In a blatant display of bandwagon-jumping (something I try diligently to avoid) I've been reading a lot of graphic novels in recent years. I always enjoyed comics when I was a kid, and have rediscovered a taste for them as they've matured into the graphic novels of today.
But I noticed something recently, when I was reading previews of The Dark Knight and The Watchmen.
The Dark Knight article referred to a pair of Frank Miller Batman graphic novels (Batman: Year One & The Dark Knight Returns) that I've got sitting in my bookcase today. But the articles made reference to things and events in these comics that I simply had no memory of… despite a firm recollection of reading the damn books only a short while ago.
The Watchmen is, hands down, one of the greatest comics ever created (so sayeth the scholars and critics) and I finally got around to reading it last year, but I'm suffering the same problem… scenes and characters that I simply do not remember. Even more interesting is that, for those scenes that I do remember, more often than not what I remember is reading the book… I remember the text, and none of the imagery. One would think that, in a medium that is so much about the imagery, it would stick in my mind. Apparently you'd be wrong.
I'm rereading The Dark Knight right now and it's as if I'm reading a brand new book. There are none of those "oh yeah, I remember that" moments that I get when going back and rereading a book from years past. I can sit down today and read Dune and half of it will be immediately familiar, even though it's been years since I've picked up that book. But for some reason, the text has stuck with me, where the imagery of the graphic novel, and the story accompanying that imagery, is simply gone.
I find this fascinating… that no matter how much I may enjoy the art and style and story of graphic novels, they've got the staying power of cotton candy in my mind, evaporating shortly after I've consumed them. On the plus side, of course, is that I can go back and reread these any time and re-experience what it's like to discover these stories once again. But the downside to that has to be, if I won't remember anything 6 months from now, then what's the point?
I can't answer that, and maybe I don't need to. The instant gratification may be all that comics need to provide. But it's still interesting to me.
As an aside, after writing the title for this post, I looked it up to make sure that "ephemera" meant what I thought it meant. It did, but I found an interesting secondary meaning that's oddly appropriate to a discussion about comic books:
But I noticed something recently, when I was reading previews of The Dark Knight and The Watchmen.
The Dark Knight article referred to a pair of Frank Miller Batman graphic novels (Batman: Year One & The Dark Knight Returns) that I've got sitting in my bookcase today. But the articles made reference to things and events in these comics that I simply had no memory of… despite a firm recollection of reading the damn books only a short while ago.
The Watchmen is, hands down, one of the greatest comics ever created (so sayeth the scholars and critics) and I finally got around to reading it last year, but I'm suffering the same problem… scenes and characters that I simply do not remember. Even more interesting is that, for those scenes that I do remember, more often than not what I remember is reading the book… I remember the text, and none of the imagery. One would think that, in a medium that is so much about the imagery, it would stick in my mind. Apparently you'd be wrong.
I'm rereading The Dark Knight right now and it's as if I'm reading a brand new book. There are none of those "oh yeah, I remember that" moments that I get when going back and rereading a book from years past. I can sit down today and read Dune and half of it will be immediately familiar, even though it's been years since I've picked up that book. But for some reason, the text has stuck with me, where the imagery of the graphic novel, and the story accompanying that imagery, is simply gone.
I find this fascinating… that no matter how much I may enjoy the art and style and story of graphic novels, they've got the staying power of cotton candy in my mind, evaporating shortly after I've consumed them. On the plus side, of course, is that I can go back and reread these any time and re-experience what it's like to discover these stories once again. But the downside to that has to be, if I won't remember anything 6 months from now, then what's the point?
I can't answer that, and maybe I don't need to. The instant gratification may be all that comics need to provide. But it's still interesting to me.
As an aside, after writing the title for this post, I looked it up to make sure that "ephemera" meant what I thought it meant. It did, but I found an interesting secondary meaning that's oddly appropriate to a discussion about comic books:
ephemera plural: paper items (as posters, broadsides, and tickets) that were originally meant to be discarded after use but have since become collectibles.
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