(no subject)

[skygiants]

Ironically, Joe Sacco's Footnotes in Gaza was a Hanukkah gift from my dad to the family at large. None of us knew anything about it, except that my Mystery Cousin Mark has a cameo appearance on the first page, and we are all super fascinated by Mystery Cousin Mark.

(Here is what I know about Mystery Cousin Mark: he currently works as a misinformation agent for the government of Dubai; his ex-wife is some kind of Saudi Arabian heiress; and he has a murderous vendetta against the squirrels of Denver, where he keeps a spare house. I've met Mystery Cousin Mark three times - the first time at my cousin's super epic wedding in Israel, at our family reunion in the wilds of upstate New York, where he and my mom reconnected; the second time at a New York dinner party that he invited us to thrown by his buddy the Bosnian sniper; and the third time at our family reunion this past fall, when he picked up this book and was like "see that dude Mark on the front page? That's me! :D" SO YOU SEE THE INTEREST.)

Anyway. It turns out, once I got past Mark's cameo, that Footnotes in Gaza is a work of graphic journalism investigating two massacres of Palestinian citizens from the Israeli occupation of the Gaza strip in 1956. The book is explicitly trying to present the Palestinian view on the incident, and it does a very powerful job of that. Which would make it a hard read for anyone, I think, but kind of especially so for an American Jew with Israeli relatives.

I'm gonna say right now, I really do not want to debate any issues about Israel and Palestine in this journal. I have too many biases and not enough actual information to say anything that I would feel comfortable with living on the internet forever.

I will say, though, that -- there are a lot of narratives, true narratives, about Jews as victims. It's the familiar story that we get, at least in the US. And I do think it's always important, for anyone, to take a look at the other narratives, no matter how uncomfortable -- to get used to the idea that there are stories where that's flipped. I think it's important for anyone to get a grip on the fact that there are places and times and stories in which they are the bad guys, the people who have privilege and power and abuse it, and that those narratives can be true, too.

Comments

[vivien]

A murderous vendetta against Denver squirrels? But they are soooooo adorable!

[skygiants]

HE IS CONVINCED THEY ARE OUT TO GET HIM. According to his report, they pelt him with things every time he steps out of his house! Maybe they are just annoyed by his face.

[james_davis_nicoll]

I had an angry chipmunk do that to me and my fellow campers in Algonquin Park in 1980. The other chipmunks were bold enough to let us feed them treats but this one wasn't, and the lack of food enraged it.

[skygiants]

Somehow it seems more menacing coming from a chipmunk! Maybe because I expect rude and aggressive behavior from squirrels, but chipmunks look so tiny and sweet usually . . .

[schiarire]

One thing that I think is very interesting about the book is that it's EXTREMELY TEXT-HEAVY, with a manic, almost punishing energy coming out of it most of the time. The most effective scenes, in contrast, are either completely silent or nearly so. It made me very curious about what his other work is like.

[skygiants]

I'm curious too! It's true, there is A LOT of text -- though I do really like the places where bits of text overlap each other in that intensely layered way, that actually was very effective for me. If, again, difficult. It took me much longer to read than any other graphic work I have ever read.

[surexit]

Mystery Cousin Mark sounds utterly intriguing, and so does the book.

[skygiants]

Both of these are pretty good summations! (Mystery Cousin Mark is a lot lulzier to me than the book though.)