Comics and Narration

Chapter Six. The Subjectivity of the Character

121 Chapter six The Subjectivity of the Character We usually describe as “behaviorist” a narrative in which the knowledge that we can have of characters is limited to their actions and their words and in which we are denied access to their thoughts and feelings. As the Finnish researcher Mikkonen has observed, this is still the most common type of narrative in comics —and he cites Tintin and Corto Maltese as examples.1 We should not forget, though, that words (in the form of direct speech) emphasized by the expressivity of the body are already, in themselves, a privileged means of access to the subjectivity of a character, be it “Petit Christian” or Captain Haddock, as we have seen above. However, there are other types of language use to call upon. The “speech records ” supplied by the balloons can be supplemented by “records of thought,” to adopt the terms of the narratologist Seymour Chatman.2 In fact, comics can deploy a simple and effective resource to express a character’s thoughts, his/her “inner voice”: they can be displayed as direct speech by “thought balloons” (linked to their source by a chain of smaller balloons). The words conveyed in them take on a special status as the reader knows that they have not been spoken aloud but simply formulated internally by the character. The other characters remain oblivious to these thoughts, which are for the exclusive benefit of the reader, who thereby has direct and highly privileged access to the inner life of the protagonist. Arguably, the balloon mechanism is used here to carry out a deception—it connotes a false enunciation, one that has not really taken place except in the innermost recesses of a pseudo “consciousness.” By availing itself of thought balloons, the narrator explicitly positions itself as omniscient, and capable of penetrating the mind of its paper marionettes. The narrator has at its disposal two other ways of giving us access to the characters ’ inner life: by relying on the reciter or the monstrator. The reciter can intervene by means of indirect speech, reporting the thoughts, feelings, conjectures, and other mental activity of the character. In Jimmy Corrigan, Chris Ware gives the reciter responsibility for the articulation of what Jimmy’s 122 the subjectivity of the character grandfather felt on the day when he realized that his own grandmother was going to die: Finally, he decides it’s time to go back./But maybe first he’ll pick out a rock, and give it a name and he’ll keep it with him/for the rest of the night. At least/and it won’t matter/what his dad says/ and it won’t matter what his dad does /. . . /. . . /And while he might have readied himself for harsh words, rough handling or even a slap nothing prepared this boy/for the unchecked sobs/of a child/anticipating the imminent loss of his mother. (unp.) However, examples like this are extremely rare. As a mimetic (or dramatic) art, comics usually favors direct speech, which facilitates the immersion of the reader in the action. Consequently, frequent use is made of the convention whereby thought is transmuted into words. Thus, when Professor Philip Mortimer is exploring the London sewers, it is unlikely that sentences such as “Upon my word, I think this must be the right direction” or “Curses! I’m cornered!”3 are spoken audibly—unless we imagine that the professor is in the habit of talking to himself. Jacobs, however, puts them in speech balloons rather than thought balloons. If the reader is not especially surprised, this is because comics is a monosensory medium in which all the information is transmitted through the visual channel and words are read instead of being heard (the false orality of the speech balloon corresponds to the false enunciation of the thought balloon). It is also because the character-speech balloon pairing is itself a convention that has become completely naturalized after a century of intensive use; it defines the sphere of action of the graphic persona. As Thierry Smolderen writes, the balloon “makes speech spring from the same source as action, assimilating it to a behavior that persists from one image to the next.”4 Moreover, the solution that Jacobs opts for sets up a more dynamic tension between the professor’s soliloquy and the reciter’s monologue that provides a parallel commentary on the scene. It should be noted that, even if the reciter does not report Mortimer’s thoughts...