Throughout The Cautioner’s Tale the reader is constantly being made to ingest the letters, news clippings, and scraps of paper compiled to create this narrative as well as take in the objects portrayed on the page. Wilburn provided this story as a graphic novel for a reason, and it is an unconventional graphic novel, so throughout my reading I was trying to decipher why the author would choose to create this story in this medium. I’m particularly interested in the ways that attention is dispersed across the pages. Some words are highlighted, some are worn, some articles are covered, others are ripped, some scraps seemed distant and faded. In the form of a traditional novel, or even a more classic version of a graphic novel, this type of erasure would not be present. So, what does this erasure do for the arc of the story?
Something that was apparent is that these objects that were compiled were most often stacked on top of each other, another type of erasure. This covering up parallels the covering up of the several political scandals committed by the magistrate, different media outlets, and other agents of the magistrate. While these forces are working within the plot to conceal their agendas, the narrative that the reader is being shown on the page is also strategically concealing information. The rate of revelation to me felt low because of this concealing and erasure. There is a tension that exists both graphically and textually as information is both concealed and revealed by the narrator through her journaling and the placement of her documents and artifacts. This tension shows the reader that although they are being invited into this story, it is obvious that there are still parts of the story they have not been invited to. The arc is slow, it unravels. This shapes the narrative, trapping the reader in the tension between the revealed and the concealed. There is also erasure of the past. Neither the narrator or the reader knows the history of the world they are in. By eliminating this history the author has removed the need for in depth world building, everything is revealed in its own time.
Wilburn has made erasure one of the most prominent themes in the story. As a reader, we can follow the arc of this erasure and see how it shapes the narrative. In fashioning The Cautioner’s Tale as this unconventional graphic novel the author is able to create a layering effect with the information given to the reader. This in turn shapes the narrative flow and provides the author with a space in which he is able to slowly tease out the arc of the story. Essentially, it allows him to reveal and conceal information as he chooses, and show the reader when he is choosing to reveal and conceal. This raised the stakes for me as a reader and acted as an on ramp for the work. The concealing and revealing in play throughout this work created an effortless tension that allowed the story’s arc to be explored both textually and visually.
I liked how you connected the layers of paper to the covering up of wrong doing by the government in this book. Mary Morgan has to dig through a lot of information to get to the truth and this was visually represented.
ReplyDeleteThe erasure of the past, as you point out, makes it easier to introduce the world, since the character doesn't know anything about their history. Usually I would think the author would have to compensate for this somehow, but I did find the world building fairly solid, but I guess our worlds may have too much in common.
I agree with Iris, Barrie. The layering of materials as erasing rather than compounding the sense of violation. You have excellent thread showing how it moves throughout the piece. Very well done
ReplyDeleteE
Hi Barrie,
ReplyDeleteI appreciate how you discuss the erasure of some elements and documents through the layering of image. I was interested, though, in your idea about rate of revelation. You mentioned the rate of revelation as low. I read this differently. I took the rate of revelation to be high since some important facts were revealed right away. It took no time at all to figure out the Bigly Rump was the bad guy. And, of course, we know that our narrator somehow makes it out of all this alive. So, for me, I suppose, the narrative tension lies in the path, not necessarily the destination.