Book review: Invisible Presence: The Representation of Women in French-Language Comics by Catriona MacLeod

 reviewed by María Márquez López, Universidad Rey Juan Carlos, Madrid

Catriona MacLeod. Invisible Presence. The Representation of Women in French-Language Comics. Bristol, UK/Chicago, USA: Intellect, 2021. 260 pp. $39.95 paper, $113.50 hardbound. https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/distributed/I/bo94635111.html

             

The publication of a new historiographical volume that delves into female characters and comic female authors is great news, as so far those two areas have not had the academic and editorial interest they deserve. A great deal of genealogy work remains to be done but fortunately, some researchers such as Trina Robbins (author of Pretty in Ink. North American Women Cartoonists 1896-2013, Fantagraphics, 2013), or Nicola Streeten & Cath Tate (The Inking Woman. 250 years of Women Cartoon and Comic Artists in Britain, Myriad Editions, 2018) have done so. It was striking though that Franco-Belgian bande dessinée (BD), a major source of great world comic classics, had not attracted the same attention from scholars. Finally Catriona McLeod has produced a vast work on this subject. All in all, this book is a great enjoyment for comics scholars.

 

The oxymoron MacLeod chooses as a title, Invisible Presence, situates the reader with respect to the analytical guidelines which confront an enormous corpus that spans over the entire 20th century and ends in the early years of the 21st century. The author, a lecturer in French studies and politics at the University of London Institute in Paris (ULIP), analyzes in depth the best-known female characters of some bande dessinées (BD) such as Bécassine (1905), Barbarella (1962) or Adèle Blanc Sec (1976). She also highlights possibly less famous works with female protagonists such as Yoko Tsuno (Spirou, 1970), Valérian: agent Spatio-Temporel (Pilote, 1967), Aya de Yopougon (Gallimard, 2005) or Lulu femme nue (Futuropolis, 2008). 

 

Before going into detail about her research, the author tells the readers that what they are going to find on the following pages is, broadly speaking, a failed attempt to graphically and narratively represent a “real woman”, at least according to the BD’s authors (who are mostly male). They claim difficulty in some cases (Tronheim, Moebius), or incompatibility with certain genres such as comedy in others (Goscinny, Hergé). As MacLeod shows, sexuality is the indissoluble and key factor in female representation. Although avoided in the first decades of the 20th century, it was eventually overused in an iconographic journey where young, white, and heterosexual women are the main protagonists.

 

              The book is structured in three sections and thirteen chapters. The first section, “Primary Women Characters,” consists of four chapters which provide information on the three female characters that she feels have achieved the greatest impact on publishing industry: Bécassine, Barbarella and Adèle Blanc-Se). The analysis of Bécassine (La Semaine de Suzette, 1905), a character based on the writer’s Breton maid, Jacqueline Rivière, is quite remarkable. The BD ended up becoming a true best seller thanks to the strategy “defeminized, entirely neutralized as a potentially threatening female representation” (MacLeod, 48) although one should note that the magazine was published for a Catholic school audience. The gender perspective with which MacLeod analyzes how Barbarella (V Magazine, 1962) goes from sexual icon to stereotypical wife and mother in four albums is equally appealing. The author also highlights how Jacques Tardi gives Adéle Blanc-Sec (Les Aventures extraordinaires d’Adèle Blanc-Sec, Casterman, 1976) an “anachronistic independence” in the middle of the 19th century penalizing her at the same time for it with severe physical abuse and a much smaller presence in her own albums than the reader could expect at first (MacLeod, 63, 72, 64).

 

              Throughout five chapters, the second section, “Secondary Women Characters,” draws attention to the lack, or at least very limited presence, of this type of character in the most successful BDs of much of the 20th century (Tintin, Les Schtroumpfs, Astérix among others). MacLeod pays special attention to three works -- Astérix, La Vie de ma mère, Le combat ordinaire -- in which the characters oscillate between de-sexualization, victimization and a new narrative strategy introduced in the 21st century by Manu Larcenet, who portrays “the evolution of women in France” in his albums (MacLeod, 137). It is also worthwhile noting in this section the chapter “Black Secondary Women in the Works of Warnauts and Raives: The Eroticization of Difference,” in which the author reflects on the successful literary trope of the interracial couple (heterosexual, white male, black female) popular in the 1990s BD. As MacLeod underlines, here we are dealing with a feminine iconography in which intersectional variables of gender, sex, race and class intersect (Crenshaw, 1989). And that complicates the Otherness (De Beauvoir, 1949) that characterized the Franco-Belgian BD until then with new signifiers from the exploitation of the longstanding stereotype of the “Black Venus” (MacLeod, 122).

 

             The third section, “Women Characters by Women Creators,” is mainly devoted to recalling the pioneering contribution made by the magazine Ah! Nana (Les Humanoïdes Associés, 1976-1978) in renewing the iconography and narrative of female characters of BD. MacLeod deservedly highlights the pioneering works of Nicole Claveloux and Florence Cestac and focuses on analyzing the discourse on Odile et les Crocodiles (Les Humanoïdes Associés, 1984) by Chantal Montellier. I personally do not agree with certain criticisms MacLeod made about the work of Annie Goetzinger, specifically about her Légende et réalité de Casque d’Or (Glénat, 1976). I consider the value of this work is fundamentally narrative since it shows the gender violence suffered by its protagonist without romanticizing the story (as happened in the film directed by Jacques Becker in 1952), and highlighting the strength of the character to get ahead despite a tragic life of sexual abuse at a very early age. I also disagree with the analysis of the female characters in Ah! Nana in chapter 11: “a small minority focused on women as strong and positive figures who challenge the misogynistic bias of society” (MacLeod, 162). In this sense, I consider it appropriate to contextualize the moment of production of the magazine (post-second feminist wave), when perhaps there was more need to expose injustices and reflect the structural nature of gender violence. Perhaps, if the creators of Ah! Nana had outlined very strong and empowered female characters, the French readers of the time would not have identified with them. As for the chapter “Murdering the Male Gaze: Chantal Montellier’s Odile et les crocodiles,” the discourse on the pioneering contributions of this French author  is brilliant in various ways: from the recovery of the figure of Artemisia Gentileschi in cultural imaginary (widely vindicated in the feminist sphere later), to the denunciation of sexual violence more than thirty years before the #MeToo movement or the invention of the literary trope “rape-revenge” (MacLeod, 172) now present in contemporary audiovisuals such as Promising Young Woman, or I May Destroy You. This last section ends with the chapter “Everyday Extremes: Aurélia Aurita’s Fraise et chocolat” (Les Impressions Nouvelles, 2014) that MacLeod includes as an example of the “de-eroticization of sex” (MacLeod, 184) and a female body’s representation that escapes the (heterosexual) male gaze.

 

Invisible Presence. The Representation of Women in French-Language Comics is a fundamental book for comics scholars, whether or not their research is focused on gender studies. Catriona MacLeod’s detailed analysis of BD, and its male and female authors, is a very valuable source of information especially the vast and varied descriptive level of characters, vignettes, plots and actions. So much so that a narrative thread is sometimes difficult to follow without having the image analyzed appear on the same page. Finally, I have to highlight the importance of the vindicating aspect of this volume, namely highlighting the void regarding female characters and female authors that persists in encyclopedic and historiographical volumes on BD; the difficulty of creating genealogy about 20th-century pioneering female authors, and the gaps in the creation of female characters other than by straight white women. It is also important to acknowledge and deplore, as MacLeod does, the invisibility of French female authors, such as Chantal Montellier, who, despite their enormous and interesting production, have barely been translated.

 

The complexity of walking to the corner with someone: A Swedish book review

 by Gerald Heng

                                          Walk me to the corner     

                                              Anneli Furmark  

                                            Montreal: D&Q

Somewhat by whimsical chance, I picked up Anneli Furmark's Walk me to the corner at the Stockholm library Seriebiblioteket. Anneli Furmark is a well known Swedish painter and comic artist who has a few books (mostly in Swedish) under her belt including Red Winter, one of 2016 Angouleme official selection. She is based in northern Sweden. You can take a look at her works at her website. Seriebiblioteket is one of Stockholm's public libraries, but is dedicated to the world of comics and comics scholarship, and is where I go to get my irregular dose of new comics-reading materiel. I have been meaning to read her book for a while now, but had not got around to it. It has now been two weeks since I checked it out and it is a beguiling book. I been going back to different sections of the book again and again. I might have to get my own copy of the book, as it is almost time to return it to the library. I don't think I will be done exploring this book thoroughly for a while yet, maybe because it is touching on something that is weighing heavily on my mind at the moment.

The book's main protagonist, Elise, shows her thoughts and her desire for Dagmar, and the subsequent consequences of that on her marriage to Henrik. The book also follows Elise's logic and thinking including her selfish reactions to Henrik's rejection of her ideal world, where her desire for Dagmar should have no impact on her marriage, because she still loves him the most. The story-lines wander through dinner with girlfriends, walks with her son, sessions with a therapist and frustration with a Swedish flyttkartong*, are all wonderfully engrossing. The ending part, 'Amusement Park,' is spot on in its analogy.

I am not sure if the story-lines in the book come from her life or from other sources, but Furmark has done a masterful work putting the age-old delicate twin topics of love and desire down on the pages. I keep going back to this question, "What is love?" The desire part is pretty much laid out in the book as Elsie's relationship with Dagmar, but the love part is quite unclear. Elise claims she love both Dagmar and Henrik, but to varying degrees. This gets more convoluted later on when Henrik told Elise he has started his own romantic relationship with someone which leads to Elise falling apart, unable to deal with this revelation.  Maybe the question is intended to be unanswered in the book. This is probably something everyone will have to decide for one's self due to its very nebulous and capricious nature. Maybe it is human nature -- to love oneself the most -- finally at the end of that question.  There is a self-centered duality hinted at in Elise's dinner with her girlfriends where she tells of the wonderfulness of having a passionate relationship with someone she completely connects with, but yet she still needs the long term comforting safety of her marriage with Henrik. So it's apparently a question with no one correct answer, excluding major religions' thinking about fidelity.

Her use of ink, pencil, watercolors washes, more pencil shading, color pencils to tell the story leaves me in awe. The artwork is a mishmash of different techniques but its use to tell the story is perfect. It gels so well for me. If you haven't read it yet, I recommend it highly.

* A wonderful cardboard moving box which comes flat, but builds into a box without any tape and has its own subculture in Sweden and is highly sought after in South Africa, as I discovered when I moved there for work.

Book Review: A History of Women Cartoonists by Mira Falardeau

 A History of Women Cartoonists. Mira Falardeau. Oakville: Mosaic Press, 2020. 298 pp. ISBN 9781771613514. $24.99. http://www.mosaic-press.com/product/history-women-cartoonists/

 reviewed by Jean Sébastien, Professeur, Collège de Maisonneuve

Working in comics, cartooning, or animation was for a long time perceived as man’s work and this is slow in changing. In A History of Women Cartoonists, Mira Falardeau envisions how we can turn the tide. The title of the book shows that one of the ways in which change can be brought is by including more works by women in the canon and to do this by valuing work published by women from the early 20^th century up to the most current day. Even if the book is largely a history of women artists, the last chapters have a different tone.; they act as a call to action in order to get things to change!

In this book, Falardeau gives an overview of the work of creators from the United States, from English Canada and Quebec, from France, Belgium and Switzerland and from the Middle East and the Maghreb. The main portion of her book is structured according to these four regional cut-outs. In her general introduction, she acknowledges that her book, thus, limits itself to only a part of the world’s production by women artists. Such a project, by its very nature, can be celebratory, but deciding who should be included can always become an issue. Falardeau has chosen to reference a larger number of artists in the introductions she writes for each of the four sections that constitute the main content of the book. For example, in her section on the United States she refers briefly to some 60 authors; out of this number, Falardeau selected 15 for whom she has written a more detailed biography, while describing that author’s most important works.

Falardeau’s book is designed to bring forth the similarities in the obstacles that women are faced with, whether in cartooning, comics or animation. In her introduction, she makes a point of noting that these three mediums share elements of a common language. In animation as in comics, women have been less recognized than men and Falardeau’s book works to tilt the balance. This is especially important, for instance, if one is to have a proper historical view of the animation that came out in 1930-1960 period: among the women animators portrayed are two pioneers: American Mary Ellen Bute and Canadian Evelyn Lambart.

A most interesting aspect of the book is its comparative nature. If the section about the United States will not bring any new names to the attention of those who have read Trina Robbins and Catherine Yronwode’s Women and the Comics, or Trina Robbins’ follow-up works, including her more recent Pretty in Ink. Falardeau does a great job in comparing the general economic context and the prevalence of misogyny at different times in the four contexts that she has chosen to look at. For instance, Falardeau links the relative openness to women in newspaper illustration in the United States to the fact that America developed early on a very dynamic illustrated press and that the sheer number of positions opened some of them up to women. She notes that this was not the case in Canada, either English or French, where she finds that women only began to have a presence as major newspapers added women’s pages and children’s pages to their pages from the 1940’s on. In France, there were numerous girls’ magazines in the early 20^th century. However, very few illustrations in such publications were attributed, and even if it is likely that there were women illustrators, most worked in anonymity. Falardeau’s section on the Middle East and the Maghreb is the shortest of the four and she touches very lightly on the political situations in different countries only to point out that, if some women have found it easier to create as expatriates, others became professional illustrators  to work in their home country. Through this comparison of the history of the press, Falardeau compares feminisms within different national contexts finding more advances for women in the United States.

“Should we link this abundant production to freedom of expression generated, on the one side, by a fundamental tradition and on the other, by successive waves of immigration providing the most innovative ideas of feminist thought? Ultimately, the United States were at the forefront of comic’s innovations while the other countries remained a little more conservative.” (p. 154)

Falardeau also points to the differences as to how second-wave feminism entered comics. Whereas in the U. S., this was mostly in comic book form through counterculture publishers, in France, it was the publishers of the science-fiction magazine Métal hurlant who thought that there was a market for a feminist publication in the world of bande dessinée and developed Ah! Nana a quarterly that came out from 1976 to 1978. The title roughly translates to Hey! Gal, but is homonymous with the French word for “pineapple.” In the section about Quebec, Falardeau briefly situates herself in this. As women’s magazines were taking on feminism, one of them asked her to create a strip which she did for from 1976 to 1978. A few years later (1981-1987), Falardeau joined a specifically feminist monthly, La Vie en rose, covered political and social issues; it gave humor and cartooning an important place.

The small press movement of the early nineties embraced autobiography as an important genre in which quite a few women creators of the period found their niche. Falardeau points to the fact that there already was an important autobiographical strand in the work of many women artists before that and refers to Mary Fleener’s comics in the underground movement, Lynda Barry’s early work in alternative weeklies and Lynn Johnston’s syndicated strip For Better or Worse. Even if there have been some opportunities for women in the past decades, feminist criticism has highlighted the slowness in openings within the mainstream. For those who remember Robbins’ criticism of the closed doors for women at Marvel and DC in her 2001 book The Great Women Cartoonists (to which Falardeau refers), there is a sad resonance to be found in more recent criticisms in France against the Angouleme International Festival which has granted its Grand Prize to only three women since it was founded in 1974. One of the festival’s attempt to correct the situation was miserably sexist; in 2007, the festival had come under heavy fire for having named an event “the brothel”, “La maison close.” In 2016, a collective of women authors called for a boycott because that year there were no women at all in the list of thirty author candidates for the Grand Prize.

In accounting for current production by women, Falardeau takes into account the rise of webcomics. She duly notes issues that come with self-publication on the web, especially that of needing to monetize one’s work, and the fact that, especially for younger artists, webcomics have served as a springboard to get attention from traditional publishers. Here she brings to attention a few artists in each of the four geographical groupings she highlighted. Her book is a who’s who in this new medium, from Meredith Gran and her comedic Octopus Pie to the tidal wave of blogs in France (many of them by women in the early years of this century), to the more recent political use of Facebook posts by Nadia Khiari in which she drew, Willis from Tunis, a cat who commented about the Arab Spring.

Even if Falardeau’s book is mainly designed as a canon-making work, she has found it important to show how empowerment of women cartoonists has been possible over time. In a chapter titled “Three Examples of Positive Action,” she opens with a short history of the New Yorker magazine. Its liberal founders, Harold Ross and Jane Grant published a great number of women illustrators. Her brief overview of the less-than-great record of the magazine in the ‘50s and ‘60s in its openness to women is meant to show that there needs to be an awareness about patriarchy’s hold on the workplace, and on certain types of work at the decision-making level, if change is to be attained. She makes this even more clear with her next example. The National Film Board of Canada developed structures in the early 1980s that encouraged the development of a women’s cinema. However, it was only in 2016 that the organization gave itself the goal of getting to 50% of its productions directed by women. Political cartooning still is, by and large, a line of work in which the number of men is disproportionate.  The organization Cartooning for Peace, founded in 2006, has chosen to value the membership of women cartoonists in many of its activities.

A History of Women Cartoonists translates and updates Falardeau’s 2014 Femmes et humour published by the Presses de l’université Laval. In each of the contextual pieces that precede the portrayals, Falardeau added a new paragraph or two. Among the additions in the section discussing the United States are Lisa Hanawalt and Eleanor Davis. In the section about Canada, she features Emily Carroll’s innovative work with webcomics. The call to boycott the Angouleme festival in 2016 is one of the new additions in the contextual text about France. In the case of artists from the Arab world, she added references to a few political cartoonists, among them Samira Saeed and Menekse Cam. However, the editorial work on the book by Mosaic Press is subpar. There are words in which a letter is missing. Some names have not been checked. For instance, when referring to French academic Judith Stora-Sandor, her name is properly spelled on page 22, but misspelled twice on page 246 as Stora-Standor and Stora-Stantor.

Falardeau concludes her book by taking on a certain number of issues. For instance, in cartooning, how can a character be designed to represent humans in general? She notes that the use of characters identifiable as women will lead to an interpretation of the drawing as referring to women specifically. Can the universality of a situation only be represented by the inclusion of male characters? Then there is the issue of caricature --in exaggerating characteristics, one runs the risk of encouraging stereotypes. The situation is not much better in the work of academics who analyze the work of women, where the cliché is noting the ‘sensitivity’ of the work of a woman author. Falardeau closes this short chapter by noting “the obvious link […] between humor and power, and consequently, the difficulty for women […] to achieve recognition for themselves in the world of humour” (p. 247). Destroying stereotypes takes time. “This is the task that feminist women cartoonists have given to themselves. But which stereotypes? Those held by men? The way that they see women? Or the opposite? The way women see themselves?” (p. 258) The last words in her conclusion come as an answer: “Women cartoonists need to create their own mythology.” (p. 269)

A version of this review will appear in print in IJOCA 23:2.

Book Review - Menopause: A Comic Treatment

All images courtesy of Penn State University Press

reviewed by Janis Be Breckenridge, Whitman College

Czerwiec, MK, ed. Menopause: A Comic Treatment, University Park, Pennsylvania State University Press, 2020, 135 pages, $29.95, ISBN: 978-0271087122.

 Shattering the silence and secrecy surrounding the ‘big change,’ Menopause: A Comic Treatment offers an unflinching look at an often stigmatized or taboo topic. For those unsure of the precise nature of the biological process, the National Library of Medicine defines menopause as “the time in a woman's life when her period stops. It usually occurs naturally, most often after age 45. Menopause happens because the woman's ovaries stop producing the hormones estrogen and progesterone.”

 This collaborative volume collects twenty-five highly distinct graphic works that vary in length from single-page comics to a sixteen-page illustrated narrative. Showcasing an array of personal experiences, the intimate stories convey multiple aspects of this biological event, from physical to psychological, hormonal to spiritual. While one author-protagonist somewhat anxiously anticipates perimenopause, the majority narrate the process as it unfolds or reflect upon it in hindsight. Most undergo menopause naturally, seemingly as a rite of passage, while others detail early onset, chemical, or surgical menopause. In parallel fashion, these testimonials run the gamut of emotional responses from confusion and frustration to curiosity and fascination. Even as some contributions narrate overcoming shame and ignorance, others insist upon jubilant celebration or assume a defiantly irreverent attitude. A particularly laudable characteristic of the anthology is the diversity of the contributors—across the spectrum of age, ethnicity, profession, sexual and gender identification, even expertise with comics creation itself—that have come together to share their wide-ranging perspectives. In short, Menopause: A Comic Treatment effectively illustrates how the complexities of menopause are anything but a singular experience.

 In a brief introductory essay, editor MK Czerwiec (known online as Comic Nurse) relates her own unpreparedness for the destabilizing effects of perimenopause and how failure to find adequate representation in popular culture led to the creation of this volume. Discovering a paucity of comics on the topic, and worse, that the few in existence were denigrating and judgmental, Czerwiec was determined to produce a work with a positive ethos aiming to help women understand their bodies, navigate the unknown, and foster a community of support. In her words, “A new collection of comics was needed—one that shared stories that might actually be helpful, stories that encourage those of us facing the symptoms of perimenopause to find our voices rather than remain silent, to invite us into strength rather than push us further into shame” (2). The result is the most recent of nineteen titles in Pennsylvania State’s pioneering Graphic Medicine book series which, as stated on their website, affirms “a growing awareness of the value of comics as an important resource for communicating about a range of issues broadly termed “medical.” 

 True to the spirit of the graphic medicine series, Menopause: A Comic Treatment effectively informs the reader by depicting real-world, lived experiences rather than touting medical jargon. Two contributions—not coincidentally those of medical practitioners themselves—directly incorporate the voices of healthcare and academic professionals, only to immediately turn away from specialized terminology and instead offer personalized responses as laypeople. Monica Lalanda’s comic, “When My Biological Clock Stopped Ticking,” opens with her discussing menopause “as a doctor” but the impenetrable language quickly degenerates into “blah blah blah” (26); her response “as a woman” immediately follows and provides the more relatable perspective maintained in the rest of the cartoon. 

Excerpt from “When My Biological Clock Stopped Ticking” by Monica Lalanda

 

 Similarly, Czerwiec’s “Burning Up” includes a full-page panel in which a professor of neurobiology lectures about the neurobiological functioning of the hypothalamus; the rest of the comic presents her personal and far more-accessible theory that the purpose of hot flashes is, and I cite her technical explanation verbatim here, “give-a-shits burning off” (34). Throughout the anthology, contributors share private thoughts, personal coping strategies, and individual ways of coming to terms with myriad symptoms including hot flashes, cold sweats, six-month-long periods, vaginal dryness, thinning hair and dry skin, vaginal atrophy, lack of sleep, etc. An absolute rejection of menopause as a pathology, however, becomes a common denominator across their stories. 

Excerpt from “Burning Up” by MK Czerwiec

 

 In representing the myriad ways that contributors maintain their “own styles for living through the challenges of perimenopause” (3), the volume showcases correspondingly divergent narrative and visual styles. Comics by newer and first-time artists are accompanied by those of veteran cartoonists whose work will be immediately recognizable to comics enthusiasts. Lynda Barry’s “Menopositive!” maintains the characteristic attributes of her unique genre of autobifictionalography by humorously revisiting traumatizing uncertainties of girlhood, cultural anxieties, and triumphant moments of self-discovery. 

Excerpt from “Menopositive!” by Lynda Barry

 

 Roberta Gregory’s contentious signature character, the angry and often crass Bitchy Bitch, makes an appearance (a reprint from her last Naughty Bits storyline, issue #40, 2004). Her bitter rant about first menses and the inconveniences of menstruation ends with manic glee at the prospect of burning feminine her hygiene products and never suffering with cramps or PMS again. And true to her own underground comix roots and work with Tits and Clits, Joyce Farmer offers a funny, potentially scandalous, sex-positive comic affirming not only that menopausal women get horny, they also know how to take care of themselves.

 An examination of the cover art reveals how the design anticipates the volume’s intimate content, complex intricacies, and often surprising juxtapositions. A blood-red overlay on a dramatically enlarged comic, together with the large white and yellow lettering that boldly announces the volume’s title—which seems to scream and leap off the page—confers a sense of urgency, if not a somewhat harsh, almost garish, quality. The strategically cropped reproduction of Teva Harrison’s “The Big Change” depicts a stand-up comedy routine in which the speaker verbally calls out and simultaneously acts out (bodily and through exaggerated facial expressions) myriad symptoms linked to this time in her life when “estrogen has left the building.” With an effective combination of sparse text and cartoonish close ups, each panel lingers on a single, specific indicator of perimenopause. Not coincidentally, hot flashes take center stage. In this way, the comedienne dramatically illustrates, with grace and humor, that menopause is no laughing matter. But the punchline, revealed only here within the comic, truly delivers a one-two punch: the speaker suffers sudden and acute symptoms as a result of surgical menopause, but finds vengeful solace in knowing that her suffering causes her cancer to suffer. The contributor biography at the book’s conclusion informs the reader that the original comic appeared in Harrison’s In -Between Days: A Memoir About Living with Cancer and, tragically, that the author later died of breast cancer. This poignant work, which weaves the volume together from start to finish, aptly conveys the anthology’s overall tone and structure. The comic exemplifies the creative blending of the personal and the clinical even as it graphically illustrates how serious complications can be treated with ludic undertones.

 Further highlighting the bewildering effects of menopause, graphic memoirist Mimi Pond uses techniques of exaggeration, distortion, and excess in “Women’s Carnival.” A middle-aged woman and her mother stumble upon a women-only funfair complete with a tunnel of love (whose red waters dry up before the ride is over), fun house mirrors (where the rapidly aging mother eventually becomes invisible), a mood swing (in which she insists that she never loved or perhaps feverishly loved her husband), and a hormone scrambler (a metaphor? ask the characters with ironic self-awareness). 

Excerpts from “Women’s Carnival” by Mimi Pond

 Pond’s bizarre carnival culminates with a freakshow that delivers scathing social critique. To the protagonists’ incredulity, rare women, true oddities—such as one who asked for and received a raise, another who can still wear her high school clothes, and another who confronted a coworker and received an apology—are put on display. The climactic highlight features a naked chorus of the world’s angriest women who take the stage to rage at having been discredited, objectified, and dismissed. The mother, visibly transformed after experiencing one wild ride after another, ultimately opts for the freedom and liberation of running away with this circus. These escapades, rendered in bright, flashy colors, demonstrate the absurdity and unpredictability of women’s biological cycles together with their unequal social status.

 Likewise exploring how women perceive themselves and are perceived by society, but now through the lens of gender and sexuality, two comics signal the need for greater inclusivity in discussions around menopause. For Ajuan Mance, uncertainties about when perimenopause will begin and what it will be like raise a unique set of questions as a gender non-conformist. In “Any Day Now” the genderqueer academic, self-described as a “woman-identified-gentleman-scholar” (66), points out that womanhood has been defined by doctors and poets primarily in relation to motherhood, fertility, and femininity. Reflecting on the shared (and unshared) professional and personal milestones experienced by members of a female cohort brings recognition of personally deriving identity more from intellectual adeptness and physical strength than reproductive functioning. With this insight, worries about being able to continue wearing favorite sweaters and ties during heat flashes shift to concerns about potential memory and dexterity losses more commonly associated with aging. The experimental comic, in which each page becomes a technical exercise in the shifting use of color to indicate changes in tone, time, and emotional states, foregrounds the reality that conversations around menopause presume a CIS gender identity.

Excerpt from “Any Day Now” by Ajuan Mance

 

 In a similar vein, trans author KC Councilor’s “Cycles” opens with a question that leaves him disconcerted: what is it like to go from a body that cycles to one that doesn’t? The comic then explores, in retrospect, the situation of being trapped in a female body, feeling aversion and loathing towards its regular cycles. A flashback reveals how this disconnect was externalized when her parents openly celebrated her first menses, an event that she experienced as a “bloody painful horror” (75). A more humorous disjuncture takes place during hormonal transitioning when, experiencing a period while using the men’s restroom, he nearly pelts another man as he tosses a bloody tampon into the trash. The final panel poses a disarming inversion to the comic’s opening as he poses a comparably jarring question, one that will likely give the reader pause: “What does it feel like to relate to the body you’re in?” (77). 

Excerpt from “Cycles” by KC Councilor.

 

 The publication of Menopause: A Comic Treatment is particularly timely if the Washington Post’s Wellness section is any indication. Several recent articles address the topic, citing the importance of normalizing conversations around menopause in order to ensure that women get the care, guidance, and support they need to safely manage disruptive symptoms. “Why Everyone Needs to Know More about Menopause - Especially Now” (June 29, 2020) laments women’s lack of knowledge and discusses the positive, stress-reducing impact open discussions around perimenopause can have, pointing to how this is especially critical during the pandemic when anxiety and depression are on the rise. “Experts are Cheering Michelle Obama’s Openness about Hot Flashes. And They Have Some Advice” (August 20, 2020) again underscores the value of open discussions and praises the former First Lady for being forthright about her own experiences, while “Another Routine the Pandemic has Disrupted: Your Period” (August 24, 2020) offers anecdotal evidence of increased irregularity in women’s cycles due to the stresses of the pandemic.

 Indeed, centered on the intersection of women’s bodies and real-life experiences, Menopause: A Comic Treatment heeds this urgent call for candid and frank discussion, sharing information and resources, and forming supportive networks. As this review has hopefully made clear, each comic offers a unique and particular response to perimenopause. Yet through these intimately personal if not openly confessional tales, several overlapping themes emerge. These include flashbacks to the uncertainties and fears that surrounded first menses, encountering the invisibility that awaits the aging female in society, coming to terms with myriad symptoms, and ultimately discovering a newfound sense of liberation and freedom. Contributors give voice to uncertainties and fears, but often feature protagonists who overcome shame or ignorance to ultimately find satisfaction, gaining both empowerment and independence. In short, these women come to accept if not embrace this transitional period (no pun intended). MK Czerwiec’s groundbreaking anthology successfully achieves her important goals of breaking silences, exposing secrets, and drawing together individuals to create a community of knowledge. The many laughs along the way are an added bonus. 

Janis Be, Professor of Hispanic Studies, specializes in socially committed narrative and visual cultural production. Her scholarship on Spanish-language comics, which has appeared in IJOCA, ImageText, Ciberletras, Chasqui, Confluencia and Ergocomics, covers such diverse topics as Argentine feminism, the Spanish Civil War, childhood recollections of Pinochet’s Chile, Alzheimer’s, addiction, and traumatic memory. Versions of this review will appear online and in print in IJOCA 22:2.