Comics Biographies

This week we are reading about graphic biographies. But before I get to those I just want to say that I think we are spending far too much time in class debating terminology. Graphic novel or comic or graphic narrative or comix. Travel narrative or travel guide or travel memoir. As far as these readings value to youth literature goes the terminology is irrelevant. I think we should focus instead on what is good and bad about the works themselves. Is the plot interesting, good, bad, or bland? Do we care about the characters or the setting? What sort of appeal factors does the art show? How do we think these comics will appeal to youth? What sort of purpose could they serve to youth? Educational? Entertainment? Just my two cents, but that is what I would like to see more of and less of the terminology debates.

So keeping my reader's advisor style questions in mind, on to the lovely comics biographies we are reading this week. I haven't finished either one yet, but so far I am really enjoying them, which is surprising to me because I don't usually enjoy biographies in plain text form. I will start with Anne Frank: The Anne Frank House authorized graphic biography by Sid Jacobson and Ernie Colón. First, I did not really like the art style, it was too clean line and graphic for me, I prefer more organic lines and varied tone. The layout however, was well thought out. I liked how the history of the Frank family was established in juxtaposition with the history of the Nazi rise to power and other national events, as seen in the panels below.




I have never read Anne Frank's Diary of a Young Girl before, so while I was aware of the basic plot of her family hiding in an attic, I really didn't know what else to expect. I expect the friction between Anne and her mother is something most teens and tweens can relate to, as well as the mentions of other oddly "normal" events, her being the baby that always cried, her crush, nicknames between friends. So far, this is a more interesting (to me anyway) way to portray historical events and biographical details than a textbook or plain text book is able to. 

Now on to The 14th Dalai Lama: A manga biography by Tetsu Saiwai. I am not very far in the story, but so far it is very engaging. I prefer the art in this comic to the Anne Frank story, because it has a looser more cartoony feel and none of the ugly coloring.  I also like that the art reflects the simplicity of the monks beliefs. This is a more interesting subject to me, because as I said in another post, Asian cultures were skipped over in my high school education, so there are a lot of aspects of the story that are new to me. Having never put much stock in dreams having any particular meaning, I found the absolute conviction that Reting Rinpoche had about his vision incredible.






































 I hope this story continues to be charming in content as well as style. 

Anyone who has finished either or both have any reader's advisory thoughts on the audience for these comic biographies?