Comics

2007 was the year I rediscovered comics. From the library I borrowed and read most of Eisner's works, Marjane Satrapi's "Persepolis", Art Spiegelman's "Maus" and the Lone Wolf and Cub series. On my own, I bought comics of which some are shown above. Most of these are not superhero comics; they are little stories of everyday life, except for the political journalism of Joe Sacco (top). A good survey of these type of comics is found in the latest "Best American Comics 2007", edited by Chris Ware (bottom panel). Most of these gentle aimless stories tend to be autobiographical, and some can be unbelievably shallow. But they were perhaps following the foot steps of Spiegelman, Satrapi, Craig Thomson, Robert Crumbs, etc, artist who had bigger themes and more concerned with the "truth" than the "I". Yet, when it works, like Alison Bechdel's extract from "Fun House" (second last panel), the effect can be magical, poignant, funny and even literary. This is a growing medium. It takes too much trouble and effort to do them, as I tried to do during the March holidays, but thankfully, not that hard to enjoy them.

Chup