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E-book Comics and the Body : Drawing, Reading, and Vulnerability

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Penilaian

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he book deals with the everyday activities of a comic book artist called Miriam, and the process of her learning to accept that her son plans to settle in Germany, a country that she still associates with the Holocaust and her childhood traumas. I remember marveling at the courage Katin has in drawing caricatures of herself, showing the character that stands for her in a series of unflattering situations, like freaking out at the sight of cockroaches. Katin representing Miriam occasionally almost as a witch, with ridiculous uncombed hair, big bulging eyes, and in an old-school nightgown. What irony, I thought. The narrative is equally honest and uncompromising about the preju-dices of the old hag in a nightie. But I was not prepared to see the naked body of the protagonist of this confessional narrative covered in her own excrement. I winced. The scene is in full color and is long, almost longer than one can bear. Why is this such a challenge to bear? What is happening to my body while I am reading that book, that scene? How does this address by the artist change my approach to the remaining parts of the story? Why is Katin doing this? Was she not afraid to draw herself like that? Is it a unique gesture or is it part of a strategy? How does such a representation relate to the tradition of self- representation in comics and to the ways cartoonists commu-nicate with their readers? By focusing on ways in which the activities of the body are crucial to making and reading comics, this book explores comics as a dialogue between artists and readers. At the heart of a dynamic and medi-ated interaction between artists and readers we find the body: Com-ics are made by expressive lines that mark the unison of movement and thinking, and they are interpreted not simply visually, but also by and via the reader’s body. The chapters of this book explore how this embodied dialogue takes place in contemporary nonfiction com-ics: These comics usually have a first- person character or narrator, and they assert to reveal someone’s personal account or experience of reality. This relationship of nonfiction comics to events of reality, together with the essentially embodied nature of both drawing and reading comics, invites the last keyword of my approach: vulnerabil-ity. I show that drawing, reading, and the interaction enabled by non-fiction comics are rooted in, and offer means to find out more about, the experience of being vulnerable.

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Ketersediaan

Informasi Detail

Judul Seri

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No. Panggil

741.5 SZE c

Penerbit

USA : The Ohio State University Press., 2020

Deskripsi Fisik

220 hlm

Bahasa

English

ISBN/ISSN

9780814214541

Klasifikasi

741.5

Tipe Isi

text

Tipe Media

computer

Tipe Pembawa

online resource

Edisi

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Subjek

Cartoons, Caricatures, Comics Drawings

Info Detail Spesifik

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Pernyataan Tanggungjawab

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Versi lain/terkait

Lampiran Berkas

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