Graphic Novel

A Contract with God by Will Eisner, is often considered the first “Graphic Novel”.  I don't really understand this, as to me it was more of a picture book consisting of a few short stories, rather than something that's using the standard comic devices and using it more in a novel format.  This however is merely a dispute in classification, because regardless of what you call A Contract with God, it's an undeniably great piece of art and writing.

Eisner's comics often times seem to read as a sort of still frame of a movie, stopped to show specific actions, giving it a polished storyboard feel.  His art is absolutely brilliant, as you can see in the below frame where he takes away everything in the background that is unimportant and shows only what the subject is doing.  He is able to depict all of the emotion through the character's slumped over body language and the feeling of almost being just overcome by the torrential down pour that's flooding the street.  Another thing worth mentioning is his amazing use of type;  Each page seems like a design where he weaves the type into the picture.  Sometimes he just uses expressive typeface changes or deliberate sizing changes to portray a certain emotion or sometimes he makes it a little more illustrative to blend it with the drawing which can also be shown in the picture below.

Blankets by Craig Thompson was an interesting read.  It's definitely appealing to most people because of the sense of familiarity and connection humans have with their first love.  I think it's definitely a realistic approach to a first relationship, having the couple realize that they aren't perfect for each other and by the end of the novel go their separate ways.  This isn't always the case obviously, as “storybook endings” are a possibility, but this outcome is more of a probability.  I wasn't particularly a fan of how abrupt the story ended since it was really well fleshed out until that moment and I would've liked to have seen a little more craft to the end.  It was speculated in class that this was an error on the author's behalf, and he most likely spent too many pages in the beginning and didn't pace it correctly for the publisher's restrictions, and I think this is probably the case. Thompson definitely has a gift for prose, not ever wasting a single word, keeping things to a very minimalistic narrative, but still giving the reader a deep understanding.  This transfers into his art too, effortlessly transitioning between panels.  One of my favorite devices that he employs is when depicting flashbacks it never really says it's a flashback but you can instantly tell through his use of imagery what's happening and that you've been transferred to a different time in the protagonist's life.

Overall, I think this week's reading has been the most satisfying so far, with the introduction of the graphic novel, my personal favorite comic format.