Lecture 11: "Hillary Chute “Comics as literature? Reading graphic narrative.”

0:19 Hello everyone, I am Dr. Deepali Yadav, assistant professor in the department of English at Banara Hindu University. I am offering a course titled comics and graphic novels in Indian context. We have completed two weeks of this course where we dealt with visual methodologies in the first course visual methodologies in print where we had discussed several kinds of critiques and how they thought depicting visuals in the print medium is different and uh what is the politics which uh gets highlighted when visuals are depicted through the print medium. So in this first week we discussed about various technicalities, tools, vocabularies

1:05 and uh uh the effects that are created by portraying visuals in print. In the second week we dealt with the emergence of comics particularly in India and in this week we saw that comics in India was actually a western phenomenon. It was brought from the western countries like America where superheroes like Batman, Spider-Man, Iron Man were being translated into regional languages of India as well as retaining their also sometimes retaining their uh actual original English language structure. So uh apart from this, apart from the

1:50 western influence, we uh continue to gloss over other kinds of comics industries, the comics publishing houses that emerged in India including Indrajal comics, Raj comics, Diamond Comics. uh and we saw that how each one of these publishing agencies, publication houses were catering to a different set of audiences had diverse aims including Amarachetrakata as well you know where where where the goals and aims were completely different from the Raj comics and uh the diamond comics and how each of these created uh a publication house which was unique and individualistic in its own manner. Now tracing this historioggraphy of visuals in print in

2:37 this third week we have come across the title of this uh course is introduction to Indian graphic novels. So now we have in this week I'll introduce you how graphic novels as a genre uh emerged in India. What were the first graphic novels? How did it all come into existence? What were the basic ideas? What was the aim? What are the audiences? All these factors led to an emergence of a separate market based completely on graphic novels. So today in India we also have a separate set of readers academicians critiques researching on graphic novel genre which is very different from the actual literary novels as well as the visuals that are depicted on television, films

3:23 or any other kind of uh narrative form which can also be exhibited through OTT or radio platforms. In this lecture which is lecture one for week three, we will be discussing a prominent critique who has worked a lot on the graphic novels and most of her work coincides with the intersections of the content the form what is it actually that makes graphic novel form different and diverse from comics? Because if comics had already existed uh then what was the need of graphic novels form? What is it doing? In what way is it different? Is it just, you know, um are graphic novels and comics the same things being packaged and marketed in different ways? Or graphic novels had an uh

4:10 individualistic aim of its own, a separate entity of its own where it it can be said where it can be said that you know it caters to a a diverse set of audience which are very different from the comics audience. So her essay titled comics as literature reading graphic narrative. So now she's trying to emphasize as the title of the lecture itself suggests as the title of her article that we are doing here itself suggest that she's trying to we have a question mark here comics as literature because there are many raised eyebrows when people tend to think can comics be literature because literature has always been canonical high art something that influenced the tastes cultures and shapes mannerisms and sophistication as we have seen in the history of English

4:57 literature as Well, that how various ages, various centuries uh for example the century of pope and dryen where you know pros and uh mannerisms and sophistication in the neocclassical age became so prominent that it kind of it kind of uh went on to create a separate form of its own and then there was a reaction against it and so many other things and this is how the literature has been shaped. So in the similar vein in the similar line graphic novels are also a reaction against the existing um existing set of literature'ses existing set of narrative forms existing set of how we can tell a story. The emergence or the rise of graphic novel is

5:42 basically based on the need that the reality in which we live today has become so complex has become so disjuncted has become so uh uh uh uh separate that it has got no linearity. So in what ways can we depict what are the ways what are the narrative forms that we can exploit which do justice to our existing reality. So graphic novel presents itself as a form where you can bring visuals, where you can bring photographs, where you can bring uh literary uh words, where you can bring all sorts of forms which can just you know conjoin together which can come under the same platform which can come under the similar rubric of what can be

6:28 largely called as graphic novel. So here she uh Hillary Shu who is an who is a prominent American critic and who has written extensively on the need for introducing graphic novels in the classroom. She is trying to respond to the question whether comics or graphic novels should be treated as literature or not because uh since time immemorial we know that they have always been disregarded as a low bro culture as a low culture which has got nothing to you teach and as a result of it they are not kind of they have never been introduced in the syllabuses in the course structures or within universities and school education. But today uh the need that I am giving

7:14 you a SUAM course the the the the reason why I'm giving you a SUAM course itself is a fact that graphic novels have been introduced in the BA syllabuses uh in different uh universities of India at undergraduate level and uh students find it really difficult coming from schools because they had no exposure they have no critical material available on how to study visuals if they are taking literature. So this very need made me offer this course comics and graphic novels uh in Indian context because uh students are reading Bimayina, students are reading Delhi uh in diverse Indian universities at a BA level but what they really lack is the infrastructure to see

8:00 the visuals or what they really lack is sometimes uh the critical ability to read the visuals in the text itself because they have had no training in it before that and that makes it a very challenging job for them. So we can see that there has been a fresh change which is being introduced in our academia in in in the universities today where now we are reading comics as well as graphic novels as a part of undergraduate courses and what to speak about other universities I am very glad and very happy to say that under NEP national education policy which has been NEP 2020 we have also introduced a graphic novel and a comics in our undergraduate syllabus where students Students are getting the firsthand opportunity to

8:47 read visual text along with the verbal text that they usually study in the name of literature. So beginning with the introduction, Hillary Shu focuses on the strengths of comics and argues beyond the verbal visual nexus of the genre. Contrarily she sees the genre often disjunctive back and forth of reading and looking for meaning. So one of the ways Hillary Schu says that graphic novel is different. Graphic novel is a separate entity has a unique identity of its own as a form as a genre because uh the the the form does not encourage any linear reading. There's no linearity because when you're looking at the page when you're looking at a picture uh which has different panels or which is

9:33 distributed which is narrating a story line. So, so the reader at once does not go uh one by one from uh left to right as it is in the reading but the reader uh once you turn the page you have a glance at all over the page what is happening. So you look at the visuals which may be nonlinear uh your eyes may be you know traveling from top of the page to the bottom of the page from right to left or left to right whatsoever. So it just there's no particular linear way of reading a graphic novel. So in a way it actually marks uh it it is different from the normal customary reading of literary literary text that we do generally that we have a certain tendency that we have been taught since beginning that a text would be should be read in such a manner

10:20 but when you see visuals in print along with the printed bubbles and speech bubbles that are there it is not necessarily that you are looking at the visuals in the same way as you are reading a novel. Her focus is on the non-fictional narratives for reading history. So actually you know um if you see the diverse landscape of graphic narratives both internationally and nationally because this is this is the unit unit 3 week three where I'm actually giving you an introduction of graphic novel. So I may not necessarily limit myself only to the Indian context because in order to give you an introduction I should give you a wide introduction of the graphic novels that exists glo globally that have also made that have been very famous and popular in the west and in the subsequent weeks

11:06 when we actually go on deeper and deeper with the graphic novels then we will discuss diverse aspects of graphic novels that have been produced in India. So in general uh what Hillary shoot because she has worked on many kinds of graphic novels for example mos persip police palestine so all these graphic novels if you see Joe Sako uh Palestines and arts begelman's moss she has done a very intensive rigorous study and she was one of the very first critiques in the literary field do her dissertation to do her PhD on the graphic novel when the genre itself was considered very novel and she had a very challenging task to do that to make it very much permissible very much um what you can say that a research can also be allowed

11:53 in the departments of literature on graphic novels and comics without raising an eyebrow over it. So what she says is that her focus is on the non-fictional narratives for reading history. So if you see a very wide purview of graphic novels that exist uh in in a domain for analysis you see moss arts artsel moss is also a graphic novel which has conducted a study uh on holocaust how peopleman's parents were subjected to live in the holocaust Germany in the Hitler's time then you have Palestine uh which which where where Joe Sako has had a very documentary and journalistic approach in in in narrating the realities of people who are living in those uh in in in in the war affected Palestine uh in that country and so in India as well if you

12:40 go on to see uh the graphic novels for example one of the first and uh first formally recognized graphic novel if I say that is Orijit Saints river of stories and other graphic novelists also for example Vishrajoti Gosh's Delhi calm and this side that side um all these novels are in a way kind of a historical rendering uh the kind of um you know they are reflecting on the socopolitical issues of some time that has passed by. They are trying to document it. They are trying to provide it. So um in a way uh one can very well say that graphic novels are something which are very different from comics uh in a way that they deal with serious subjects. So they there may or may not be superheroes here

13:27 but the superheroes are actually you know uh uh but but the story line and the superheroes if they are there in the graphic novels are actually fighting with the real existing socopolitical issues on our on in the country which are very much the burning issues of contemporary world and they need our urgent response to it. How the past represents itself through the medium of comics and the retellings differ in this medium. So one of the questions that she's looking at in this article is that because we have history books because we have uh news media also covering those socopolitical events we have photographs we have so many other forms we have films we have so many other uh other genres we have so many other forms where

14:14 the history where the event has been narrated has been exhaustively researched upon. Then what is the need of rewriting that particular event in the graphic novel form and what is the difference that this form brings? Does it in any way affect the reading of the history? Or does it in any way kind of brings out something new that other forms cannot unravel in their mode of narration? Or I mean is it just any other medium which is just doing a retelling of of something in a different way and it is unable to provide us with any new answers. Is it just a fascination or is it actually something that is bringing change to the notions of our existing reality and knowledge?

15:01 How visuality in comics blurs the line between public and private histories? So another question. So in the introduction I'm first familiarizing you that what are the questions that she's asking because what do graphic narratives do? For example, if Art Spiegelman, Mos Moss, I think you all should read Moss at least once if you want to do this course comics and graphic novels because this is one of the most important book that any scholar who is working in this area should have read Art Spiegelman's moss. So because he's also telling the private history there he's re retelling the history of his parents that how they survived Hitler's Germany how they survived the Holocaust what it was to live in the Holocaust Germany. So in a way he's he's bringing it down he's

15:47 narrowing it down the national reality to the the private realities that how an individual for example his father lived in that time period. So, so when when it comes down to private histories which you cannot tell in the history books because those are the national records those are the records of a wide range of public wide range of big institutions coming into foreplay. So in this case literature why we study literature because we study literature only because it tells us the pe story of common people which history leaves because history is only the story of uh the the famous icons the celebrated heroes the popular names uh it is it is just a revisiting of what they did but how their policies how these struggles were coming down to general public what was

16:33 their how did they feel to live in the Hitler Germany are some some some of the narrative naratives that need to be retold and this personalization in graphic narrative form through in the form of visuals that you know he's able to tell the Holocaust history by narrating by by drawing the visuals on his own that what his father must have told to him is in a way kind of presenting a different reality which was unseen till now which was undiscovered till now uh maybe people have people did not pay any attention to it and people didn't were not even aware that even these things existed because oneon-one how one faces how somebody faces an individual event uh a particular event in the history differs from what how it is being narrated at a national level.

17:19 So many histories tend to omit so many important events and how the common people of that particular country were subjected to at that uh point of time. Only a commoner can tell that kind of story. It cannot be told from the mouths of the national icons or national heroes who are untouched with the lived realities of everyday world that a common person has to go through every day. The next question that she asks is what are the difficulties faced by graphic novelist in drawing difficult traumatic histories. Now because they are drawing something which is emotionally stirring which has had a very violent past which may be very sensitive content which may invoke some kind of or trigger some kind of uh

18:06 reactions from the public. So what are the things or what are the aspects or what are the notions that an illustrator of a graphic novel should keep in mind when they are drawing histories or when they are writing forget about any history or when they are writing about any sensitive issue in the or when they are drawing about any sensitive issue because it will be all seen holocaust for example I'm again and again going back to holocaust because I assume if you're taking this course you must have had some kind of exposure to Spaggle art speakman's moss uh at some point of time in your life that holocaust itself uh is an event you know which has been condemned uh which uh nobody would even want to look uh reiterate at any point

18:53 in their life uh which is a black dot in the history of world. Uh so I mean if you are writing a graphic novel on Holocaust where so many Jews were um kind of uh condemned to to to to death in the in the concentration camps. So uh uh because Holocaust is one of the histories that nobody would want to look back to that uh has been globally condemned that is something like a black dot in the history of the world and if you're making a drawing that need that will be published and circulated globally uh and you are narrating the history of the people who were uh kind of subjected to death in the concentration camps and uh left to die in the gas chambers that Hitler did. So

19:40 you need to be very sensitive. Why you need to be very sensitive in the sense? Because uh the survivors even you know you just cannot take a stand that you are being a very neutral spectator in that case or you are being a neutral artist in that case that you have drawn because it may invoke emotions. It may bring back those kind of realities that people want to forget but they are unable to forget that such was the time. So in a way you are bringing you you or uh for example you are also subjected while you are drawing such histories you are also subjected in some way that uh you may be drawing or your your version of history may be incorrect in some way

20:26 which again will also trigger emotions in in a very wrong direction that people will come up and say no no this is not what happened. You are trying to uh you are trying to play with our emotions. This is something you know which a graphic novel should not be showing. It is something it should should not be narrated in. So these are the things you know uh uh an artist when when writing about serious issues. Forget about historical issues but because graphic novels as a genre are always reflecting as serious issues. Serious issues that are of particular interest to adults and not to children which demand a kind of reaction and response from adults. which demand some action which which which can generate some sort of response in the adults because these are very serious

21:13 issues which are beyond the comprehension and understanding of children. So when a graphic artist chooses to reflect or chooses to draw a serious issue in graphic novel, they always have this thing in mind that they have to be very careful in redrawing those sketches in in kind of rebringing the lived reality of some people in the form of sketches so that it does not hurt anybody's emotions. It is not insensitive to the lived reality of the people and it it does not in any way trigger some kind of violent response which may not be good for the society. Now uh I have taken just in order to give you a brief insight into what moss looks like. So Spiegelman has chosen uh

21:59 I have chosen a paper from a page of illustration uh of sketch from Spiegelman's moss. And the second image that you see on the screen is from the Charles Doy the European in India. So these two images are completely different from one another and uh they are in no way related to one another but I have used them together in order to give you two kinds of examples of how graphic novels or graphic narratives tend to illustrate reality in some way. So coming to uh the first illustration, the first sketch of moss that you see on your pages, you see that the face of the people in the panels apart from the man standing who is a narrator who is of

22:44 course Art Spiegelman himself. He's the narrator. So he's an outsider. So he's drawn outside the story where the story is happening outside the panels where the story is happening. He's just an observer. He's renarrating what has happened. He's revising the Holocaust history. But when you see the people out there actually they have the face of a rat. So in the entire moss you do not have people's faces drawn but the faces have been removed by the rat's faces and that is why the story is called as mos in a way kind of re invoking mouse where the Hitler and and his army was playing as the cat and hunting the Jews who are represented in a way as rats. So there

23:32 has also been a debate there are the even Art Spiegelman who has been such an established graphic novelist as to have won the Pulitzer Prize for this graphic novel. He was the first one you know when uh the a graphic novel got a Pulitzer Prize. Even he has been condemned and subject to critical comments by the survivors of the Holocaust who have said that it is very inhuman to revise the Holocaust history in such a manner as to depict Jews as mouse and Hitler's army and Nazis as cat because in a way it kind of brings back that how insecure how restless how helpless they were being a Jew in in the Nazi Germany and the cats were always on

24:18 the hunt for hunting mouse who were always running here and there. So it kind of brings back the lived reality, the harsh reality which they were trying to escape all through these years which they did not wanted to remember. And to bring back through such visuals, it is all the more dehumanizing their human experiences by turning these people human beings into animals. He's kind of playing with their emotions. He has dehumanized their emotions in a way that he does not bother about it. It is just you know uh he's he just wants to tell the story in the form of graphic novel but he does not cares about the people who have lived uh the reality of

25:03 holocaust. So but then Artpieman also has a response to it. He says that the reality was so dark enough that it was impossible or it would have been an injustice. As a response, he says to draw the faces of human characters. Why would he in any way want to bring back those humans who have died or those humans who were subjected to dayto-day risk of their lives and you know make them feel that this is what happened with them. So he has generalized not you know he has not drawn uh somebody's history particularly but he has generalized the emotions of all the people so particularly through his father he's not just talking about his father but he's talking about all the Jews that were living in the Hitler's

25:49 Germany that what it actually felt like for them they were actually feeling like because the kind of animosity that exists between the cat and the mouse it can only be exhibited in the animal form from the intensity of rivalry, the intensity of that cat always wants to eat up the mouse. It can only be shown through animal imagery and no kind of human equivalent will be able to show that kind of uh rivalry that existed between uh uh uh the Nazis and the Jews living in Hitler's Germany. Now the second image that we are seeing on the screen belongs to uh it is an image it is an illustration which uh is from India. The year is 1813 and it is the illustration is from India and you see a

26:35 European man when India was colonized. So a European man sitting in India and there are troop of servants I mean so many servants. One is washing their feet one is preparing a tea for them. The other has brought the towel for them. the the somebody in the background is preparing a bed for him. So it is kind of showing this is also a history this is also a narration even though it is not in the graphic novel form but these illustrations are also a part of graphic narratives that tend to show the kind of history. So through this image I want to show you that how visuals how images can also be taken as a part of history. So there is no written record of it and actually this illustration was made by a British official in 1813. Somebody who was a very good artist. He made this

27:22 kind of sketch. And so in a way I I I want to emphasize on the fact that even visuals can act as a historical record. Even visuals can be read as a historical narrative. They are a part of the archives. They are part of the history which are unwritten which have not been mentioned anywhere. But they only exist in the visual form and they are very important historical record about the lived realities of English men in India. Because the kind of narration that England has produced, the kind of narration that India has produced in response to the English response, it actually talks about the national landscape. What was happening nationally? What were the kings doing? What were the viser doing? What were the army chiefs doing? But this picture

28:09 actually gives you a view a perspective into the private life of a European individual with European man, European official who had come to serve India through East India Company. But these are the things which are not talked about. Private histories are something which are omitted and as a result of it such kind of graphic illustrations, such kind of graphic narratives become an important facet to retrieve those private histories that have not been documented or act as alternate histories or or act as alternate histories. Where lies a very uh vast very wide scope of you know decolonizing studies to revisit those colonial studies. Thank you.