If you’re in group 5, you’re responsible for this week’s weekly roundup. Each student in the group will highlight one key moment from the previous week’s online and in-class discussions. To recall the syllabus:
Follow this formula for the highlights: describe the moment (provide the context and the facts about what you saw, read, or heard), interpret the meaning of the moment (what does it mean?), and evaluate its significance (in other words, why was the moment important?).
You can post your highlight in the comments below (or in a separate post).
Fun Home did a very good job of hiding what it is about until you start reading it. Most of us in class did not expect the kind of stories we were going to be given nor the way it was given. Most thought it was going to be like a family comedy/fude comic, but instead it was 7 chapters about a daughter and her relationship with her father. When we watched the clip in class where the writer shows you how she wrote and drew the comic wasn’t what we expected. The author was very in-tuned with reality and wanted to bring as much of that into it as possible. After seeing that video, it made you also see the book differently. The book was almost more impressive. Most of us didn’t even realize how much time she took to do each box on each page. With that kind of dedication, you know you are reading a very well thought out comic. Fun Home was definitely a well written/drawn comic and, even though it was long, was able to keep the reader interested.
On Tuesday, we reviewed and shared thoughts, impressions, and ideas over Ch. 1-4. As Prof. Sample asked us our first impressions, there was the notion of double meanings from literally the cover to the end of the novel. On surface, there is Fun Home meaning funeral home, yet a handful of other implications within the subtext- such as the play on words between a “fun home” and a “funeral home”, and the like. Double meanings through not simply wordplay, but through allusions and references were huge throughout the novel. Professor asked, “Do they help or do they put you off? Is it overanalytical to the point that it’s going nowhere, or is the self-examination and personal narrative within all the references and illusions effectively communicative?” There were some classmates who expressed thorough headache and frustration, yet others who found the style effective. The mounts of references and allusions were ironic, for Bechdel’s father was the one to detach himself from reality the most impressively through those very things. The art of pretending- or convincing- oneself to be something or someone they are not is a form that seemed to be mastered by both father and daughter.
In class we briefly discussed Bechdel’s use of allusions to modernist literature. The opinions on this varied, specifically on whether the references made the comic more difficult to read or not. Another criticism of these references was that they had enough obscurity for Bechdel to fit them to her story. Some readers felt that this made it seem less sincere and the text became bothersome. The other side of this is that the work as a whole is so deeply personal that Bechdel’s interpretations and drawing of parallels fit right in with it. I agree more with the latter statement, especially after reading the article which was assigned for last Thursday. As prof. Sample said at one point, Bechdel’s story has a bunch of “storybook moments” (e.g. the truck which hit her father being “Sunbeam Bread”) so the literary allusions don’t seem far out of place. In fact one of my favorite lines from the comic was a modernist reference (where Bechdel says the day a person realized they will never read In Search of Lost Time is the day they reach middle age).
In class on Thursday we played a game, I don’t recall the name exactly. We had to insert our own stories into Fun Home from our given character’s perspective. Everybody came up with some very interesting ideas from slight variations of old scenes to completely new scenes for minor characters. This provided a very interesting experience. The idea of backing away from Alison’s point of view was odd, but enlightening. I feel if we just used minor characters like Alison’s girlfriend, brothers, or her mother the whole game would have told a different story than the original.