Comics as Persona

I think one of the most interesting aspects of a nonfiction comic--especially one that is a memoir (or "autobifictionalography", or whatever you want to call it)--is how transparent the form can be. Style obviously comes into play in prose writing, but even at its most recognizable, it can't come close to the expression of personality that can be achieved in comics. The visual aspect of works like Barry's "Demons" and Campbell's "Fate of the Artist" tell us more about the author than prose alone ever could.

Barry, as we've already discussed, captures the creatively eccentric tone that her "Lynda Barry Experience" showcases in "One! Hundred! Demons!". Her offbeat drawing style, quirky lettering choices, and use of collage all speak to a childlike spirit and exuberance for storytelling. The images on each page, working with the text, evoke a sense of Lynda herself--or at least the side of it she has chosen to portray in these stories.

Interestingly enough, it is this same sense of "art as personality" that allows us a glimpse of Eddie Campbell despite his best efforts to excise himself from "Fate of the Artist." Most of us noticed some level of pretension and ego in its conception, also evident in his interviews. However, his stylistic choices also show an artist interested in pushing his medium to the limit, one who is serious about his art and its potential. Though we see Hayley and "Honeybee" and Siegrist, and don't see much of Campbell himself, (until the last scene, really, and even then he is playing O. Henry), his artistic choices show his personality as artist, one that is less constrained in his expression by form than the writers in the "other" sections of the bookstore.