I appreciated the depth and the range of Bill Kartalopoulos's interview with Paul Karasik, and look forward to having Karasik at AU discussing the issues they covered at even greater length. His description of his lectures and practices with his students gave me a much clearer picture of a comic's creation than any of McCloud did (though I suppose that could have been different if we'd read "Making Comics" instead).
Whereas I often felt like McCloud's tone was that of someone pleading with an audience that fundamentally didn't believe in the value of comics, Karasik's description of the structure and value of the form is casually convincing. He seems to have a stronger, less conflicted grasp on what it takes to make a comic--"it's not a rational process," he says, though "there are rational pieces to the process." McCloud leaned toward this kind of analysis, but never quite got me there--so what's different about Karasik? Is it that this interview is between two interested parties and pretty much guaranteed to be read by interested parties, whereas McCloud was reaching for a broader spectrum of reader? Is it that the interview is in prose form, not in comic form, and I'm simply trained to be suspicious of comics and accepting of prose? Or is it something else entirely--my opinion of the two themselves?
Though McCloud explains that he chose the style he did for accessibility's sake, it had the opposite effect for me. It was too "cartoony," too difficult a jump for me to consider it a medium, an art. The work in City of Glass, on the other hand, struck me by its depth, by the richness of visuals and symbols, by the potential for reading and re-reading and always discovering some new connection. It's interesting that Karasik claims his strength lies in "thinking about how the clock works, not how the face looks"--is it because City of Glass had such a strong "face" AND such strong "inner workings" that I was more receptive to Karasik's discussion? What were your reactions to his RISD lesson plan?
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I definitely agree with you that Karasik's approach to discussing comics is more "casually convincing." Karasik presents his opinions in a much more intellectual way than McCloud. Granted that their motives and intended audience may have been different, but I feel like I, as a newcomer to comics, benefited more from reading Karasik's rather short interview than from reading McCloud's lengthy book that seemed more defensive than objectively informative.
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