The Cautioner's Tale is both a graphic novel and a mystery, so there is a lot of space and opportunity for the illustrations to guide the reader to the answers and conclusions of the plot. I was a little surprised to find that actually the illustrations were more supplementary, rather than employed in their own right. For example, the box that Mary inherits from Canker Raux is visually rendered, yet Mary spends the better part of a page describing the contents in detail. Similarly, she includes the fanmail she received by magic and also describes and explains the letters, and the mystery of the buttons.
It felt weak to me that she suddenly "remembers" that Canker and she had this secret code they made up as kids, when she realizes she can in fact decide the note inside the box. Convenient revelation that could have been set up better, especially considering she has space for a lot of backstory.
Otherwise, the scrapbook method uses the genre pretty well, the reader discovers the visual clues along with Mary, the author reveals information gleaned in messages from her murdered friends. It's interesting to me that Mary stumbles in the final revelation, the literal puzzle piece to unlock the secret safe, when she decides to trust Gadsby Pork, despite his lecherous tone and swine like appearance. We're glad she did, since it revealed the trove of documents that Ancillary Pawn hid in the wall. This story had a low revelation rate, since so much of what is unknown becomes clear through Mary's musings, it never developed tension or intrigue for me.
R. M. Wilburn could have left more for the readers to figure out, especially considering the possibilities for reader interpretation of illustrations. I ultimately felt the pictures weren't necessary and didn't add anything, it felt like a wasted opportunity.
Booz, i wonder if your frustration with the “overwriting” has more to do with this being a journal, rather than a traditional graphic? And therefore is kind of stream of consciousness? I appreciate your analysis, particularly finding the moment where discovery happens (after, yes, so much being told) thanks!
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Building on top of Iris's response, I think it's more epistolary in style than journal/diary - a kind of letter to the reader, or collection of letters and newspaper clips for the reader. I don't think there's any stream-of-consciousness here, at least not the way I understand it. I think journals are often not overwritten as they simply record thoughts and events as the authors conversation with theirself. See Kafka's Diaries:
Delete"I write this very decidedly out of despair over my body and over a future with this body.
...
Do you despair?
Yes? You despair?"
"Writers speak a stench."
"Finally, after five months of my life during which I could write nothing that would have satisfied me, and for which no power will compensate me, though all were under obligation to do so, it occurs to me to talk to myself again."
Booz, I love that you call it a scrapbook method. When I was working on my analysis I was trying to decide what to call this style of unconventional graphics. I think you make a good point about the low rate of revelation. Intrigue doesn’t really peak throughout this, and maybe that’s due to the fact that there aren’t many “portals” like we talked about in our last class. For me, I couldn’t find an emotional portal into this work, which made it difficult for me to find intrigue anywhere throughout my reading. Thanks for sharing! Barrie
ReplyDeleteI have to disagree with you on the photos, my lovely Booz. I think one of the things you miss in your critique is that not only is this a mystery and a graphic novel, it's Science Fiction, too. The photos are a key component of the world building of the Sci-fi. The serrated edges all pieced together give the piece a dystopian feel truly cementing the severity at play in the piece.
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