Welcome back!

Term two has begun and so far we have finished our second graphic novel in ASTU 100, The first being Persepolis based on the Iraq war and the newest being Safe Area Gorazde based on the war in Eastern Bosnia. While both are similar in genre they vary in a number of ways, from drawing style to tone and audience. Persepolis was a more simple story, which highlighted the adolescent life of narrator Marji and her experiences living through the Iraq War. This Graphic novel has a very simplistic drawing style as author, Satrapi, felt graphic violence would distract from the child-like innocence and tone. Safe Area Gorazde on the other hand has quite a different drawing style which is very graphic and detailed while also keeping a monochromatic colour scheme. This may be because writer and journalist, Sacco, intended the book to be an exposure to something thats not talked about enough, the war in Eastern Bosnia.

The audience intended for Safe Area Gorazde is much different from Persepolis as it is written from the perspective of a Journalist, living in a war refuge in Bosnia, who finds himself distracted with drinking and women while also keeping up with a very gruesome, under-reported war. This very honest representation of his time in Bosnia is used as a tool to expose our media industry which is being bashed in recent years because of constant dramatization and occasional lying for ratings and views.

I don’t believe theres a right or wrong way to create a graphic novel and instead I think each novel, while similar in genre had their own reasons for choosing such different drawing styles. I agree with Satrapi’s choice to use simplistic drawings since graphic violence would take away from her intensions of the book. But I also see why Sacco chose to draw in such graphic detail, his audience is more adult and the intention for the book was to be an exposure, of both the media and of a war which almost seemed forgotten.