The Graphic Novel

     In Craig Thompson's graphic novel Blankets, He wrote about his own life, and I found the part of his childhood to be interesting. He had a pretty rough. For example, every day at school, the boys picked on him. He was small and skinny and still looked like a little boy but the other kids were much bigger. They held him like a baby and rocked him and threw him in a ditch. The artist showed emotions the boy was feeling in his drawings. When he was picked on, his shoulders are slumped, his head is hanging down, his eyes are half closed, and his mouth is frowning. This is all worked together to make him look very sad.

      I can relate to this personally because I was picked on in middle school. The boy uses art to escape the bad times and thinks those are the only time in his life that was good. I did not have as bad as that boy, but I did use my art to make me feel better.

      I also choose to write about Blankets because I like the art style. He uses marker and ink in black and white and this helps show dark emotions. One of my favorite scenes is the dream. The curved lines, shapes, and patterns in the dream showed a world where he escaped from his painful life. This was almost opposite from the spike lines and harsh shapes in the scenes with the bullies.

       The artist did a good job showing emotions in his characters, even though he uses a simple art style. Will Eisner uses much more detail in his characters to create emotions, and Craig might use a little more detail to get emotions across to the reader in his characters.