Fun Home

The latest edition of the London Graphic Novel Network is now up. I've written about Fun Home ages ago, and I don't say a lot of new things, but the other reactions are worth reading. My bit below:

It's telling that Bechdel explains explicitly why [the literary allusions] are used:

"I employ these allusions not only as descriptive devices, but because my parents are most real to me in fictional terms. And perhaps my cool aesthetic distance itself does more to convey the arctic climate of our family than any particular literary comparison"

I say "telling" because each allusion Bechdel uses is ALSO explicitly explained. Fun Home isn't like rounds of Radio 4's Quote Unquote where you are quizzed on your literary knowledge. It's not a game of spot the reference, because Bechdel always does the work for you and gives you all the answers. Which is why some ppl can read it and not even be fazed by its uber-literate stylo. And her attitude is the opposite of haughty. Instead she describes the habit almost as a tic - and the reasons behind it are actually (when you read the above) q sad.

I almost get the sense that the references are involuntary - an abnormal, almost pathological way to engage with the world. I like to draw a link with the obsessive compulsive disorder Bechdel develops and then overcomes when she's 10. There is a sense in Fun Home that literature becomes about asserting control of a reality that is in fact ~beyond~ your control. Developing links and patterns to your experiences is a way to digest and understand them, and there is a comfort and satisfaction to that very similar to counting things and coming to an even number.

That for me is the central insight in the book, and why I think it's so brilliant.

A Room Of One's Own

You fall in love with Virginia Woolf as you read this -- so funny, so wise, so humane. The argument is a simple one: only when women can afford a room of their own will they be able to write good fiction. What interests me particularly is Woolf's idea of what good fiction is. She thinks patriarchy disfigures the writing of women of talent -- the bitterness it provokes makes the author impose herself on her work. The novel becomes a piece of 'self-expression' rather than art. And what makes fiction art? The ability Shakespeare and Jane Austen had, of removing themselves from their work, and letting their characters speak for themselves.

This poses a problem for me. My two favourite novelists are James Joyce and George Eliot, and what I like about them is precisely that they put so much of themselves into the stories they write. In terms of graphic novels too, what I have most responded to is autobiographical work: Blankets, Fun Home, Maus (although I wouldn't really want to read the latter again). I'm sure that if I ever do write any kind of fiction, I would naturally gravitate towards this kind of brutally honest, redemptively embarrasing stuff. Would it be bad art as a result? For me, it is the kind of art that moves me most.

Fun Home

You know what, autobiography has to be honest. You have to rip your guts out to do it right. That's why Fun Home is so powerful. I loved it very very much.

Was particularly impressed with the perfect way Bechdel evokes the fun-eral atmosphere within her family. You could breathe it. I didn't think the detached, self-analysing tone was distant or unfeeling. That's what growing up in such an environment would feel like. And the reference-heavy narration didn't obfuscate. As Bechdel says herself -- that's the only way she could make sense of her family. In such arctic conditions, literature would be the only source of answers and solace.

And in any case, the book teaches you how to read as you read it -- spotting patterns, similarities, contrasts. Making comparisons. Creating binaries. Building a matrix of meaning out of those binaries. I approach literature in a similar obsessive-compulsive way (see here). On a baseline level, reading can be about crafting these satisfying little logical systems to make you feel in control, enlightened, better.

And wasn't the cartooning great? The mood and attitude of the characters was communicated with an immediacy words cannot keep up with. With one panel, Bechdel can say everything.

And, of course, it's all about growing up -- freeing yourself from the straitjacket of home and family, and creating your own identity. I didn't know much about most of the authors referenced (Wilde, Fitzgerald, Proust among others), but the riff on Joyce at the end completely captivated me. Yes! This is Bechdel's Portrait of the Artist and Ulysses rolled into one. With pictures! I can't ask for anything more.