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A really good piece on comics author Craig Thompson, promoting the recent re-release of his debut book, "Good-Bye Chunky Rice":
Graphic novelist weaves his own life into his beautiful, heartbreaking stories
Sunday, May 14, 2006
STEVE DUIN
The Oregonian
Y ou worry about confessing too much . . .
But as I finish reading "Goodbye, Chunky Rice," the wine bottle clunking against the hull of the boat, I am crying, and I don't know why. For Stomper and her puppies? For Dandel, who knows where she belongs, or Chunky, who doesn't? For Merle, who heals a fractured heart?
Or is it something or someone else altogether? The silence of the house? The passing of the years? The echo of every friendship that disappeared on the outgoing tide?
If I confess too much, I am in the right place: Craig Thompson's world. A neighborhood anchored by a Victorian house in Southeast Portland and framed by two groundbreaking -- and heart-rending -- graphic novels, "Goodbye, Chunky Rice" and "Blankets."
The first is anthropomorphic, the second autobiographical. Asked what precipitated the leap, what provoked him to plunge into those memories and deal honestly with the era of his life that's captured in "Blankets," Thompson keeps it simple:
"Heartbreak. I left a relationship behind in Wisconsin without any closure. Plagued with longing/romantic idealism, I funneled it into this admittedly premature examination of my youth.
"I was 23 years old, still lost in the melodrama of it all. The surface details were from my childhood and high-school days, but the emotional drive came from the chaos of those early twenties."
That emotional drive, that unapologetic openness, and the ability to direct the chaos into black-and-white panels, are all on vivid display in "Blankets," a 592-page "illustrated novel" that contrasts the protagonist's tender, dawning love for Raina and his dimming patience with Christianity.
"Blankets" -- which has sold more than 60,000 copies in the U.S. -- introduced Thompson to the Borders crowd, but "Chunky Rice," just published in a new edition by Pantheon, is the work that endeared him to the comics community.
" 'Blankets' is a great, sensitive, coming-of-age story about . . . well, about Craig," said Diana Schutz, an editor at Dark Horse Comics, where Thompson worked briefly as a designer in 1997.
" 'Chunky Rice,' on the other hand, is about the pain of loss, but it's also about you and me and all of us, and in that sense, paradoxically, is a far more personal book."
Thompson, 30, grew up in Marathon, Wis. -- "the smallest of small towns" -- and in the anxious grasp of devoutly Christian parents. "During my senior year of high school, my parents pulled us kids out of public schools and subjected us to a wholly Christian home-school education," said Thompson, whose diploma bears the stamp of the Christian Liberty Academy.
He found his escape in drawing, and in the small, forlorn possibility that comics might provide a vehicle for the story he wanted to tell, "an emotional experience rather than an action-driven plot."
In 1996, Brett Warnock at Top Shelf Productions stumbled upon one of Thompson's mini-comics, entitled "My Friend Joey's Legs," and quickly fired off a postcard saying, "I love your stuff."
A year later, Warnock got a phone call from Thompson, who said he was moving to Portland and asked if they could meet. Unfortunately, Warnock said, "My radar wasn't working at the time. I'd forgotten the name. I blew him off. I literally hung up the phone, and as I did, the light bulb went on in my head."
"He was always getting these calls from wannabe cartoonists," Thompson said. "He didn't even write down my number.
"Fortunately, I called him back."
When Thompson showed Warnock his latest work, the reviews were mixed: "He didn't like any of the personal stories, but he liked the cute little turtle story that wove it all together."
That turtle was Chunky Rice. In 1999, Top Shelf published "Goodbye, Chunky Rice," in which Chunky leaves his beloved Dandel, a mouse deer, to see the world. As he sails into the sunset -- "I've had my share of motley crews," Chuck, the boat skipper, says, "but a mute turtle kid and two sisters sharing the same torso sure takes the cake" -- Dandel stays behind, collecting old bottles, filling them with notes that convey his longing, and tossing them into the sea.
As Portland artist Steve Lieber noted, "This astoundingly accomplished piece of work came seemingly out of nowhere." He was blown away not only by Thompson's emotional honesty and technical chops, but by his commitment to in-depth storytelling:
"He left a day job at Dark Horse so he could pursue his own storytelling full time. He has a spectacular work ethic, and the ability to remove himself from human society for months at a time to get things done."
Thompson disappears into the attic or the back porch of that Southeast Portland Victorian, depending on the time of year and the heat rising to the rafters, and tries to produce two pages of art and narrative each day.
"Craig is a consummate artist," said Joe Sacco, the author of "Palestine" and "The Fixer: A Story From Sarajevo," and a major influence on Thompson. "His line work is amazing. My jaw drops when I see what he can do. I've seen him draw from life, capture things in one go, whereas I'm the guy who pencils and erases, pencils and erases, pencils and erases before I finally commit to ink."
Sacco concedes that he finds Thompson's emotional honesty intimidating: "I'm not willing to be quite so confessional on the page as Craig is."
Thompson often says "Blankets" is about "what's it like to sleep next to someone for the first time," but he brings much more to his tale of blossoming love and burgeoning doubt than longing and romantic idealism.
"My connection with Christianity as a child was quite fervent and committed," Thompson said. "The notion of an afterlife, a heaven, a hope outside of the terrible and mundane reality, was quite comforting to me . . . I often feared I wasn't believing hard enough -- that my faith would come undone -- and like a lot of Christian kids, I was 'rededicating my life to Jesus' every year at summer camp."
Years later, Thompson says he still holds on to the "gnostic" vision of Jesus that puts the final fold in "Blankets:" ". . . the rest of Christianity, its Bible, its churches, its dogma, only sets up boundaries between peoples and cultures. It denies the beauty of being human . . ."
Thompson's current project is "Habibi," which Pantheon will release in 2007. "It's an 'Arabian Nights' tale of my own making," he said, "as long as 'Blankets' but more dense." He has spent the past year studying the Quran, Arabic calligraphy, and Middle Eastern environmental and sexual politics.
"I've already taken a shot at Christianity; now I'm going at Islam," Thompson said, laughing. "Hopefully, I won't be the Salman Rushdie of comics."
Steve Duin is The Oregonian's Metro columnist. Reach him at 503-221-8597, steveduin@news.oregonian.com or at his blog, www.oregonlive.com/weblogs/papertrail.
Copyright 2006 The Oregonian
