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WORK TITLE: Alone
WORK NOTES: trans by Ivanka Hahnenberger
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE: 2/8/1967
WEBSITE:
CITY:
STATE:
COUNTRY:
NATIONALITY: French
http://www.simonandschuster.com/authors/Christophe-Chaboute/2109189678
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Born February 8, 1967, in the Alsace region, France.
EDUCATION:Studied fine arts in Angoulême and Strasbourg, France.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Graphic novelist.
AWARDS:Alone was chosen as an official selection at the Angoulême International Comics Festival.
WRITINGS
Also author of Sorcières, Le Téméraire, 1998; Quelques jours d’été, Paquet, 1998; Zoé, Soleil, 1999; Pleine lune, Soleil, 2000; Un îlot de bonheur, Paquet, 2001; La bête, Soleil, 2001; and Purgatoire (series), Soleil, 2001. Contributor to the magazine A Suivre and to the collection Les recits.
SIDELIGHTS
Since the 1993 publication of his book Les recits (“Stories”), based on the work of Arthur Rimbaud, Christophe Chabouté has become known as one of the most innovative graphic novelists of his generation. As of 2018, three of his books have been published in the United States.
The Park Bench
Relying exclusively on images rather than text, The Park Bench is Chabouté’s English-language debut. It tells the story of an ordinary park bench and the people who come in contact with it through the seasons. The bench is a trysting spot for young lovers, who carve their initials into it; a place for old friends to meet for a chat; a rough bed for someone without a home. One frequent visitor comes to the bench with a new bouquet of flowers each time, waiting in vain for the woman he loves. Others are too engrossed in their own thoughts to stop at the bench, scarcely noticing it as they pass by.
Frequently touching in its exploration of the themes of loneliness and unrequited love, the book is also filled with humor. In one segment, a woman fastidiously wipes off every inch of the bench before sitting on it, only to begin picking her nose. An older man looks reprovingly at a group nearby who are smoking a joint but is happy to take a toke off the roach they leave behind on the ground. A contributor to Bookspoils said that, in showing intimate glimpses of ordinary life, The Park Bench “speaks volumes.”
Alone
Alone is the story of a shy, disfigured man who lives in the island lighthouse where he grew up. He has never left the island; the only people he regularly encounters are the fishermen who bring him supplies. But he is interested in the outside world he has never seen and that he learns about from the pages of an ancient dictionary. Things begin to change, however, when a fisherman leaves the man a note asking simply, “Is there anything special you would like?” Pondering this question carefully, the man decides that what he wants most is to know where the seagulls that he sees every day come from.
Describing the story as a “delicate fairy tale,” Comics Beat reviewer John Seven found Alone brimming with sympathy and understanding. As Chabouté shows his protagonist discovering small glimpses of the world, said Seven, the author shows that even with sophisticated access to knowledge, “we all have our own lighthouse we’re peering out from at the lives of others.” Chabouté’s striking art and empathetic rendering of his protagonist’s rich inner life, said a Publisher’s Weekly reviewer, make Alone a “stunning humanist fable.”
Moby Dick
Chabouté’s graphic-novel adaptation of Herman Melville’s Moby Dick has also received admiring reviews. Writing in the New York Journal of Books, J. Kent Messum observed that graphic adaptations of literary classics can be difficult to pull off because the original novels may not lend themselves easily to this type of translation. Messum felt that Chabouté’s Moby Dick does not avoid all of these problems but that the author “makes a valiant effort and harpoons a good deal of the targets set before it.” The reviewer applauded the fact that Chabouté follows the original closely and noted that the author succeeds in depicting Captain Ahab’s madness and his crew’s growing anxiety about their voyage.
Appreciating the way that Chabouté’s simple, stark black-and-white illustrations convey the era in which the book is set, Messum nevertheless felt that the cumulative effect of this minimalistic style does do justice to the complexity of Melville’s book. The reviewer also found Chabouté’s dialogue somewhat forced and monotonous. Even so, Messum hailed Chabouté’s Moby Dick as a “compelling vehicle for a retelling of one of the world’s greatest stories.”
BIOCRIT
BOOKS
Chaboute, Christophé, Alone, translated by Ivanka Hahnenberger, Gallery 13, New York, NY, 2017.
PERIODICALS
Publishers Weekly, May 22, 2017, review of Alone, p. 80.
ONLINE
Book Queen Reviews, https://bookqueenreviews.wordpress.com/ (September 17, 2017), review of The Park Bench.
Bookspoils, https://bookspoils.wordpress.com/ (February 1, 2018), review of The Park Bench.
Carpe Librum, http://www.carpelibrum.net/ (December 7, 2017), review of The Park Bench.
Comics Beat, http://www.comicsbeat.com/ (February 1, 2018), John Seven, review of Alone.
Drizzle Review, https://drizzlereview.wordpress.com/ (February 1, 2018), Rebecca Valley, review of The Park Bench.
Drunk in a Graveyard, https://drunkinagraveyard.com/ (February 1, 2018), review of The Park Bench.
Lambiek, https://www.lambiek.net/ (February 1, 2018), author profile.
New York Journal of Books, https://www.nyjournalofbooks.com/ (February 1, 2018), J. Kent Messum, review of Moby Dick.
Outerhaven, http://www.theouterhaven.net/ (February 1, 2018), review of Alone.
Christophe Chabouté published his first work, Stories, based on the work of Arthur Rimbaud, in 1993 in France. Since then, he has received numerous prizes for his very personal illustration and storytelling style. When Alone, a wholly original work of his, published in France, it was widely hailed as his masterpiece and was an Official Selection at France’s prestigious Angoulême International Comics Festival.
Christophe Chabouté
(b. 1967, France) France
Léo Ferré, by Christophe Chabouté
Christophe Chabouté studied Fine Arts in both Angoulême and Strasbourg. His first work appeared in the magazine À Suivre and in a collective album about Arthur Rimbaud in the collectin Les Récits of Vents d'Ouest. His real debut was in 1998, when he produced 'Sorcières' at Le Téménaire publishers. This was followed by 'Quelques Jours d'Été' and 'Un Îlot de Bonheur', which were published by the Swiss Paquet publishers. Back at Soleil, he conceived 'Zoé' in 1999, 'Pleine Lune' in 2000, 'La Bête' in 2001 and the 'Purgatoire' series from 2003. Chabouté has also collaborated on a collective album about Léo Ferré.
Pleine Lune, by Christophe Chabouté
Artwork © 2018 Christophe Chabouté
Website © 1994-2018 Lambiek
Last updated: 2006-12-26
Alone
264.21 (May 22, 2017): p80.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
* Alone
Christophe Chaboute, trans, from the French
by Ivanka Hahnenberger. Gallery 13, $25 trade paper (384p) ISBN 978-1-5011-5332-7
In a remote lighthouse lives a shy, deformed man, the son of the long-departed lighthouse keeper, who has never been off the tiny island. Fishermen bring him supplies. For entertainment, he looks up words in a tattered dictionary and tries to imagine the baffling outside world they describe. (Reading that an oboe is an "instrument with holes and keys," he pictures something like a violin studded with door keys.) Then a curious fisherman sends him a note, and a crack of light shines into his boxed-in existence. This small, graceful story becomes a lush fairy tale through Chaboute's stunning black-and-white art; he lavishes loving detail on the hermit's fantastic inner life and his daily routines on the starkly beautiful island. Chaboute is justly celebrated in his native France, and this is widely regarded as his masterpiece. It's a visually stunning humanist fable. (July)
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Alone." Publishers Weekly, 22 May 2017, p. 80. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A494099077/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=96d2d7d7. Accessed 11 Jan. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A494099077
Review: The quiet poetry of Chaboute’s ‘Alone’
06/13/2017 5:00 PM BY JOHN SEVEN
It’s 84 pages in before the subject of French graphic novelist Chaboute‘s largely silent work Alone finally appears, and even then, it’s only in the form of a hand dropping food to a goldfish in a bowl. It’s a metaphor for how the deformed Alone — that’s what he’s called — lives his life, isolated in a lighthouse with weekly provisions dropped off by a local sailor. The lighthouse is the fishbowl and Alone is just a goldfish, waiting around for help.
Once he does appear fully, nearly 20 pages later, Alone is picking up his package, freshly dropped off, after quickly hiding at the sight of the boat coming. He is interrupted fishing — that is, taking care of himself — and his flight to a hiding place shows that he is not quite a goldfish after all. He sees what goes on beyond the bowl, reacts to it, fears it. Inside the safety of the lighthouse, he hovers over entries in a tattered old dictionary that elicit memories and fantasies, and sometimes brings the together in order to pass the time.
It turns out that he’s not quite as alone as we thought. In a short sequence that shows the goldfish isn’t as much a prisoner of its own limited perceptions either, Alone and the fish have direct interaction, with Alone taking steps to obstruct the fish from something that causes him despair — the sight of his fish dinner. And then it’s back to the dictionary-driven fantasies.
But if the goldfish can interact with its guardian, the implication is that Alone can also connect with his own. And that connection begins one delivery with an attached note that asks, simply, “Is there anything special you would like?”
The outside world is not necessarily one that Alone equates with comfort and happiness. Besides the boat that makes the delivery, what he knows of it are the seagulls who swirl around the lighthouse and the violent beating of the waves against it. The outside world is not really inviting at all. But even the most dangerous vistas will inspire curiosity, even the desire to explore, and what Alone wants most, what he uses his dictionary for and finds other opportunities to engage with, is to visualize what lies beyond the violent waves. Where do the seagulls come from?
Chaboute captures this life with a slow and mostly silent precision, covering the routines inherent in isolation and the limitless possibilities that can be brought to such an existence, like discovering a whole new dimension. The story is a delicate fairy tale in which the monster is victim, the prisoner of the tower, and in which the isolation that defines his life is revealed as more of a universal existence than even he imagines. As Chaboute offers small slices of the world, he shows that despite our knowledge of everything that goes on around us, we all have our own lighthouse we’re peering out from at the lives of others.
Despite the somber quality of the book, it’s an extremely hopeful one. Chaboute isn’t so airy fairy that he seems to think everything works out happily ever after, but he does imply that it’s the exercise of your freedom to live, the earnest attempt to try and live happily ever after, is the thing that actually matters. Since we’re all in the same situation and struggling to be in the world, it’s those who make an attempt who are the true heroes of our fairy tale.
Is man an island onto themselves? When do we begin to realize that there is more to the world than what our imaginations would have to us to believe? Chabouté’s seeks to entertain that question in a graphic novel that changes the questions just when you think you have the answers, Alone. Does the novel leave us questioning things, or does it give a resolution to the questions it seems to keep asking? Title: Alone Author: Christophe Chabouté Publisher: Galler 13/Simon and Schuster Language: English (Translated from French by Ivanka Hahnenberger) Format: Paperback Page count: 367 pages Genre: Publication Date: List Price: $25.00 ($16.77 on Amazon)
Read more at The Outerhaven: Alone Review http://tohvn.com/2tctiPp
There is a hidden beauty in Alone, inspired by Chabouté’s elaborate, yet simplistic drawings. These drawings encompass most of the book, as there is very little dialogue. What little dialogue there is still goes a very long way in creating the world that the story thrives through, and is amazing in its own right. Alone is about a disfigured man who has been living in a lighthouse for all of his life, confined to the sea in what he calls a “stationary stone ship…a granite boat that doesn’t pitch… (227-28)” The man, who is simply referred to as “Alone” by the sailor who commonly delivers goods and provisions to his lighthouse, is accompanied by a lone goldfish and his imaginations of the world outside of his lighthouse, which is completely foreign to him, as he has never left his lighthouse. According to the sailor, his parents left Alone in the lighthouse because of his deformities. Regardless of that, Alone seems to live a fulfilling life, at least to his limited knowledge. It isn’t until halfway through the book where we see Alone, and even then, it’s a silhouette or tiny peeks at him doing something in the lighthouse or fishing. When we do finally see the man, he isn’t as grotesque as it was made to be imagined at the beginning of the story. Alone is deformed, with one eyebrow bigger than the other and a massive overbite with patches of hair on his head, but the deformities are somewhat of an allegory to a matured naivete that makes up his character, someone who isn’t “properly formed” in the image that the world would have him be. He does appear to be content with his living situation, nonetheless. That doesn’t necessarily stop him from wondering what is beyond the endless sea that encircles his lifetime home. Every night he takes his dictionary and drops it on his table to randomly select a word from the book. At first, it seemed somewhat random, however, as the story progresses there seems to be a correlation between the words that randomly pop up and the previous circumstances that Alone witnesses. One such moment starts on page 198, where he witnesses a couple arguing. The man leaves the woman behind for a bit and she sits on the island reading a magazine. When the man comes back, she leaves without the magazine, and Alone goes to retrieve it once they’re gone. After looking through all of the stories and gossip, he takes his dictionary and drops it on the table. He randomly points out “voyage,” and as he does, he begins to lament about what is outside of what he has known as home. Chabouté does an excellent job allegorizing the human curiosity through the eyes of Alone, as evidenced by the child-like fantasies that he experiences after picking a new word from the dictionary. Things like imagining hailing tennis balls for the word ‘metaphor,’ or a violin with actual holes and keys for the word ‘oboe’ characterize this in its entirety. It isn’t until they break from that at the end and Alone has the epiphany after viewing the second definition of ‘prison,’ that Chabouté really encompasses the human capacity for compassion and curiosity. While this is shown in glimpses through the eyes of the younger sailor, Alone’s action of releasing his fish from what he perceives as its own personal prison truly shines this in your face in a shocking, yet welcoming manner. The simplicity of the choice of black and white color is a clear contradiction to the notions that Christophe Chabouté invites us to partake in. Things aren’t black and white in the world. While there is a lot of gray, there is a bit of color too, and in order to live your best life, you must expand your horizons in order to do just that. Alone isn’t a happily ever after kind of book. It’s a ” what’s next in my travels” kind of book and I don’t think I would have enjoyed it as much if it wasn’t. Review Disclosure Statement: Alone was provided to us by Gallery 13/Simon and Schuster for review purposes. For more information on how we review video games and other media/technology, please go review our Review Guideline/Scoring Policy for more info.
Read more at The Outerhaven: Alone Review http://tohvn.com/2tctiPp
REVIEW: THE PARK BENCH BY CHRISTOPHE CHABOUTÉ
November 9, 2017
The Park Bench is full of quiet, revealing, and intimate glances into every day moments, capturing clever little details in the background. Including: romantic couples both young and old, gossiping, people watching, and so much more. This silent graphic novel speaks volumes.
Marketing his English-language debut, The Park Bench is Chabouté’s beautiful and acclaimed story of a park bench and the lives it witnesses. At once intimate and universal, it is one of the most moving books you could hope to come across.
From its creation, to its witness to the fresh ardor of lovers, the drudgery of businessmen, the various hopes of the many who enter its orbit, the park bench weathers all seasons. Strangers meet at it for the first time. Paramours carve their initials into it. Old friends sit and chat upon it for hours. Others ignore the bench, or (attempt to) sleep on it at night, or simply anchor themselves on it and absorb the ebb and flow of the area and its people.
I’ve had my eyes on this particular graphic novel for ages, so when it finally arrived in the mail I took my sweet time perusing the book. Letting the story sit with me for a while was certainly a wise way to go about Chabouté’s work. Though, I do have to say that for that second half I couldn’t help but read through it in a whirlwind. For anyone who loves to be deeply involved in their own thoughts, The Park Bench (both the book and the object) is a must.
the park bench 3-- bookspoils
the park bench 2-- bookspoils the park bench 1-- bookspoils
The above is a prime example of tiny details coming together to create a bigger picture.
the park bench 4-- bookspoils
the park bench 5-- bookspoilsNo words need to describe how the above page is utterly heartbreaking.the park bench 6-- bookspoils
ARC kindly provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.
Publication Date: July 6th, 2017
4/5 stars
Note: I’m an Amazon Affiliate. If you’re interested in buying The Park Bench, just click on the image below to go through my link. I’ll make a small commission!
Review: Park Bench by Christophe Chaboute
park-bench-9781501154027_lgPARK BENCH BY CHRISTOPHE CHABOUTE (GALLERY 13, 2017)
Reviewed by Rebecca Valley
In April, I visited Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum in Los Angeles with my mother. It was an impulse decision – it was hot, Madame Tussaud’s was air-conditioned, and deep down my mother and I are both too vain to resist a good photo shoot. We wandered past eerily life-like figures of Snoop Dogg and Betty White into a gallery of movie sets, where I found the thing I didn’t know I was looking for – a young Tom Hanks in a khaki suit, back straight and feet slightly pigeon-toed, seated on a half-empty park bench.
This bench, of course, is part of the iconic set from the movie Forrest Gump. It comes from the series of scenes that frame the narrative – Hanks tells the story of his life to everyone who happens to sit down next to him. Some ask questions, others check their watches or read the newspaper. This is only a fragment of the film, but it has its own weight. We realize, as we laugh at an old man napping through Forrest’s story of becoming a ping-pong world champion, that we only occasionally become aware of the lives that go on and have gone on around us. We are inherently, and in many ways necessarily, self-centered – we don’t and can’t always know the stories of the people who drive our taxis or hand us our lattes. I grabbed a book from my purse, cracked it open, and posed disinterestedly next to the young, waxy Hanks. My mother snapped a picture. We moved on and left him behind.
Christophe Chabouté‘s latest graphic novel, Park Bench, due out from Gallery 13 this September, deals with these same things – how we interact with a given space, and the way that space can both isolate and unite us. Chabouté‘s book also takes place on a park bench, in an unnamed city; in fact, the only text present in Park Bench is on the cover. The novel proceeds like a silent film, where each panel shows the same park bench, identified early on by a gouged “I ❤ U” on the backrest, as people come and go and seasons pass. Because there are no words, it’s as if we’re watching the bench from a comfortable distance – close enough to see the people coming and going, but not close enough to hear their conversations. In some scenes, where gestures and expressions take the place of spoken language, the silence of the book is forgotten. In others, when a man returns again and again with a bouquet of flowers to wait for a woman who never comes, the silence weighs heavy on the page.
The wonder of this book is the way it allows the reader to focus on moments of small beauty. In one series of panels, a little girl leaves a balloon on a park bench, and the park’s begrudging custodian seems to ignore it completely, only to return a few panels later to carry it away. In another scene, a homeless man who often spends the night on the bench finds a bouquet of flowers on the seat and hands them out to passersby, leaving one in an empty wine bottle by his head while he sleeps. There are also moments of small comedy; one lady wipes down the entire bench with a handkerchief before sitting and promptly picking her nose. Another older gentleman glares at a group of scruffy young men smoking a joint beside him, and then plucks the remnants off the ground after they leave and takes a quick but conspicuous puff.
In the end, Chabouté brings a quiet, commonplace poetry to imbue an inconsequential setting with life, and with meaning. There is loss on this bench, and joy; endings and new beginnings. The beauty of this book lies in the steadfast way it allows us to observe and admire a place we’ve passed a hundred times, and will pass a hundred times more. Nobody else in the book is aware of the moments that pass, but we are. In Park Bench, we watch as the world goes by, and each life takes its steady course.
Park Bench by: Christophe Chabouté
SEPTEMBER 17, 2017
BOOKQUEENC
park bench
Description from the Publishers through Netgalley
With his masterful illustration style, bestselling French creator-storyteller Chabouté (Alone, Moby-Dick) explores community through a common, often ignored object: the park bench.
From its creation, to its witness to the fresh ardor of lovers, the drudgery of businessmen, the various hopes of the many who enter its orbit, the park bench weathers all seasons. Strangers meet at it for the first time. Paramours carve their initials into it. Old friends sit and chat upon it for hours. Others ignore the bench, or (attempt to) sleep on it at night, or simply anchor themselves on it and absorb the ebb and flow of the area and its people.
Christophe Chabouté’s mastery of the visual medium turns this simple object into a thought-provoking and gorgeously wrought meditation on time, desire, and the life of communities all across the planet. This could be a bench in my hometown or yours—the people in this little drama are very much those we already recognize.
My Review:
At first, I wasn’t sure that I was going to like this. It is strictly images and roughly drawn ones without any words. However, as you turn each page the stories that are told are magnificent. You see the lives lived and only constant is this one park bench. I absolutely love this graphic novel and the more I think about it, the sweeter the story is.
I gave this book 5 crowns.
BLITZED BOOKS: CHRISTOPHE CHABOUTE – “PARK BENCH”
October 4, 2017 in Blitzed Books, Book, Book Review, Rigby Wolfe.
I love comics, I have tons on my bookshelf, I’ve read and re read my collections, and I’m constantly on the hunt for new additions. Park Bench by Christophe Chaboute isn’t normally one that would catch my eye, with the plot surrounding such a mundane object as a park bench, it doesn’t exactly jump out and grab your attention. But despite the seemingly dull subject material this comic has stuck with me ever since I turned the last page, and I’m so glad I was able to experience it.
The narrative follows the titular park bench throughout the seasons and the various people that have their lives touched by the bench. The story opens with a couple marking their initials in the wood of the park bench, a marking we’ve all seen a million times before, but it sets the tone for the rest of the story and how the bench is a character in the community. The homeless man trying to sleep, the skateboard kid working on his grind, the lovelorn man waiting for his blind date, the constantly visiting dog using the legs of the bench as a personal toilet, all of their stories and struggles are overseen by the inanimate bench which serves as an unexpectedly important part of their narratives. Seasons change, couples break up, skateboard tricks go unlearned and life moves on. The reader, much like the park bench, has to quietly and impassively watch events unfold. Some are funny, some are heartbreaking, some are simple quiet moments, but they all revolve around the bench.
I adored the simple stark art style in black and white, and no dialogue was needed for me to fully experience the ups and downs of every single page. To tell a story with no words is not an easy task but Chaboute manages to deftly tell a rich and emotional story with the art alone. I cried and laughed, I couldn’t put the book down and once the story was over and the park bench was alone again, the story stayed with me for weeks. If you get the chance to pick this up I highly recommend it, it’s a quick read but it’s worth it. I’ve picked it up a few times after finishing it and loved revisiting the old park bench.
Park Bench by Christophe Chaboute is available from Simon and Schuster publishing. If you are looking for an unorthodox addition to your bookshelf or coffee table Park Bench is a perfect fit.
You can find Simon & Schuster Canada online at SimonAndSchuster.ca, on twitter, and Facebook and keep track of more awesome book releases.
All photographs taken by the oldblackgoat.
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07 December 2017
Review: The Park Bench by Christophe Chaboute
The Park Bench by Christophe Chaboute is a graphic novel about the day-to-day experiences of a park bench. It's a simple premise, but interestingly, there is no text used in the artwork at all. I've since learned graphic novels like this are called wordless or silent graphic novels.
This is my first time reading a wordless graphic novel but Chaboute makes it surprisingly easy to follow the story arc. There are happy, sad, curious and mundane things that happen on, at and around the park bench and the reader is able to follow along with relative interest.
The Park Bench is an entertaining reading experience and has definitely cemented my view that graphic novels should play a part in everybody's reading at one stage or another. I've always been of the opinion that adults who say they don't read, just haven't found the right book or genre yet.
What graphic novels have you enjoyed?
Author(s):
Herman Melville
Release Date:
February 20, 2017
Publisher/Imprint:
Dark Horse Books
Pages:
256
Buy on Amazon
Reviewed by:
J. Kent Messum
“proves a compelling vehicle for a retelling of one of the world’s greatest stories.”
Adaptations of classics can be tricky things. Television and film often come up against the usual suspects: problems with length, translation, or the fact that some novels don’t lend themselves well to other art forms. Whether a reinterpretation or a stickler for source material, updated versions of literature’s great works have their work cut out for them. Christophe Chaboute’s graphic novel of Herman Melville’s masterpiece Moby Dick is no different, though it makes a valiant effort and harpoons a good deal of the targets set before it.
Chaboute’s version follows Melville’s book closely, particularly in spirit. This is no small feat as narrative is almost nonexistent and dialogue dominates the pages. He effectively says more with less, letting his pictures paint thousands of words.
Drawn in a stark pen and ink pared-down style, the work has a throwback vibe that works well in the context of a classic. It’s got a sharp edge and bleak tone to it, helping to render characters as the hard seafaring men they are, as well as showing the relentless pursuit of Moby Dick as the cold, calculated, vengeful act it is.
The panels are often tilted, giving a superb off-balance sense of life aboard an old sailing ship on the open ocean. Chaboute often speaks only in silhouettes to great effect. The black and white also recalls a time and era when people thought much more in terms of such.
Captain Ahab’s madness and single-mindedness of purpose are reflected commendably, as well as the alternating loyalty and increasing worry of his men aboard the Pequod. The tale of the great white whale moves at a good pace in this form, granting a fair amount of valuable insight to a sailor’s lonely life as well as the savagery, courage, and often misguided heroism of whaling in its early days.
This graphic novel was not without a few faults, however. Right off the bat, the introduction written by John Arcudi is a bit presumptuous. The heaps of praise and endorsement are to be expected, but there are some substantial claims made before a reader has even got to the first official page. Arcudi takes great pains to insinuate (if not downright tell us) what we should think of the book before judging for ourselves. By the finale of this version of Moby Dick it seems obvious he was off the mark on a couple things. As the introduction is the first thing read, it proves to be a slight turn off going in, while also setting the bar a little higher than appropriate. The expectations set are not entirely met.
The minimalist artistic style of Chaboute has its merits, but at times one can’t help but think that Moby Dick deserved more, maybe even simply some needed shades of grey. The sheer black and white lacks depth after a while, something that Melville’s original book had plenty of.
Also, someone needs to educate Chaboute in a more nuanced use of the exclamation point. Practically every sentence of dialogue (and it’s almost all dialogue) ends in an exclamation point, giving the impression that all characters are constantly raising their voices, even when they’re clearly not. It seems a trifling complaint at first, but becomes increasingly annoying as the pages wear on, soon establishing a monotonous feeling of forced volume throughout the novel. This overuse feels a bit childish, akin to a cheap comic book, a detraction that could have been easily rectified before publication.
Despite these setbacks, Chaboute’s adaptation is well worth the time of any fan of Herman Melville’s definitive classic. In the hands of this artist, the graphic novel proves a compelling vehicle for a retelling of one of the world’s greatest stories. In fact, it is one we can all get on board.