Yatterings

I blogged a link to Jeff Vandermeer’s article on Bookslut about comparing graphic novels and novels. I wholeheartedly agree with Joe Gordon that you must read the while thing before cheering or throwing any toys out of the pram because Jeff comes from a position of respect and love for both forms.

His thesis is that the two forms are very different and that comparing them together is a waste of time. This is essentially true in that they work in very different ways. One relies upon the imagination of the reader to conjure up their own images of the text and the other has images and text working with each other.

Perhaps some of this confusion comes from a desire on both parties fences to have the no-doubt greener grass on the otherside. Somehow they perceive a value in the other but no idea what it is. Is the Sandman series any more literature than the stories it calls from? Is Signal to Noise any more “literary” because it uses Barthes as a reference point for the nature of the narrative? Not really. For a start what do you define  as “literary” (No I don’t have an answer either)?

Secondly, it smacks of a denial of self. Why not celebrate graphica separately as its own entity? Why not celebrate genre as its own thing? Allowing genre to be inventive and to develop in its own way seems to be a better answer than watching it emulate something else, something it is not.

Trying to shoehorn ill-fitting items together smacks of a desperate need for homegeneity rather than the celebration of difference. Le difference et mort, vive le difference? I think so.