Skip to main content

The Arrival: Certainty and Uncertainty (3 Points)

 The Arrival by Shaun Tan follows the life of a man who leaves home in order to find new opportunities for him and his family. He sets out alone, and seems often confused about the new culture he is around. With the need of guidance, he asks people around him for directions, he asks for assistance in daily tasks, and he searches for a job, all the while encountering people who also have, at some point in their life, fled their home to this new place. I felt that this story dealt a lot with the bittersweet feeling of this new life being mostly uncertain contrasting with the certainty of his family. One of the more bittersweet moments for me was when, after a series of tests and procedures, the man goes to his new, cramped home and pulls out a briefcase that has his wife and child at a dinner table in it. To me, this represents his uncertain future contrasting with his memory of his family motivating his determination to keep going even through difficulties adjusting to this new environment. Another moment of bittersweet comes right after this scene, where the man hangs up a framed photo of his wife and daughter, and the panels 'zoom' out of the scene to reveal a large apartment-style building with people in many of the windows. Even farther out of the scene, we see more apartment buildings alongside a factory-like building. While the environment resembles his room in that it is cluttered and tightly packed, the lighting and tone of the scene, along with the bright birds, makes it feel like there is hope for the future. The same tone and lighting comes back in the end of the novel when the family finally arrives to the new place. This moment also appears bittersweet to me as the dad is teaching the daughter part of the new culture he learned, surrounded in this small space by all his new items that he has obtained throughout his journey. Despite the change, the family is happy and smiling in their new environment.  

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Killing Joke (2 Points)

  1. What is your reaction to the text you just read? Well, there were definitely parts that I did not vibe with, but there were also parts I enjoyed. As a whole, I think it does a really good job of story-telling and creating complex characters, as well as the timing for the story was very spot on. However, I had a problem with the major 'lesson'. I'm not sure that lesson is the right choice of word, but I did not like that despite all that the Joker had done just in that night alone, Batman was still willing to help him in a peaceful manner. He traumatized two people who may not be able to walk the world in the same way that they had before this night, yet Batman wants Joker to have a better life. It almost seems like this is for a selfish reason too, since his driving force in his decision is that he could die if he does not help him. 2. What connections did you make with the story? Discuss what elements of the story with which you were able to connect? I'm not sure ...
Post a Comment
Read more

My Favorite Thing is Monsters (6 Points)

For the week that we read these, we were asked to discuss whether the comics we read should be considered literary or not. My first reaction was to break down what made something 'literary'. I was inclined to say that as long as something had words and was telling a story with some amount of depth, then that was what I considered literary. However, I realized while talking with team members about this question that I had a new consideration of literary comics. I like to think of comics the same way I think about art, and that is that anything can be art. I do not think that we have to tie down the constraints of what is and is not literary because that can put writers who just want to create into a bubble. Whether I used my old definition or my new definition, I think My Favorite Thing is Monsters is definitely a literary comic. It masterfully uses its media to tell a fantastic and relatable story. Everything about the comic felt real and was very engaging, the art felt in sync...
Post a Comment
Read more

American Born Chinese (3 Points)

 I read American Born Chinese about two years ago for the Asian and Asian American Diaspora LMST Class, but I did not quite remember everything that happened, so I decided to read it again. While there are seemingly three story lines, they all merge into one at the end, which caught me off guard again the second time reading it. I definitely think this fits into the category of literary comics. Not only does it have great writing, it tells a compelling story that really makes the reader stop to think. While I cannot say that I relate to this story in the same way, I can see how this story could be relatable. I feel like this is an important novel that everyone should take a second and read. I also really enjoyed the pacing of this novel, both in the sense of the three stories coming together as one and in the panel by panel framing of the scenes. The writer understands well how to use blank panels and pages. 
Post a Comment
Read more