Dessins et textes de ALISON BECHDEL. 20€ chez denoêl graphic. C’est beau, ça les vaut !

ce qu’en dit la pie :

"A l’occasion de son premier passage à Paris, rencontre-signature avec Alison Bechdel pour la parution de son roman graphique Fun Home. Une tragicomédie familiale (Denoël Graphic). L’auteure des fameux "comic strips" Dykes to watch out for (10 albums publiés en anglais) s’est lancé avec éclat dans le roman graphique avec l’histoire de sa relation à son père au fil de son enfance et de son adolescence. Un père dont elle suppose qu’il s’est suicidé à l’âge de 44 ans (...). Alison Bechdel trace avec délicatesse et humour sa jeunesse et l’éveil de son propre lesbianisme liée à sa passion des livres qu’elle partageait avec son père. Comme toujours, scénario et dessins sont précis, expressifs, fourmillant de détails qui révèlent une atmosphère au delà de l’histoire. Fun Home a été publié en feuilleton cet été dans Libération et sera présenté en primeur à Violette and Co."

ce qu’en dit jackadandy

"He tries to dress her like a Victorian doll ; she wants a custom-made men’s shirt with French cuffs."

Bitch Ph.D. reviews an advance copy of Fun Home, Alison Bechdel’s new autobiographical graphic novel about growing up lesbian in a funeral parlor with a closeted gay dad who dies in an accident/suicide.

Bechdel, syndicated cartoonist of Dykes to Watch Out For, talks about creating in this interview at AfterEllen.com.

She describes her artistic process as a "failure of imagination" and insists she doesn’t understand how people can write fiction. For her comic strip she "literally acts out each scene that she draws, complete with props and costumes, posing as each person in a frame and capturing it all in photographs... ’It indicates a weakness in my drawing technique,’ she...says. ’I can’t make stuff up in writing or in drawing ; I can only reproduce it.’”

For the new graphic novel she "found herself reenacting difficult scenes in her life and ’marinating in it.’ A few years ago she actually visited the stretch of highway where her father was hit by a truck and took photographs of trucks rushing at her down the road."

Oosh.

Above, Bechdel finally gets a look at the result of her seven years of labor. In the accompanying post on her site, she writes, "I’m deeply pleased, but not elated, for some reason. I feel a bit like Mr. Earbrass, the protagonist of my favorite Edward Gorey book, The Unstrung Harp. When he spots a copy of his latest novel in the window of a bookseller’s, Mr. E. is overcome by ’a state of extreme and pointless embarrassment.’"

(...)

Bechdel’s starting a book tour, and unfortunately I’ll miss her by a couple of days in S.F. but maybe you’ll be more lucky.

Addendum : Bechdel has just been in the process of revamping her Website/blog, and the link to her post above has been updated and should now be correct.

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