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Comic Books That Need a Bookmark

The New York Times has an article on the recent surge in popularity of graphic novels.  Surely if you’ve stepped into a bookstore recently you’ve noticed that there’s likely a shelf freshly catering to graphic novels and other alternative comi(x)cs… But like the author of the article states, although this shelf is usually found at some distance from the cartoon-and-humour section, as if to place greater artistic merit on them, they are still obviously stocked and shelved by someone not out of love, interest, and knowledge, but because “hey these graphic novel things are hot right now… we should sell some.” So invariably, amidst the choice picks of Chris Ware, Seth, Chester Brown, and Art Spiegelman, you’ll also find some misplaced Spider-Man comics, illustrated Star Wars books, and the Manga—can’t forget all that Manga.

The article deals with the former—those who suffer through the creation of this artform alone, sharing their own personal stories through their drawing. Check out the author’s description of the type of person who creates graphic novels (graphic novelists?):

For those who do stick with it, the career of the graphic novelist can seem less a choice than a compulsion. The process of becoming one goes something like this: First there’s a conversion moment, which happens at a remarkably young age, usually when the artist is still in grammar school. To put it simply, he falls in love with a comic strip—fairly often it’s ‘’Peanuts’’—and then with comics in general. Soon he’s copying them, and then he’s generating his own. In high school, where this artist, a nerd, most likely, and an outcast, is unrecognized for the talent he is, cartooning becomes a refuge, a way to work out revenge fantasies and occasionally even a modest claim to fame.

More of the same in college or art school—if he even bothers with formal training. Cartooning is now an obsession, a visual diary in which the artist records every detail of his personal life, with a special emphasis on his sexual fantasies and his usually excessive masturbation, and then at some point, if he is lucky, he figures out how to turn all this rage and depression and thwarted energy, all those pages and pages of sketches and drawings, into storytelling, into a portrait of the artist as a young man.

It painfully hits home, perhaps not because of its truthfulness, but because it actually describes so many people (Seth, Joe Matt, Chris Ware, R. Crumb, to name a few) that perhaps it feels like a sad cliche (sort of like how serial killers all seem to have the same fatherless, animal-mutilating, pornography-filled childhoods) .  But the saving grace of this cliche cartoonists’ childhood, I suppose, is that the resulting art is anything but unoriginal. Be sure to watch the article’s multimedia peresentation to see the work of and listen to Seth, Chester Brown, Joe Sacco, Chris Ware, and Art Spiegelman.  Once again Chris Ware is practically apologizing for even existing (he describes comics as unbuoyant, brittle, and clattery, and I can’t be certain, but I think it’s his way of saying, “comics are dumb").

It’s been a long while since I’ve done any real comics myself, and this rush of the medium’s popularity is very inspiring.  I suppose, however, the only thing stopping me is writer’s block.  I am certain I don’t want to make another depressing young man’s autobiography—mostly because, in addition to it having been done already, contrary to my profession’s demographics, I’m actually quite happy.

Maybe that’s the problem.  Am I too happy to be creative?  Does real art only come to those who suffer?  Maybe I need to masturbate more…