I haven’t always been the huge comic book nerd I am today. At school I devoured novels in good, proper, long-form prose with the best of them. It wasn’t until I left school, left home, and went to University that a friend introduced me to Sandman (at that time a series more than 10 years old) and I fell in love with the medium. The rest is, as they say, history. Years later and I am still a self-confessed, card-holding comic book geek.
Before I came to BGS, I never examined why comics appealed to me so strongly, but part of my remit in the Library has been to grow the graphic novel collection, and this warranted a certain amount of reflection. If nothing else, I needed something to say when sceptical parents and teachers raised an eyebrow!
Critics of the medium (you know who you are!!) are wont to claim that graphic novels are for lazy people. They suggest that comics are easier and faster to read and so don’t count as real books. This never rang true with me as it is completely at odds with my own experiences; I have always been a strong reader who enjoys traditional prose and yet I love comics as well. I’ve thought long and hard about their argument and have concluded it’s just plain rubbish. But what’re you going to do? Haters gonna hate.
So here are my reasons. The things I love about comics and the reason why I’ve been so relentless in my efforts to grow BGS Library’s collection. I hope they might ring true with some of you, and that they might convince others to give the medium a go:
Comics have their own vocabulary. In much the same way as poetry has rhythm and shape, comics have a set of devices and conventions that can enhance a story and really help convey the feeling of a moment in a way more resonant than all but the best prose. An awkward family moment in A Game for Swallows (below) illustrates my point perfectly. Repetitive panels convey the painfully slow passage of time and, when shown this way, the reader can more easily sympathise with the feeling and involve themselves in the story.
The visual nature of graphic novels is also perfectly suited to metaphor. One image can make complex situations and internal conflicts clear, where words might over-labour the point or fail to convey meaning altogether. For example, the panel below from Art Spiegelman’s seminal holocaust story MAUS where the artist portrays himself wearing a mouse mask (in his story the Jewish people are shown as mice and the Nazis as cats) speaks volumes on his complex feelings about his own identity. Similarly, when Neil Gaiman shows Lyta Hall’s descent into madness in the final arc of Sandman, the juxtaposition of panels showing her meeting figures of Greek myth and ones showing her wandering the streets in ragged clothes elegantly convey the incongruity of her inner and outer lives. Both of these examples could, I feel, only have been conveyed as effectively in graphic form.
The unconverted often claim that graphic novels are no fun because ‘they don’t let you imagine’. On the contrary, I believe they encourage the reader’s imagination, but not just in terms of the visual. If you get all your readerly pleasure from imagining how the characters and settings look, then perhaps graphic novels aren’t for you. But I love the way graphic novels encourage you to imagine. The boring details of what characters look like are already provided for you so you can concentrate on what’s really interesting. What is going unsaid between two characters, what exactly a raised eyebrow or popped hip could mean, what is happening just beyond the edges of the panel? My imagination goes into overdrive when I read comics, filling-in the gaps between panels and pages.
Finally, I should say a word about the artwork that brings the author’s words to life. It’s true that the quality of graphic novel art can vary wildly from the sublime to the mediocre, but when they get it right, you’re in store for something really special. A great artist can convey so much about a character just by their stance and can set a mood it would take pages upon pages of prose to express. And the best thing? The art is ever-present, prompting you not to forget these details of character and setting as the story progresses. A fantastic example of this is the manga series Vampire Knight. If you haven't heard of it, it’s about a school for both vampires and humans, policed by a boy and girl who must be constantly vigilant to prevent a massacre. The problems these students face are quite grown-up and it would be easy to forget the central tragedy, that they are still children. Thanks to the stylised art, well-drawn uniforms and gothic schoolyard setting, this fact is ever-present for the reader. There are hundreds of other examples I could give where the sheer quality of the art is reason enough to love the book.
Helping to expand the Library’s Graphic Novel collection and talking to you all about your favourite titles has been one of my personal highlights this year at BGS. Although I am moving on at the end of this term, I know that your enthusiasm, and that of the Library team, will drive you onward in your own literary journeys. Thanks to the fantastic Library team for a most excellent year and thanks to you all for keeping me entertained!
If you are yet to be converted to the graphic medium then do yourself a favour and give one a go this Summer. You don’t know what you’re missing. And if you’re already a fan, then do everyone else a favour and let them know why you love graphic novels.
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Mr Hancock