Berger, Arthur. "Comics And Culture." The Journal of Popular Culture. 5:1 (Spring 1971).
Harvey, Robert C. "The Aesthetics of the Comic Strip." The Journal of Popular Culture. 12:4 (Spring 1979).
Coleman, Earle J. "The Funnies, The Movies And Aesthetics." The Journal of Popular Culture. 18:4 (Spring 1985).
Three papers yesterday, all over 20 years old, the first quite insightful, the other two, not so much so. But they're all fairly quotable, which is convenient. It's always nice to cite someone saying something that you want to assert. Makes you sound all learned.
Berger�s paper, �Comics and Culture� is mostly about comic strips. He talks about serialisation in newspaper strips, saying that they �satisfy a need to know what happened �next� [�]� (168), explaining that, in the three- or four-panel strip, we know the format by virtue of sheer repetition, but we keep reading to see how the strip will get to the punch line in the last panel, which is a lot like genre expectations in general. We know that the hero will (a) beat the villain a fair fight then, (b) the villain will double-cross the hero, thus forcing the hero to kill him such that (c) the hero can be conveniently free of guilt, but we still watch, both because the repetition is comforting and because we want to see the slight variation. �Thus what the comics do is raise moderate levels of anxiety which they then satisfy� (169, italics are original).
He also reverses a couple of commonly-held critiques of popular entertainment. First, he refutes the �lowest common denominator� argument, which assumes that because they must appeal to mass audiences, popular arts must be �inoffensive and uninteresting� (169). �Yet the opposite argument can be made: if you have a strip with many readers you can always afford to �lose� some of them for any given day�s adventure� (169), an argument that �was brought to [his] attention by Charles Schulz� (169). This argument applies to any serialised material, or for that matter, any regularly broadcast material, that has a large enough audience that individual episodes could be aimed at different parts of the mass audience with some security that, though some of the audience might drift away, or even be offended, they�ll probably be back next week.
There are some problems, here, with regard to how a strip (or television show, or magazine) gets to that level of popularity, and thus that level of security, but the logic is sound. Once again, we�d have to actually test that theory in the real world to see if it were true. It occurs to me, as well, that producers and publishers might institute the LCD problem merely as a product of their own fear of losing their audience, even if the problem didn�t exist.
Second, he points out, counter to points made by Jewett and Lawrence that intelligence is a sign of villainy in popular culture, that both heroes and villains in superhero narratives employ high-technology. �Rather than refusing to face the contemporary world and returning to the older simpler days of the pastoral, many comics use science and technology for their subject matter� (173) in such a way that �The triumph of the heroes reflect [sic] an awareness of the potentialities for good and evil in machines and a faith in man�s ability to control them; that is, a realism and an awareness of the moral dilemma posed by science and technology� (175). Rather than either glorifying or demonizing technology, superhero comics tend to simply use them as a plot device, as modern magic.
Finally, again counter to Jewett and Lawrence�s insistence that the superhero strikes an inherently anti-democratic/individualist ideological stance, Berger points out that �The diminution and humanization of the superheroes [in the 60s] suggest a different conception of the role of the superhero in our culture. We have, in effect, rejected the old, infantile superhero�who represents the strong father who will rescue us (as individuals, who are weak and powerless, and as a society in general) and have accepted responsibility for ourselves and the social order� (171-173). The more flawed and human heroes get, the more like us they are, and therefore the less their very presence takes away our ability to control our own lives. It�s a fascinating point, actually, and brings a very specific political angle to the iconic/specific dimension of fantasy literature. I will have to think about this one more.
Harvey�s �Aesthetics of Comics� is a very old-school bit of criticism that seems to take the job of the critic to determine whether a piece of art is of high quality or not, which is quite alien to my experience! He seems to be taking the position of the reviewer, as opposed to the academic. What�s interesting about that position is that it almost invariably affiliates the reviewer/critic with the artist, and not the audience. If we�re looking at the art from a point of view of trying to make it �good,� then we�re looking over the artist�s shoulder. If we�re looking at it from the point of view of figuring out what it does or says, then we�re generally looking over the reader�s shoulder.
Harvey does make one very good point, though. He insists on defining the medium before entering into an analysis of it because �If critical examination of the comics is to rest on a theoretical foundation of any substance, then that foundation ought to consist of a precise knowledge of what the comics uniquely are� (641). He defines comics in the conventional way, �pictures + words� (as opposed to the Eisner/McCloud �sequential art� definition), and then tries to adjudicate them based on how much they employ both elements in concert with each other.
What he demonstrates, I assume inadvertently, is that how we define the medium has everything to do with how we look at the medium. If we define it in terms of the combination of text and art, then we will see certain kinds of techniques at work. Moore�s habit of repeating innocuous dialogue from previous scene during a violent scene, for example, is a great example of using pictures and words in combination to achieve a certain effect. However, if we follow the �sequential art� definition, we will notice how Moore visually connects panels to each other, such as in Watchmen when Jon Osterman, Dr. Manhattan, without himself moving, flashes through his own memories. The panels consist of Manhattan standing still while the world changes around him. His lack of physical change in the panels is an indication that he sees all time periods simultaneously. Definitions matter because they will direct and deflect our attention in specific directions.
Finally, Coleman�s paper is interesting because, in the process of comparing comics and film, he anticipates McCloud�s definition of comics in Understand Comics. �Detecting movement in the comics is far from automatic, since neither the pages nor the lines thereon actually move or change position. If there is to be the perception of motion, we must play an active role; our eyes must trace contours, follow the paths or rhythms of lines. Thus, it is the movement of our own eyes which enables us to impute movement to comics� (97). Aside from the implication that this process requires conscious effort, which McCloud strongly argues against, these couple of sentences neatly sum up McCloud�s theory of �closure�! The page does not move. Only by comparing one panel to the next can we perceive movement.
Coleman also quite lucidly explains that �comic strips, which arrive in the adult container of a newspaper, are regarded as a less childish mode of expression than self-contained comic books� (89). Strips are regarded as sophisticated because they are packaged with other, ostensibly sophisticated materials. By virtue of being in a newspaper, strips are connected to a strong history of political cartooning, and cartoons that are political, such as Doonesbury or Pogo. Comic books started as collections of strips, thus their packaging implies a reader who doesn�t want, or doesn�t have the capacity to understand, the sophisticated part of the newspaper.
Posted by orion at May 14, 2006 3:22 PM