Saturday, September 22, 2007

Interdependent Parallelism, part 2: Page 5 (read this second! See part 1 below)

Page 5 is simpler I think but still very artistic in its presentation. Here, the words are filling in the tragic back-story of the main character (the loss of his son). I think the combination here is “duo specific” because each has its niche. The words talk of loss, and the artwork neatly emphasizes this with the portrait fading in and out and then disappearing in the wallpaper. I would categorize this as a moment-to-moment kind of transition (several panels of a spot on the wall where the portrait once stood) with a very film-like close up of the family and the son himself). The panel with the close-up of the son is drawn in the most clear, bright lines, and stands out from the dark gloom of the rest of the page. Clearly, it is a sharp and painful memory.

The ending is a straight subject to subject transition, to emphasize clearly the break from thought. The portrait disappears; we see the phone, and then Quinn speaking into the receiver. A loud noise from the outside world, and we are pulled back into the ongoing mystery.

I like the film noir vision of this book, and I think the artistry of it is among the best we’ve seen. See you in class!

1 comment:

Caitlin said...

I really like what you had to say about these pages. The trick that the artist did with the portrait and the wallpaper was really great in my opinion, and added to the David Lynch-like quality of the novel. As far as the maze to fingerprint transition on page 4 is concerned, I was very confused by it at first and your post really helped a lot. After reading further on in the book, I went back and saw this page as setting up some of the themes of the novel, such as mazes and the idea of Quinn losing himself in the Paul Auster character.