Bookslut
August, 2004
Carnet de Voyage by Craig Thompson
Although the book categorizes itself under Graphic Novels and
Travel on its own copyright page, Craig Thompson’s new book
isn't really a comic book; it's prose, peppered with comics sequences,
as in Phoebe Gloeckner's The Diary of a Teenage Girl or Jules Feiffer's
The Man in the Ceiling, albeit with a significantly higher comics-to-words
ratio than either of those books and hand-lettered, not typeset.
In the majority of the book, the weight of the narrative is carried
by the words, not the pictures, which are in many instances unconnected
to the text. To me, that makes it illustrated prose, not comics.
Whatever its medium, though, Carnet de Voyage is intriguing for
both its travel stories and behind-the-scenes of touring in Europe
earlier this year to promote Blankets, as well as for Thompson's
fantastic drawings of France, Barcelona, Morocco and the Alps.
In
France, the more or less by-the-numbers discussions of wine
and cheese are amusing enough as journal entries. Since he is being
shuffled around by publishing
types, it is understandable that the sketchbook pays more attention to the
people he meets than to the buildings around him. As a travelogue, Carnet is
most detailed during Thompson's time in Morocco, where he takes
a break from comic book promotion
to research his next proper book, Habibi, "sort
of an Arabian folk tale of [Thompson's] own making." During Thompson's
trip through Morocco, with the promotional tour forgotten for the time being,
Craig becomes just
another
traveler. With no people around to distract him, he draws more buildings
and landscapes than in most of the rest of the book, and in-between self-indulgent
bouts of loneliness, draws amusing strips about "travel diarrhea." His
observations of Morocco, its culture and the people he meets are fascinating.
Should Craig Thompson ever be tempted to draw a second Carnet, devoted solely
to traveling alone in strange countries, it would be a welcome addition to
my shelf.
A close examination of Thompson's drawings merits its own pass
through the book. In his March 9 entry, for instance, Craig writes
that he has lost his
drawing
supplies and been forced to replace them with second hand felt pens. The difference
in the art is marked. Stuck with the mostly uniform line of a felt pen, his
art looks sketchier, flatter and less alive than in the rest of
the book, which were
drawn with Pentel
Pocket Brush pens, mostly straight into the notebook without
preliminary underdrawings in pencil, according to Thompson, when I met him
at the Chicago Comics signing with James Kochalka last month. Once
he leaves Morocco
and replaces his lost art supplies, Thompson's artwork goes back to its usual,
vibrant style.
It's easy to read Carnet de Voyage as a mini-sequel to
Blankets even though it's not. There seems to be
a progression the “character” of Craig has gone
through, despite that the book stops somewhat abruptly before
his promotional tour has ended. The various details of his
personal life that he chooses to include occasionally veer
into the same "melancholy introvert pining for beautiful
girls" territory of Blankets, and these stories
lend themselves to a sort of story arc. I suppose any good
travel journal would do that -- it is hard to imagine how
any person with an attentive mind could travel through foreign
countries for three months and go home unchanged -- but
while the arc in Carnet de Voyage is hardly epic
drama, it still adds up to an engrossing story for fans
of Thompson's other books.
Carnet de Voyage by Craig Thompson
Top Shelf Productions
ISBN 1-891830-60-0
224 pages
