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It seems
staggering that Joe Sacco's Palestine isn't better
known. Art Spiegelman's Maus is essentially required
reading for any fan of graphic novels, and Palestine
is as touching, revealing, and perhaps even more journalistically
sound than Spiegelman's work. Drawing from months spent in
the Occupied Territories and dozens of interviews, Sacco even
deals with the same set of people to an extent. Of course,
its perspective is essentially the opposite, which is perhaps
the cause for its lesser-known status.
The world,
with a couple radical exceptions, considers the actions of
World War II Germany to be wholly detestable, making the Jews—the
focus of Maus—into heroes we can justly rally
behind. However, those same Jews (almost literally) are the
villains in Palestine, treating the Palestinian people with
almost as detestable behavior as the Germans of WWII. Because
America is of a predominantly Judeo-Christian background and
the cultural narrative regarding European Jews is one of "strictly
victim," the thought of them as villains might seem offensive
to some. Perhaps the memory of the Palestinian attacks on
the Munich Olympics give the impression that this is not a
country that we should feel sympathy towards. These questions
and controversies are what make Palestine so engaging,
though the ambiguities it addresses are perhaps the reason
it's not as widely-read.
In the
early 1990s, Joe Sacco traveled to the Occupied Territories
of Palenstine such as the West Bank and the Gaza Strip—places
that readers have assuredly heard about on the news. Because
cameras and film were expensive, Sacco chose to draw his story,
creating what could be the first instance of a graphic nonfiction
mixing genres with the "new journalism" of Tom Wolfe and Hunter
S. Thompson. Sacco travels through the area, interviewing
those who have spent time in Israeli prisons, been the victims
of torture, had their houses bulldozed by Israeli forces,
and had their olive trees or other source of income destroyed
by Israelis. He interviews businessmen who need to put "product
of Israel" stickers on their food exports simply so the airport
won't leave them to rot and spoil for weeks before shipping
them. He witnesses riots in Ramallah and takes a UN tour of
the Gaza Strip. On a tour of local religious landmarks, his
elderly Palestinian tour guide is harassed and mocked by Israeli
forces. He sees the sorry excuses for schools that the police
regularly raid and disrupt. He sleeps in the shanty-town houses
with haphazard steel roofs. Essentially, he experiences the
third world conditions and system of total oppression in Palestine,
the kind of system where one side fights with stones and the
other has tanks and machine guns.
The first
chapter of the book provides a handy two-page refresher course
on how the Israeli-Palestinian conflict came to be. In 1917,
Lord Balfour of the UK began the course of events that would
eventually sign over much of the land that is now Israel to
the Jews, and he is quoted saying, "Zionism, be it right or
wrong, good or bad, is rooted in age-long tradition, in present
needs, in future hopes, of far profounder import than the
desire and prejudices of 700,000 Arabs who now inhabit that
ancient land...We do not propose even to go through the form
of consulting with the wishes of the present inhabitants of
the country." Foreign powers setting up the eventual redistribution
of lands they didn't inhabit created the modern conflict we
see today. At the very least, entertainment value aside, Palestine
offers a deeper understanding of a long-standing conflict.
Thankfully,
there is plenty of entertainment value. Sacco's words intersperse
with his Daniel Clowes-like drawings on the page, making the
interviews, the dialogue, and his thoughts one cohesive narrative.
Text boxes float over animated and fluid drawings that depict
riots and feasts, emergency rooms and parties. But Sacco's
real strength is making these stories human. He understands
that to draw world attention to the plight of these people
and overcome the prejudices many may have, he'll have to show
the Palestinians as the beset people they are. He captures
the aforementioned system of total oppression that forbids
the Palestinians weapons, allows their land to be "settled"
piece by piece, and makes them jump through impossible hoops
for travel, education, and jobs. And Sacco shows every emotion
of the human experience: the joy and pride of the teachers
in the school for the Deaf at the progress their pupils are
making; the frustration and fear over the difficult path to
a better life, made hard by the system in place; the immense
inner strength of a woman who won't be broken by torture;
the jokes, both dark and light, of the people. Every page
of Palestine bursts with warmth as well as pathos.
But Palestine
is admittedly a largely one-sided affair. There are 200-some
pages of uninterrupted viewpoints from within Palestine. In
the last chapter, Sacco gets into an argument with a woman
from Tel Aviv that casts a shadow on the messages of the preceding
chapters but does not unravel the stories Sacco has woven
together; it just acknowledges the complexities of the situation.
Beyond
the beauty and emotion he instills in his subjects, the newsworthiness
of the topic, and the humanitarian effort of trying to enlighten
the world about the plight of so many people, Sacco draws
from a tradition of graphic autobiographies. As he lives among
the people of Palestine, he doesn't hesitate to reveal how
scared he gets during a riot in Ramallah. He is constantly
intimidated by the people who have been hardened by time in
Israeli jails. He knows that if the situation gets too intense,
he can always jump a taxi back to Jerusalem for a night in
a dance club with the Swedish and Dutch girls from a hostel.
He shares the moments where Palestinians ask him what his
writing could possibly do to help them, and he shares his
worry that it may not do much of anything.
Palestine
is every bit as good as any of the classics of the genre.
It's as full of frustration and ennui as Ghost World.
It can be as foreboding and questioning as Black Hole.
It's as human and personal as Our Cancer Year. It's
as touching and informative as Maus. Sacco's book will
draw any reader in with its storytelling and will stir his
or her soul for the plight of their fellow man. Its mix of
journalism and graphic memoir will appeal to many different
types of readers, which is good. Everyone should read this
book.
(November,
2008)
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