MADreads

Peeking through bamboo curtains

March 18th, 2009 Barbara - Alicia Ashman

Guy Delisle is a Canadian-born resident of France who has worked as an animator all over Europe and in Asia.  His peripatetic career has taken him to some unusual locations — and he creates graphic novels documenting his sojourns.

The first two are Pyongyang: A Journey in North Korea and Shenzhen: A Travelogue from China.  In both, Delisle uses his experiences working for an extended period of time in locations not visited by tourists.  Misunderstandings and culture shock are themes shared in these two books — along with Delisle’s gentle cynicism.  He pokes fun at institutional hypocrisies and relates encounters with people, recording events both mundane and surreal.

Delisle is not writing travelogues (regardless of his subtitles), these are assemblages of anecdotes — he spends a lot of time in hotel rooms and offices and very little traveling to landmarks or features.  Nevertheless, he is able to convey his experiences so vividly that reading his work makes you feel as if you have been transported with him.

The illustrations give rare visual images of places where cameras are forbidden though Delisle’s artwork has a cartoony style and is deceptively simple.  With everything rendered with minimal lines and in shades of gray, his depictions have the focused clarity of black-and-white photos.  Architectural details, traffic, clothing styles and street scenes are meticulously drawn, often without comment, allowing the reader to soak up backgrounds without being fully aware of it.

Delisle’s latest graphic novel, Burma Chronicles, finds him in a new country, on a much longer stay and in a slightly different role.  He is accompanying his wife, a Médecins Sans Frontières administrator and his primary job is caretaker of their baby son, Louis.

Anyone who has ever travelled with a baby will immediately connect with Delisle’s travails with Louis.  He also experiences the peculiar phenomenon of caretaker invisibility that occurs when pushing a cute baby in a stroller. Louis opens doors in this closed country and Delisle’s walks with the baby (and the fact that he is living in a neighborhood, not a hotel) give the newest title a richer flavor than the two earlier works.

One of the neighbors is Aung San Suu Kyi, winner of the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize, living a cloistered life under house arrest.  Discovering her proximity, Delisle attempts to wander down her street with Louis, only to be firmly rebuffed at a guard station.  References to The Lady recur throughout the book, her invisible presence is covered in ways that are powerful and affecting.

Terrible glimpses of human rights abuses and of the difficulties and frustrations facing Médecins Sans Frontières staff creep into Burma Chronicles.  And the pervasive grimness of life under a powerful military regime is brought into high focus in one memorable passage, where Delisle finds out his negative commentary on Burma to a visiting journalist resulted in a foreign news article that might seriously endanger the life of one of his Burmese acquaintances.

The isolationist government’s maddening oppression along with the the other ills plagueing Burma would render a more direct approach too sorrowful to read about.  Guy Delisle’s graphic novels provide a sympathetic outsider’s view to some of the most closed off parts of the world.  They are terrific examples of how powerfully words and pictures can combine to carry the reader into the story. 

If after reading these you are like me and just can’t get enough, you could visit his terrific website which provides a lot of additonal information about his books.

Entry Filed under: Graphic Novel, Nonfiction