Girlness

In One! Hundred! Demons!, the demon of “girlness” seems to plague Barry throughout. She was not given the opportunity to behave like a “girly girl” as a child; her mother would not let her grow out her hair or buy her Barbie dolls and, as a result, the novel, at least aesthetically, seems to be an explosion of suppressed “girlness.” The scrapbook pages are prime examples of this “girlness.” They are feminine in appearance, composed of flowers, feathers, dots of glitter, etc., and are, in general, pastel in color. The bright colors also serve as a backdrop for all the panels in the novel, thus enhancing the feminine “girly” aspect of the novel. In the penultimate panel of the “Girlness” section, an adult Barry is contemplating buying stationary “that brought back such painful memories I had to put it back. It was too frivolous, too girlish too late” (192.1). This momentary doubt about the stationary is put to rest by “the powerpuff girl” (192.2) and in buying the stationary Barry allows herself, for the first time, to engage positively in an act of girlness, realizing “its never too late for Super Monkey Head and her pals” (192.2). Perhaps this incident allowed Barry to create such an aesthetically girly work in One! Hundred! Demons!