{"id":759,"date":"2009-04-28T09:59:37","date_gmt":"2009-04-28T14:59:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/?p=759"},"modified":"2009-04-28T09:59:37","modified_gmt":"2009-04-28T14:59:37","slug":"graphic-self-deception","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/?p=759","title":{"rendered":"Graphic Self-deception"},"content":{"rendered":"

I have to admit I was a little resistant to this week’s reading, not to do to the form of the graphic novel, but because of the subject matter regarding 9\/11.\u00a0 Like many others, I have trauma fatigue and-still one administration later-remain a little nauseous from the transformation of tragedy into an excuse for fear-mongering and little American flags.\u00a0 That said, I feel that the two texts, read together, accomplish something that would have been impossible singularly-they act as foils to one another.\u00a0 Anthony Lappe and Dan Goldman’s Shooting War<\/span> attempts to personalize a war on foreign soil to the American reader; whereas Art Spiegelman’s In the Shadow of No Towers<\/span> depersonalizes terrorism in the United States.\u00a0 To that end, the styles of illustrations complement each.\u00a0 As other have noted in their blogs, Shooting War<\/span> blended graphic design, photography, and drawings to create a blended reality (not quite a comic strip, not quite a computer generated image, not quite a hand-sketch).\u00a0 Conversely, In the Shadow of No Towers<\/span> withdraws from reality, adopting nostalgic forms from the comic strip tradition.\u00a0 The former defamiliarizes, whereas the later one soothes and orients [the implied American reader].<\/p>\n

As complements, In the Shadow of No Towers<\/span> and Shooting War<\/span> represents responses to trauma-one first-hand, over a short period of time, the second abstracted and extended over time.\u00a0 As Jimmy Burns states in the beginning of Shooting War<\/span>, “But that asshole was right about a couple things.\u00a0 Not all the dime store Hegel, but the part about my stupid blog.\u00a0 It wasn’t changing shit… I did need action.\u00a0 I couldn’t shake the rush.\u00a0 It was like noting I had ever felt.”\u00a0 Anthony Lappe and Dan Goldman underscore the adrenaline-rush call-to-action that many experience after a trauma-the knee jerk reaction to do something.\u00a0 In the Shadow of No Towers<\/span>, however, parodies that response-extended over years of tangerine-coded threat levels-to which there is no clear resolution.\u00a0 In one of his strips, one of his characters admits, “…maybe I really want<\/strong> the world to end, to vindicate the fears I felt back on 9\/11!\u00a0 May it’s just my<\/strong> little world that ended… But then I glance at the news and there’s absolutely no doubt… THE SKY IS FALLING!!!” (9).\u00a0 Rather than contend with the fact that his world pre-9\/11 held a false sense of security, he must (and like many others) go to the other extreme of alarmism instead of realizing that he lives in the same world no more or less safe.\u00a0 Moreover, In the Shadow of No Towers<\/span> concludes with “Bringing Up Father,” a comic strip that emphasizes Americans desire for a clear resolution to (even fictional) problems.\u00a0 It seems that Americans can’t get over that sometimes there is nothing that can be done-that in fact, as the old axiom goes, “Motion should not be confused with action.”\u00a0 In fact, Shooting War <\/span> seems to demonstrate this self-deception.\u00a0 Rather than take ownership over the emotional payoffs of being the center of a media blitz, Jimmy Burns demurs, “I’m a magnet for death; mayhem.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I have to admit I was a little resistant to this week’s reading, not to do to the form of the graphic novel, but because of the subject matter regarding 9\/11.\u00a0 Like many others, I have trauma fatigue and-still one administration later-remain a little nauseous from the transformation of tragedy into an excuse for fear-mongering … Continue reading Graphic Self-deception<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[100],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-759","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-week-15-graphic-novels"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/759"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=759"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/759\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":761,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/759\/revisions\/761"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=759"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=759"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=759"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}