Graphic Novels - A Primer Please?
First off: thanks to people who posted bits of 70's slang. LJ was broken yesterday, and it was hard for me to see your posts and comment for thanks, but thanks :-)
New question/topic, starting with confession time: I have never read a graphic novel. (Well, at least not since reading Tin-tin as a kid.) I have seen them, of course, in almost every bookstore that I haunt, and I've glanced at the covers and even turned a few pages. I've peered over the shoulder of people reading them next to me on planes. I read the comments of people talking about them, all the time. I haunt the blogs of certain graphic novelist authors (well one, at least - Mr. Gaiman...) But I've never read one.
Question time: How *do* you read one? Do people look at the pictures first, then read the text? Do they read the text first, then the pictures? Do they go back and forth - a word, a glance, a word, a glance?
I suspect that there's no easy answer. I further suspect that graphic novels just aren't "for me" - I know that when I go to art museums, I have a truly annoying-to-me tendency to read the little write-ups on the wall before looking at the giant, reason-I'm-there, graphic material of paintings or drawings or photographs.
So? Is there any hope for me? Am I doomed?
Mindy, thankful for any insights people can share
New question/topic, starting with confession time: I have never read a graphic novel. (Well, at least not since reading Tin-tin as a kid.) I have seen them, of course, in almost every bookstore that I haunt, and I've glanced at the covers and even turned a few pages. I've peered over the shoulder of people reading them next to me on planes. I read the comments of people talking about them, all the time. I haunt the blogs of certain graphic novelist authors (well one, at least - Mr. Gaiman...) But I've never read one.
Question time: How *do* you read one? Do people look at the pictures first, then read the text? Do they read the text first, then the pictures? Do they go back and forth - a word, a glance, a word, a glance?
I suspect that there's no easy answer. I further suspect that graphic novels just aren't "for me" - I know that when I go to art museums, I have a truly annoying-to-me tendency to read the little write-ups on the wall before looking at the giant, reason-I'm-there, graphic material of paintings or drawings or photographs.
So? Is there any hope for me? Am I doomed?
Mindy, thankful for any insights people can share