Taking a shot at understanding.

I really, really enjoy nonfiction graphic novels that are not memoirs. Specific enough for you?

As previously noted, a lot of graphic novel memoirs seriously bum me out; tops on this list were David Small's Stitches and Alison Bechdel's Fun Home. There's something about seeing challenging if not downright horrific childhoods and young adulthoods portrayed in pictures that I very nearly can't handle.

But history and biography graphic novels? Love 'em. Another good case in point of this phenomenon is Apostolos Doxiadis's and Christos Papdimitriou's graphic novel Logicomix: An Epic Search for Truth.* Although the authors admit the book is more "based on reality" than it is pure nonfiction (they provide a very nice note in the back, explaining how and when they deviated from pure fact), I decided it didn't really bother me. The book is a rather selective biography of the life of philosopher and logician Bertrand Russell, and covers the overlap between the philosophy of logic and the science of mathematics.

Now, I'm not saying I got a lot of it. I certainly don't get the math stuff and most of the logic stuff just seems like semantic wrangling to me, but I must say that the graphic novel format, for whatever reason, makes me feel like I've got a shot at understanding some of the basics of what the authors are trying to say.** Although I most likely won't have time to follow the interest, it also somewhat motivated me to maybe someday read more about Bertrand Russell--his is one of those names I hear a lot but can never really place. (Just so you know: he was born in 1872 in Great Britain, the grandson of former Prime Minister Lord John Russell, became a mathematical logician and well-known author, later became a vocal anti-nuclear activist, and died in 1970.) So thumbs up on this one; it ranks right up there with Jim Ottaviani's historical/scientific graphic novels Fallout and Suspended in Language: Niels Bohrs's Life, Discoveries, and the Century He Shaped.

*Can't remember where I heard about this one. Lesbrarian, did you suggest I read it? If so, thanks!

**I did learn this: I don't think you want to be married to a logician.

Comments

[lesbrarian]

Wasn't my suggestion, since I haven't read it yet-- but it had been on my TBR, and after reading this post, I've gone and placed the hold on it.

I also find graphic memoirs to be bleak. I loved Fun Home and liked Stitches, but they don't exactly leave you with warm fuzzies.

For a nonfiction GN that won't make you want to jump off a bridge, try Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics. I actually OWN MY OWN COPY of this one, that's how good it is. McCloud does a superb job of explaining what comics are and why people like them, and he does it in graphic novel format. It's a graphic novel about graphic novels!

And-- I'll never give up on my quest to recommend fiction you'd like, never-- I really, really, really, really, really think you might enjoy the Bone series, by Jeff Smith.

[Citizen Reader]

No, Lesbrarian, you are right. Both Stitches and Fun Home were interesting books, good books to read, but wow, NOT uppers.

I hate to rain on your parade (normally I'm a rainer but I like you and your parades, so it really does kind of hurt me) but I have read Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics, and actually used it and recommended it as a textbook when I taught a class called "Reading Interests of Adults." It was great at explaining comics, and how and why they work. The trouble was...I just don't care that much how comics work. I should, but like most visual topics--interior design, fashion, colors that match--it's like a foreign language to me and I can just either go on appreciating without understanding, or make myself nuts. I have chosen the former.

I have always wanted to read the Bone series, and will put it on the ol' TBR list for this summer. Thank you!

[lesbrarian]

Summer's drawing to a close. (Thank. God.) Have you read Bone yet?

Anyway, I did go and read Logicomix:
http://bfgb.wordpress.com/2010/09/06/logicomix-by-apostolos-doxiadis/