In this unit, We investigated various culture differences by interviewing people from different family backgrounds, to understand their identities and beliefs. In class, we read a graphic novel and analyze how the author shows each character’s culture and personality. With the answer we got from previous generations, we compared their thoughts with our own, to explore the differences between cultures.
Author’s Choice
In the graphic novel “Anya’s Ghost”, Vera Brosgol uses different styles to show characters’ development. But before going deep into analyzation, let’s first talk about the way this story is written. The title basically pointed out that the story will be focusing on Anya. Usually, in traditional novels, when narrations have “I” in it, we know the author is telling it in the first point of view. However, in graphic novels, all narrations are conveyed by images and dialogues, therefore, Vera Brosgol is talking about Anya’s life, in third person’s point of view. Speaking of dialogues, it plays a big role in expressing the character’s emotions. Throughout the book, readers can clearly see each character’s change in mood and personality from what they say. For instance, when Anya’s mom offers snacks to her, she said, “Did you see me back then? I weighed 300 pounds, and looked kinda like a grandma”, and gave it her snacks to her little brother. (Brosgol, page 3) From this dialogue, we can tell she has a low self-esteem. She doesn’t appreciate how she looks and cares too much about her appearance. When Anya fell down from the beep test, she murmured, “I’ll be killing myself shortly…” (Brosgol, page 68). With the dialogue, it emphasizes how nervous she is. She is giving herself too much pressure. When she found out her jewelry was buried in the ground in the yard on the way back home, she demanded, “Mom!!! Sasha buried my jewelry in the goddamn yard again! You promise you’d make him stop!” This shows that she is very angry towards her brother, has no patience for him. On the other hand, Emilly was introduced as a naive innocent character. From the conversation between her and Anya, readers know that the ghost is murdered by someone. (Brosgol, page 91) People will have sympathy for her. Also, during a test, Emily would whisper answers to Anya. Help her to get straight A’s. But everything took a dramatic change when Anya found out the truth of Emily’s death. That she is actually the murderer. From this moment on, Anya became more open minded and braver. For instance, she starts to stand up for her brother. When Emily tried to scare her brother while he is sleeping, Anya rushed into his room, “There, there Sasha. It’s alright, it’s gone now. It’s my fault.” The way she says it definitely change to a calmer version. She became thoughtful for her family. Turning from a coward that doesn’t have faith in herself, to a person that stands up and protect others. After the truth reveals, Emily became her true self, cruel and dark. When Anya tells her to leave, she said, “I’m not going back in the dark. I’ve come so far and I’m not going to let you run everything.” From the dialogue, we see her selfish side. She doesn’t care whether or not others feel comfortable, the only goal for her is to get revenge. Her once helpful sweet image shattered, become brutal and murderous.
Illustrator’s Choice
Throughout the book, Vera Brosgol uses illustrations for narrations, to express mood and emotions. Have you ever heard of “a picture is worth a thousand words”? Well, this is exactly what a graphic novel author is striving for. According to marketing industry influencer Krista Neher, the human brain can process images up to 60,000 times faster than words. With a picture, you can convey so much more information than you can with words. You will also have the ability to convey abstract and complex concepts such as facial expressions. To anyone whose illustration work includes characters, facial expression is like this computer monitor: if it doesn’t work right, then all the brilliant engineering that went into building the hard drive will be wasted. The body expresses action, but the face is a window into someone’s inner life, and the expression of this inner life in a character makes all the difference to the readers. On page 12 and 13, Anya’s emotions went from sadness, frustration, to anger and disgust, then to surprise. In the first four boxes, her eyebrows are knitted together. Readers can feel the slow burn as her eyes squeezed smaller and smaller. Until (on the next page), we can see that she is completely shut down, lips are closed tightly. However, in the next frame, her eyes are wide open with fear. We can clearly tell she is surprised, as her eyebrows rose. Then she is falling into a hole, mouth forming an “O” shape. If you look through these pictures over and over, you might feel these emotions as if you are experiencing yourself. When Emily is secretly pulling out her bone from the box (Brosgol, page 185), she is licking her lips. This expression is the universal language of hungry. She craves to steal the bone, to break the barrier that is keeping her freedom. As readers, we feel how desperate she is. Yes, facial expressions are connected to mood, but character’s body postures plays a big role too. For instance, when Anya is curled into a ball (Brosgol, page 23), it means that she is sorrowful. “Clenching fist, legs wrapped around each other, and lips trembling” all shows that she is scared and depressed. Moreover, when Anya throws Emily up into the air (Brosgol, page 101), she spread out her arms, indicates that she appreciates having freedom. Furthermore, adding onomatopoeia helps emphasize emotions. On page 107, readers wouldn’t know why Anya has her face on a wall, looking surprised. But with the word “Bump” added, we know that she must have hit something really hard in the face. Also, when Emily the ghost is leaping onto Anya (Brosgol, page 191). Adding “Raaaah!” radiates the anger Emily has towards Anya. Moreover, when Anya is running beep test, the word “beep” appears four times on the same page (Brosgol, page 65). The sound represents how much laps she had run already. Conveys that Anya is exhausted and frustrated since she doesn’t like to run. The mood is closely related to colors. The whole graphic novel is displayed with a dark blueish grayish color. Ghost associates with darkness and the story is about Emily’s hatred, guilt, sadness. Blue is definitely the color to represent all these emotions. All in all, Vera Brosgol uses these aspects I’ve mentioned above, to fully develop the mood and emotions she wants to convey.
