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BETWEEN PANELS: NOSTALGIA IN THE WORK OF DANIEL CLOWES DANIEL MARRONE A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS GRADUATE PROGRAM IN COMMUNICATION AND CULTURE YORK UNIVERSITY, TORONTO, ONTARIO JUNE 2009 Library and Archives Bibliotheque et 1*1 Canada Archives Canada Published Heritage Direction du Branch Patrimoine de I'edition 395 Wellington Street 395, rue Wellington OttawaONK1A0N4 Ottawa ON K1A0N4 Canada Canada Your file Votre reference ISBN: 978-0-494-53731-2 Our file Notre reference ISBN: 978-0-494-53731-2 NOTICE: AVIS: The author has granted a non L'auteur a accorde une licence non exclusive exclusive license allowing Library and permettant a la Bibliotheque et Archives Archives Canada to reproduce, Canada de reproduire, publier, archiver, publish, archive, preserve, conserve, sauvegarder, conserver, transmettre au public communicate to the public by par telecommunication ou par I'lnternet, prefer, telecommunication or on the Internet, distribuer et vendre des theses partout dans le loan, distribute and sell theses monde, a des fins commerciales ou autres, sur worldwide, for commercial or non support microforme, papier, electronique et/ou commercial purposes, in microform, autres formats. paper, electronic and/or any other formats. The author retains copyright L'auteur conserve la propriete du droit d'auteur ownership and moral rights in this et des droits moraux qui protege cette these. Ni thesis. Neither the thesis nor la these ni des extraits substantiels de celle-ci substantial extracts from it may be ne doivent etre imprimes ou autrement printed or otherwise reproduced reproduits sans son autorisation. without the author's permission. In compliance with the Canadian Conformement a la loi canadienne sur la Privacy Act some supporting forms protection de la vie privee, quelques may have been removed from this formulaires secondaires ont ete enleves de thesis. cette these. While these forms may be included Bien que ces formulaires aient inclus dans in the document page count, their la pagination, il n'y aura aucun contenu removal does not represent any loss manquant. of content from the thesis. 1+1 Canada BETWEEN PANELS: NOSTALGIA IN THE WORK OF DANIEL CLOWES by Daniel Marrone a thesis submitted to the Faculty of Graduate Studies of York University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS ©2009 Permission has been granted to: a) YORK UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES to lend or sell copies of this thesis in paper, microform or electronic formats, and b) LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA to reproduce, lend, distribute, or sell copies of this thesis anywhere in the world in microform, paper or electronic formats and to authorize or procure the reproduction, loan, distribution or sale of copies of this thesis anywhere in the world in microform, paper or electronic formats. The author reserves other publication rights, and neither the thesis nor extensive extracts from it may be printed or otherwise reproduced without the author's written permission. IV ABSTRACT This thesis investigates the tendency of comics toward longing for the past. An understanding of sequential art as a unique system of signs undergirds attentive description of instances of nostalgia in the distinctive but wide-ranging work of Daniel Clowes. Despite great variations in tone, this work shares a sense of ambivalence, an expectation of careful reading, and a corresponding proliferation of gaps, all of which is in some way tied to longing. In each of the books examined, longing is emphasised by the formal particularities of comics: the prevailing suggestion of this thesis is that the fundamental operation of sequential art mobilises and makes space for narrative interpolations in a way that is not only comparable to but in a certain sense mimics the historical interpolations of memory. It is the space between panels - which acts as a tangible analogue of memory - that makes comics uniquely suited to nostalgic stories. V ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Sincerest thanks to Colin Mooers, Susan Ingram, and Ruth Panofsky for their nuanced advice, steady encouragement, and attention to detail. I am also indebted to Ed Slopek for recommending the work of Roman Ingarden and Kevin Dowler for introducing me to that of John Durham Peters. Finally, a special thanks to Sarah Pinder for her constant support. VI TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract iv Acknowledgments v List of Figures vii Introduction 1 1 The Grotesque, the Uncanny, and Nostalgia in Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron 15 2 Longing for Authenticity: The Camp Sensibility of Ghost World 37 3 Hypothesizing a Coherent Narrative: A Misreading of David Boring 57 4 Notes on Ice Haven 72 Conclusion 87 vii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: A page from Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron (1993). 17 Figure 2: A page from Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron (1993). 22 Figure 3: A page from Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron (1993). 29 Figure 4: A panel from Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron (1993). 34 Figure 5: A panel from Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron (1993). 34 Figure 6: A panel from Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron (1993). 34 Figure 7: A panel from Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron (1993). 34 Figure 8: A panel from Ghost World (1997). 41 Figure 9: A panel from Ghost World (1997). 49 Figure 10: A panel from Ghost World (1997). 51 Figure 11: A page from Ghost World (1997). 53 Figure 12: A page from David Boring (2000). 61 Figure 13: Panels from David Boring (2000). 62 Figure 14: A panel from David Boring (2000). 63 Figure 15: Panels from David Boring (2000). 65 Figure 16: A page from David Boring (2000). 67 Figure 17: Panels from Ice Haven (2005). 74 Figure 18: Title page from Ice Haven (2005). 77 viii Figure 19: Panels from Ice Haven (2005). 78 Figure 20: Panels from Ice Haven (2005). 82 Figure 21: A page from Ice Haven (2005). 84 Figure 22: A panel from Ice Haven (2005). 85 1 Introduction This investigation springs from the conviction that the frequent appearance of nostalgia in many of the most popular and critically acclaimed comics is more than mere coincidence. The abundance of memoirs, period pieces, carefully researched chronicles, and otherwise historically inflected work (to say nothing of the longing for a lost home that defines superheroes as familiar as Superman and Batman) suggests that comics as a medium may be particularly suited to excavation of the past. Comic book authors have identified the significance of longing in their work - Seth has remarked that "the whole process of cartooning is dealing with memory" (Taylor 15); Chris Ware's introduction to his book Quimby the Mouse is openly homesick - but the relationship between nostalgia and comics remains almost entirely untheorised. While some critics take as axiomatic the notion that "art thrives on nostalgia" (Davis 73), the principal goal of this thesis is to investigate the ways in which sequential art thrives on nostalgia. Due to its thematic diversity and crossing of genres, the work of Daniel Clowes is extremely well suited to this investigation. Distinctive but wide-ranging, Clowes's comics are at times overtly nostalgic, but they often trace much subtler forms of longing as well. Although he boasts 2 at least one very popular and accessible work {Ghost World, adapted into a film in 2001), many of his less straightforward narratives have not been the subject of critical examination. This research focuses on several of his longer works, all of which were originally published serially, often alongside other stories, in his long-running comic book series Eightball. It is in these sustained narratives that the nostalgia in Clowes's work is able to fully develop and its inseparability from his medium of choice becomes most clear. In The Future of Nostalgia, Svetlana Boym provides, among other things, an indispensible history of the term: rarely associated with physical illness, "nostalgia" can be traced to Johannes Hofer, a Swiss doctor who coined the word in 1688 to diagnose a homesickness so acute it could lead to nausea, fever, and even cardiac arrest (3-4). Due to its obsessive tendency, Boym characterises the condition as a mania: the sufferer, invariably a Swiss soldier in these early instances, compulsively returned to thoughts of home (4). Curable at first by the longed-for return home, as it swept Europe this "mania of longing" (4) gradually shed its physical symptoms and by the eighteenth century became quite difficult to relieve (6). The need for a remedy, however, became less pressing as the affliction was enthusiastically adopted as a romantic attitude; Boym suggests "I long therefore I am" as "the romantic motto" (13). The nineteenth century saw the institutionalisation of nostalgia "in national and provincial museums and urban memorials," accompanied by the rise of "armchair nostalgia" and the popularity of furniture that allowed the owner to organise memories, such as curio cabinets and display 3 cases (15). Boym correlates this with the "fondness for herbariums, greenhouses and aquariums," all circumscribed mini-arenas that contributed to the museification of the home (16). This enabled private indulgence in nostalgia- "a sentiment of loss and displacement" (xiii) - without being displaced. Having become a saleable commodity, longing inevitably developed into a style, a mode (16). Taken at its Greek roots, nostalgia might be literally defined as an ache {algid) for the return home (nostos), but one of Boym's first definitions is somewhat more precise: "a longing for a home that no longer exists or has never existed" (xiii). The fictive, imagined home has much in common with the nation and, indeed, nostalgia has always had national stakes - Hofer could not help viewing the disease as a product of his countrymen's patriotism (Boym 4).