“The man who has no sense of history, is like a man who has no ears or eyes” -Hitler
I hate Berlin by Jason Lutes, but I feel bad.
I feel bad for singling out Lutes (as opposed to other more successful folks I hate like Brandon Graham or Frank Quitely), some poor dude who is just working hard doing something he loves. Something decidedly uncool. With little hope of any reward. I feel bad for the version of myself (the idealistic, formalist one) who grew up in the nineties, but I hate him too.
And let’s just get it out of the way that I haven’t read Berlin – only early chapters of it many years ago.
[pic of my copy – er, um, sold it – imagine a space on the shelf big enough for a “graphic novel”]
But I don’t think my lack of familiarity with the book makes much difference because I’m well enough acquainted with it (I’ve read/listened to interviews with Herr Lutes, in fact) to know that it’s what I find quintessentially boring, concerned with the past as parts, with correctness and historical accuracy, with piecing together a clockwork apparatus that utilizes the “comics medium” properly. parts is parts…
I have these two competing metaphorical agents operating inside my brain: the quick, spontaneous, associative agent and the slower, more organized analytical agent. The analytical agent seeks order, control – building systems that are self-contained and complete. The unresolved nature of the work produced by the quick, spontaneous part of my brain is more interesting, though, to me because its success or failure just seems to happen – I can’t unpack the way it functions.
So, yeah, here’s what I hate: when cartoonists give themselves over completely to their fascistic, organizational side, when the design of the system they’re building is the goal, when the components of the work are these discrete, mechanical operators that are masterfully controlled to achieve a particular end. I can appreciate the craft (and, really, the nineties college kid in me would love to be this sort of craftsman, where deeds would get him into heaven), but the work itself eschews excitement and delight in favor of propriety and cleverness.
It is creative process as control fetish, reducing life to pedantry and toil, cutting out the weirdness, the unexpected beauty that keeps me going.
Nuff said!
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i’m wondering aloud to myself what it was i just read.
I think I gave away all my Berlin issues too. At first that sort of historical realism in comics form was new and interesting, but as time passed I realized that I don’t want to read novels like that, so why would I want to read comics like that.
I have a huge organizational/system aspect in my brain, and it can be great for creation. But, for me, the system acts as a kind of generative device. The system provides a framework to open up the gaps and spaces that can be filled in with anything.
What is this piece of narcissistic garbage?
You hate ‘Berlin’ even though you haven’t read it?
You’re the kind of joyless, instant gratification berke who’d kick Bach to the curb as a controlling Fascist and extoll some nonentity pseudo-punk noisemeister.
Pfui.
Derek- it’s gotta be both, I agree – it’s just dangerous to let the pattern take over.
Several years ago I read (and have possibly quoted before) a transcription of a speech given by some author (dang – can’t remember her name right now) who spoke of beginning a project with a design or conceptual hook and then ripping that skeleton out eventually.
I think that’s a good idea. I’m always more satisfied when I end up with a broken, mushy thing that sparkles.
AB – it’s a meta-essay – I’m trying to see how much hatred I can have directed at myself.
Ideas are sexy; form is sexy; structure is sexy. Berlin is sexy.
Anti-intellectual fetishisation of authenticity is not sexy.
Take a breath, AB.
I think you’re missing something, Jonathan, if you think this is about authenticity.
Authenticity is for the historians. Make mine plastic
This demented non-essay is exactly the sort of thing that turns people off from TCJ-style writing. Oh and despite HU’s break with them, you’re still practicing the sort of comics journalism/essay writing that they pioneered.
People sure are reacting in the best way possible.
It’s working!!
“The unresolved nature of the work produced by the quick, spontaneous part of my brain is more interesting, though, to me because its success or failure just seems to happen – I can’t unpack the way it functions.”
That’s a valorisation of authenticity over craft, and by definition we cannot have authentic access to historical experience. No-one can lay a definitive claim to the historical past, because we can only experience it indirectly (that’s what makes it ‘historical’). Which doesn’t mean the attempt isn’t worthwhile.
What I mean is: dismissing a work of historical fiction on grounds of lack of ‘spontaneity’ is a category error.
This post was asinine — let’s get it out of the way that I haven’t read it. But this is a meta-comment, anyhow, which means that whether everyone ignores it, or people praise it, or people pan it, I win and those that doubt me suck cock by choice.
In conclusion: I am the greatest.
Why are you equating sponaneity with authenticity? I’m just valorizing surprise and excitement…
I am the greatest & the worst. Hate is subjective
To elaborate further: direct experience isn’t interesting to me because it is more authentic; it’s because it’s more unexpected.
I kind of can’t believe people are upset at this essay…though maybe everyone’s joking and I’m not quite picking up on it? In any case…clearly, I’m never going to understand the internet….
Anyway…I don’t think it’s crazy to equate spontaneity with a kind of punk rock/termite art authenticity claim of sorts. But…it’s hard for me to get riled up about it, in part because it’s a conceptual frame that I think isn’t much applied to comics in this way. That is, the binary Jason’s setting up in terms of comics (controlled vs. spontaneous) is (a little oddly) not the way comics are usually split up. Unless I’m missing something, it’s a binary that, for example, doesn’t really have anything to do with mainstream/alternative…which is why Lutes and Quitely get lumped together, for example (which seems like an interesting way to go.)
Along those lines…MG, I am caught flat-footed by your comment, because I have no idea what you’re talking about. You think this is like a TCJ essay? Really? Maybe you could tell me what TCJ authors you’re talking about? Because I really don’t see it…?
Not that HU and TCJ don’t have a lot of crossover; Shaenon and Craig are both columnist over there, just talking about people who wrote for us this week. But I don’t really see it for this piece….?
This is a fun essay but very weird. Have you read The Fall or Jar of Fools by Lutes? I think you’ll find many things you’d enjoy—he really is a poet, so nuanced, and creates excellent scenes that you can get inside of, and experience from the character’s perspective. I think he aims for a much different “reading experience” than what you search for in art. But, I don’t think they have to be exclusive, both can be enjoyable. I know work which I would describe the way you did Berlin, but Berlin is actually great, and doesn’t represent the art you dislike, and it’s not even done yet, sigh…
Or is this ‘meta-essay’ more meta than me? Do you actually love Berlin, and kiss each floppy at night?
Okay, that’s my bad for introducing the word ‘authenticity’, but you can replace it in my previous posts with ‘spontaneity’ without altering the argument, e.g.:
“by definition we cannot have spontaneous access to historical experience.”
Noah: i get the unusual binary being set up, but i’m not convinced by this essay that this is a sound way to think about comics. it’s a shrieking false dichotomy.
Jose- yeah, I’ve read both of those & liked them a lot at the time, but to me they’re operating using a kind of thinking that always bugs me: must exploit the comics-y properties of the medium at all costs.
I should go back & check em out, but the drawings (as with Berlin) are fussy and grating to me.
Am I seeing things or this comments thread really is infested by sock puppets?
All me – sorry!
Just in case that’s not clear…Jason was using aliases. That was de rigeur on the comments threads at his old blog (where comments threads tended to be treated as performance art) but I asked him to stop since it’s not how things usually work on HU, and so ends up being kind of confusing.
re: sock puppets. it was pretty easy to tell, for me at least. no offense taken, etc.
Noah: “I kind of can’t believe people are upset at this essay…though maybe everyone’s joking and I’m not quite picking up on it? In any case…clearly, I’m never going to understand the internet…”
Noah is right. This is easily one of the least offensive essays this hate fest. Jason doesn’t even actually criticize Lute’s comic. It’s more like autobiography.
That’s a valorisation of authenticity over craft
Has James Kolchalka died in vain?
I’m not upset at this essay, it just doesn’t stimulate thought. I disagree with most of what this site spouts, but at least it gives me something to think about. I just feel indifference about what Overby is saying, the same indifference I felt about the Johnny Ryan cartoon. I’ve heard this type of criticism before. It all amounts to “I didn’t like it, so it must be bad.”
I don’t think Berlin is bad, but it’s not for me. I feel (probably wrongly) like I can hold the entirety of what makes it tick in my head without going through the trouble of reading it – like a hyper-elongated gag cartoon. I’m sure there are details, but’s it operates by rendering a plan via a formula (and the drawings are dull to me).
And I like Johnny – he’s really funny, but there is’s formula there, too – I thought it was funny to represent that formula as its skeleton in my crummy minimal style.
19th century realist novel vs. 21st century experimental poetics.
A friend of mine posted this quote to FB:
“In painting, one should avoid worrying about accomplishing a work that is too diligent and too finished in the depiction of forms and the notation of colors or one that makes too great a display of one’s technique, thus depriving it of mystery and aura. That is why one should not fear the incomplete, but quite to the contrary, one should deplore that which is too complete. From the moment one knows that a thing is complete, what need is there to complete it? For the incomplete does not necessarily mean the unfulfilled. ”
-Chang Yen-Yuan, 847 AD.
Love that one. Here’s ol’ Marcel (sure there are a ton more like this from him):
“In the creative act, the artist goes from intention to realization through a chain of totally subjective reactions.”
“And I like Johnny – he’s really funny, but there is’s formula there, too – I thought it was funny to represent that formula as its skeleton in my crummy minimal style.”
When I said the Johnny Ryan cartoon, I meant the Johnny Ryan cartoon, not your parody of it. I don’t like Johnny Ryan because it’s mostly shock, and simulated shock doesn’t shock me (if that makes sense). I still stand by my original post of not liking this type of criticism.
Yeah – it’s not really criticism – more like pretensious goofing off.
This is a total fucken derail but I think I feel the same way about Johnny Ryan as I do about Family Guy. Both can at times be hilarious but at other times they don’t seem to understand that *mean* doesn’t always equal *funny*.
AB, hating on stuff without reading it has always been a hallmark of this blog. Pfui.
While the formal aspects of the comic are certainly carefully considered, the content itself — plot, development, dialogue, etc. — is about as spontaneous as I can make it. I did lots of research, and now I’m making it up as I go, trying to stay true to the characters and their context. By now I know where it’s all going to end up, but getting there is the fun part.
I have to ask, though — is it really better to isolate your calculating self from your spontaneous self? Might there be some harmony to be found between the two?
No – it’s best to do both! I’m living proof of the bad aspects of the other side of the coin ;) sorry for talking out my ass (& being kind of an asshole)
Berlin bored the hell out of me. the one chick’s only personality “quirk” was that she drew in lined notebooks and wrote in blank sketchbooks. the hell?
i really liked Jar Of Fools. much more entertaining/interesting.
And, btw, Mr. Lutes, classy of you to show up in these wild west parts…
Thanks, Milton.
J., Google Alert is a double-edged sword.
Yes
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Derik Badman says:
Take a breath, AB
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Nah, I think his outrage is most commendable. I just couldn’t take the — I suppose we must call it an essay — seriously enough for the bile to start squirting. Here’s somebody who was undeservedly lavished “gold stars” as a kid, I think!
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Noah Berlatsky says:
Just in case that’s not clear…Jason was using aliases. That was de rigeur on the comments threads at his old blog (where comments threads tended to be treated as performance art)
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Ah, “performance art.” (Note to self: when become Dictator Supremus, after the mass-hangings in Wall Street, go after the “performance artists” next…)
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AJA says:
I’m not upset at this essay, it just doesn’t stimulate thought. I disagree with most of what this site spouts, but at least it gives me something to think about.
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Same here!
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Milton Compton says:
…i really liked Jar Of Fools. much more entertaining/interesting.
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Oh, “Berlin” is a vastly better work.
Was too busy defending “V for Vendetta” — another unjustly slammed work, though at least the “slammer” read the work — to stand up for “Berlin.”
(Does a “Find,” with no success.) Looks like my years-old writing from the TCJ message board in praise of “Berlin” is not on my desktop; not having the time to dig through my CDs of archived comments for the fully-fleshed praise of “Berlin” given back then, all I can say is…
…that “Berlin” is exquisitely wrought, a complex canvas showing a wide scope of humanity the likes of which we haven’t seen since Alan Moore’s more “genre-y” writing in “V for Vendetta” and “Watchmen.”
Due to a drastic drop in income as of a few years ago, my comics buying went ‘way down, and so I’ve not read any later collections past the first two. But the cast of characters is richly varied and brilliantly created. There is a wonderful lack of “presentism”: the scene of a middle-class couple, in their humble but cozy home, where the husband tells his wife that he’ll vote for the Nazis because after all they went through in the Depression, all they struggled for to achieve this little bit of stability and domesticity they now have, he won’t have the Bolsheviks take that away.
There are splendid incidental characters like the chap who stands in the traffic-control tower, bemoaning the lovingly prepared but constipation-inducing lunches his wife prepares for him. The brutish dolt whose killing by a Bolshie would inspire the “Horst Wessel Song”; countless others…
And — unlike the dry and dusty tome the research-phobic would expect — “Berlin” features some of the most thrilling sequences I’ve ever seen in comics. Two of which remind how amazingly powerful classical restraint can be. (In painting, consider the pinnacle of this discipline, Piero Della Francesca.)
In one, a splendid young Jewish man (what, there’s no Wikipedia entry on the book, to remind of his name?) tells of his adoration of Houdini, the magician’s extraordinary feats. Has the excitement of a character ever been so palpably communicated?
In another, a Nazi holds up his little girl, that she might better see a speech by “Our leader…the Gauletier of all Berlin” (Quoting from memory). Who is Joseph Goebbels. Rather than presentism-loaded editorializing — “How could these Germans be such fools as to be taken in by this charlatan? — Goebbels’ speech, simply a series of talking-head-and-shoulders shots — is unspeakably powerful; the clipped, dramatic phrases, Lutes’ use of body-language within those constraints, “editing,” making one feel, there but for the grace of God, if I’d been one of those thronged around, at the end of that speech I’d have joined along with Goebbels as, at its climax, he shouts (the first time in “Berlin” we hear the name, if I remember right), “Heil Hitler!”
Two interviews with Jason Lutes: http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=17764 , http://www.bookslut.com/features/2009_01_013875.php .
^ What Mike said in the last section of his extended comment.
Thanks for the kind words, Mike, I really appreciate it. Sadly, I’ve only been able to produce two chapters since those first two collections, so you haven’t missed much.
For the record, I have no problem with people hating my work. I’ve heard it all by now, and none of it bothers me. I try to take the valid criticism to heart, and let go of the rest. In the end, I’m probably harder on myself than any reader could ever be, because I’m confronted with my own faults on a daily basis.
A very sane approach, Mr Lutes.
I get a lot of “excitement and delight” from Berlin, precisely because the high level of care and restraint allows some really over the top moments. The bit where David (that’s the name of the Jewish boy, Mike) watches the Buster Keaton movie and then pulls Rosa Luxemburg out of the canal is a high point for me and I’m not sure you could get away with that in a more spontaneous style.
Really good to see you commenting on here, Jason. A lot of people do seem to dislike Berlin for some reason but it’s just about my favourite thing in the medium. Or is it a form. I don’t think I’d be making comics if it wasn’t for Berlin.
Berlin Berlin