“Drawing” on Politics: How Sattouf & Sacco Balance the Personal with the Political

In Palestine by Joe Sacco and The Arab of the Future by Riad Sattouf, both authors utilize graphic novels to explore the different interactions between their personal and political narratives. For Sacco, this entails embarking on a journalistic assignment documenting the Palestine and Israel conflict; for Sattouf, it is detailing his childhood and socio-political experience in France, Libya, and Syria. Though both Sacco and Sattouf’s pieces illustrate their respective balancing of political and personal narratives in the graphic novel medium, Sattouf’s memoir explores the political reality of the Arab world through a personal lens, while Sacco’s reporting centers personal Palestinian stories to expand upon its broader political context. Using the medium of a graphic novel instead of prose amplifies the political realities in both works, allowing audiences to have an immersive, nuanced understanding of these political landscapes.

Sattouf employs the narrative perspective of a child to navigate the complexities of his early years as a relative outsider in Arabic communities, offering readers an accessible, intimate way to understand the complex political reality. One of the clearest examples of how his positionality as a child affects his engagement with the surrounding political environment is when, on the bus ride to the village of Homs, he notices the posters of Hafez al-Assad. In between his almost calm realization that other passengers are staring at him, merely turning around to note their piercing gazes, he watches the billboards, posters, and even a statue of al-Assad flit past (Sattouf 197). He views them with a child-like frankness and simplicity, thinking in a subsequent panel how even the bus driver “looked like Assad” with his mustache and that every man on the bus had one “except for (his) father” (Sattouf 197). He then goes to comment, again, almost childishly, saying that he didn’t like al-Assad “as much as Gaddafi” because he “wasn’t as handsome or sporty” and there was “something shifty-looking about him” (Sattouf 197). He doesn’t recognize the political propaganda for what it truly is, basing his opinions on the two dictators not by their merit or their actions but by their degree of handsomeness. Such candid reasoning falls perfectly in line with how a child might react—this authenticity shows what aspects of the political discourse stand out to him. It may not offer the most sophisticated dissection or reaction to the political strategy as an adult’s perspective might, but, combined with the detailed, colorful illustrations of the posters, it captures a wider swath of readers through the personal and genuine perspective. The interspersed imagery and overarching narrative of the graphic novel enable the audience to succinctly see how deeply integrated the propaganda is into daily life. Sattouf’s usage of this medium personalizes the political and amplifies the subtle indoctrination present in the imagery, highlighting the graphic novel's power to display subtle complexities that prose may not be able to do.

Moreover, this exploration of his personal experience with the political climate through a child’s lens is shown in the panels where he waits with his parents for their weekly rations. Sattouf, sitting on his parent’s shoulders, is oblivious to the political machinations at work here– in the fourth panel in particular, despite his parent’s evident concern at the rations providing improper nutrition, Sattouf is just excited to keep eating bananas (Sattouf 20). Between the people jockeying for space, the “fat droplets of sweat”, and the curses being thrown around, Sattouf just hovers near his parents as he takes in the pandemonium with wide eyes (Sattouf 20). When his mother reaches the counter and is dismayed to see they have “only bananas,” little Sattouf is seen reaching up, exclaiming “yum!” upon seeing bunches on the counter (Sattouf 20). The man replies to his mother that their “leader adores bananas, my sister,”and that it’s “the fruit of the people” (Sattouf 20). Even a few panels back, the impact of these insufficient rations on his parents is visible; Sattouf breaks from the panel’s narration to indicate the typical rations in curlicue script, including illustrations of “six cans of canned beef,” a “very small” bag of rice, two pounds of sugar, and “more canned beef” (20). His mother, hovering behind him, comments that at least he is eating something, another curlicue inclusion that says his mother has lost weight at the improper balance of nutrition (Sattouf 20). Much like the posters and propaganda, Sattouf, being a young child, is unaware of the broader political effects here. His decision to use his youth and naivety as a narrative device to show the severity of the regime’s impacts, without the typically complicated jargon that accompanies political analysis, allows readers to witness his personal history while gaining an implicit understanding of the underlying political narratives.

Sattouf's display of these scenarios also shows the strength of the graphic novel as a medium, as supported by Thomas Williams in his piece, “Text or Graphic: An Information Processing Perspective on Choosing the More Effective Medium." In his article, he concludes that “visual media frequently offer a superior alternative to prose for the communication of some kinds of information” by proving how graphical mediums may be more effective in providing a “meaningful context for unfamiliar information” (Williams 18). This is precisely what Sattouf sets out to do in his graphic novel, and his simplistic, caricaturistic drawing style allows readers to understand the conflicting political situations under various dictators. It is something that would not have been as effective were it in prose; the audience wouldn’t be able to see as vividly how Sattouf’s experience serves as a micro-representation of the livelihoods in similar environments.

In comparison, author Joe Sacco’s Palestine invites the reader to rather step into his shoes as a journalist to view the unflinching accounts of Palestinian’s experience under Israel's occupation, and his graphic novel is made all the more impactful by the dense, detailed panels, full of historical information, first-hand accounts of riots and Palestinian living conditions, and perspectives from a variety of professional and academic experts. In the beginning, for example, in much of the section entitled, “Remind Me,” he swaps the sharp, jagged comic format for neat columns of text that are sprinkled throughout his interactions with “Orange Card” and “Green Card,” as well as historical quotes from Golda Meir and David Ben-Gurion (Sacco 42-43). It’s an almost overwhelming amount of information—it’s as if readers are stepping directly into Sacco’s research and field notes, immersing themselves in the narrative as active participants rather than distant observers. Throughout, he ensures that he is platforming and centering the voices of the people he interviews, rather than himself. And, in contrast to The Arab of the Future, Sacco’s graphic novel takes a much more somber turn. He regularly depicts torture scenes and interactions, such as with his conversation with the woman who lost two of her sons in the “Pilgramage” section, that did not happen directly to himself, shifting away from Sattouf’s autobiographical narration (Sacco 235-241). Sacco’s characterization of himself, too, serves as a vehicle for the audience to learn more about the subjugation of Palestinian people. He includes his reactions and bits of commentary, such as when he mentions how he is “shaking like a fucking leaf” at one of the protests in the “Ramallah” section, repeating how his being there is “good for the comic” to steel himself, helping humanize and depict the absolute intensity of this situation (Sacco 121). The choppy gutters in the panels also emphasize Sacco's tension and uncertainty, making it that much more intense for the reader. They can viscerally see the resolve on the protestor’s faces, the flames of the overturned dumpster, and Sacco’s unease while weaving through the crowd, with the one-line descriptions hovering around it to provide additional detail (Sacco 121). Readers are invited to be right there with him—it would not be as effective or as impactful to read about this protest, for example, from a news article or piece of solely textual prose.

Similarly, in veering away from Sattouf’s personal-centric approach, though Sacco is featured prominently as a narrator-like character in the graphic novel, he does not shy away from including a diversity of perspectives, with quite a few being experts in terms of both lived experiences and academic backgrounds. He talks to three men who each spent time in Ansar III, an Israel prison camp, feminists who discuss how far empowerment has come for Palestinian women, and even two Israeli women who remark on being “tired” of hearing about the suffering of Palestinian people when Sacco tries to play “Devil’s Advocate” (Sacco 264). Tensions build through the argument, and the woman finally exclaims at him:

We just want to live our lives, okay? We have our lives! We have jobs and families and we go out and live just like you do…we don’t think about this stuff all the time, and we get a bit tired of hearing about it! (Sacco 264)

Though her privilege and ignorance are staggering, there are no accompanying text boxes or interjections from Sacco. His character even has his back turned to the audience, allowing them to focus on the woman’s words as her friend struggles to try to diffuse the situation, saying how it’s not that they’re “tired…but when [they] hear about it over and over, [they] get… tired…" (Sacco 264). Including this interaction and comment again shows how Sacco wants to use his conversations and interactions to paint a broader picture of the political context; he doesn’t spend as much time in the panel talking about his internal reactions or attitudes on the issue as Sattouf does. This comes across even more effectively when one considers the urgency of the situation, with Walid Salem noting in his piece “Apartheid, Settler Colonialism and the Palestinian State 50 Years On” how, after nearly 50 years of the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip, the “situation on the ground cannot be described as being any less than catastrophic for the Palestinians” (Salem 1). Sacco effectively utilizes the graphic novel medium to sow the horrific suffering of Palestinian people under occupation, showing how visuals and graphics can elicit emotional responses and understanding that prose alone might not.is densely-packed panels capture the immediacy and urgency of the conflict, bringing readers right up to the political narrative. Though he has a similar goal to Sattouf in communicating the broader meaning of the political context through personal narratives, he focuses on other’s experiences to fully capture the context, rather than honing in on just his.

With all of this in mind, though both set out to weave their accounts and narratives into the visual medium to communicate the broader political narrative of their respective environments, their varying approaches both illustrate the graphic novel's power to display complex political landscapes with startling simplicity. The visual aspects reinforce the emotional weight of their personal experiences and the complexity of political situations, whether it’s Sattouf's experience in not fighting back against his cousins or Sacco interviewing a gunshot-to-the-neck survivor. Both of these cases display the effectiveness of graphic novels in detailing the human experiences in a larger broader political context.