't agree more. However they are labeled, whatever the genre, the combination of story and artwork that defines 'comics' is an immensely satisfying one, capable of addressing any area of life and culture that any other medium could.
And thanks for the tip on "Pyongyang". Sounds like one to look for.
The first time I came across the term 'graphic novel' was when Death of Captain Marvel came out. The first ones I read were a few of the Marvel GN line: God Loves, Man Kills, New Mutants, Star Slammers, Futurians, etc. (I only read Death of CM later).
Otherwise, some great stuff has been mentioned above (you can't go wrong with Eisner or Marjane Satrapi for that matter), but here's a few more I would can warmly recommend (which I may have mentioned before):
The Professor's Daughter, the Rabbi's Cat (2 vols.) and Vampire Loves by Joann Sfar, all very well done and delightfully entertaining, and, if you want something really serious but still very good and moving, there's Deogratias (subtitled A Tale of Rwanda) by Jean-Philippe Stassen. Both of these guys work on the rightfully lauded French scene.
I also wanted to give a shout-out to some children's and/or YA material, like City of Spies by Susan Kim and Laurence Klavan and, especially, the thoroughly enjoyable Zita the Spacegirl trilogy by Ben Hatke.
I felt like “The Death of Captain Marvel” and “God Loves, Man Kills” were my beginning of reading the “graphic novel” format and I still own both and remember them fondly…
My most recent “novel” read was “Fun Home” and recommend it highly despite its being called a “memoir”, a lot of novels ‘can’ be memoirs.
One of the ones that resonates with me to this day is “Stuck Rubber Baby” … artist/writer Howard Cruise’s tour-de-force exploration of being gay and racism during the 1960s in the southern United States in the midst of the Civil Rights Movement.
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