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borpotingis's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
fast-paced
3.0
I didn't like this as much as Spiegelman's other work, but I don't think it was terrible either. The structure of the book doesn't follow that of a traditional graphic novel which can be kind of confusing.
hamckeon's review against another edition
This book was larger like a coffee table book and was not what I was expecting. I looked through some of it, but I found the organization slightly confusing. I was expecting a graphic novel like Maus, but this is not the case.
blairconrad's review against another edition
2.0
I really didn’t get much out of the actual content of the book, that is the 10 or so one pagers that Mr. Spiegelman wrote about September 11 and the time following. I can see how they might have been useful and cathartic for him, but as a reader, I was left flat. The collection of comic snippets at the end were likewise almost useless, although the one that had to be rotated 180 degrees halfway through was at least novel.
mezzosherri's review against another edition
3.0
Spiegelman's work---his first book of comix since Maus won the Pulitzer in '92---is another exploration of the liminal space where (to paraphrase his introduction) personal and world history collide. Spiegelman and his family were eyewitnesses to the collapse of the Twin Towers (his daughter was in school at the base of the World Trade Center when the planes first hit), and the 10 broadsheet folios Spiegelman created between 2002 and 2003 provide vivid details about that sunny Tuesday morning. Particularly haunting, to me, is the leitmotif image, reproduced in all 10 broadsheets, Spiegelman recalls of seeing the north tower's steel skeleton glowing a la Monet seconds before it, too, collapsed. Spiegelman also presents impassioned criticism of the political after-effects of 9/11, as well as a knowing self-mockery of the ways these unfolding events played into his own usual patterns of fatalism and conspiracy theories.
Visually, the broadsheets are very distinct from the style of Maus: the pages are vibrant with color, and certain narrative threads are told using pastiche styles from early comics (think Katzenjammer Kids, Bringing Up Father and Little Nemo). The latter half of the book even reproduces a number of excerpts from these early comics, accompanied by an essay where Spiegelman talks about how these old comics were one of the only source of refuge he could find in the weeks following 9/11.
Ultimately, though, I found this book too brief, too unfinished, to be satisfying. It's the eternal challenge of capturing and interpreting world and personal history when both are fast unfolding. It's well-known that it took Spiegelman 10 years or more to determine how to distill his parents' story of personal and world tragedy into a graphic "novel"---to expect that level of synthesis from such a short temporal distance is probably unrealistic. Nonetheless, I'm grateful I read this in a library copy: paying money for just 10 broadsheets of original work padded out by unnecessary reproductions of old comics would have felt rather like being gypped.
Visually, the broadsheets are very distinct from the style of Maus: the pages are vibrant with color, and certain narrative threads are told using pastiche styles from early comics (think Katzenjammer Kids, Bringing Up Father and Little Nemo). The latter half of the book even reproduces a number of excerpts from these early comics, accompanied by an essay where Spiegelman talks about how these old comics were one of the only source of refuge he could find in the weeks following 9/11.
Ultimately, though, I found this book too brief, too unfinished, to be satisfying. It's the eternal challenge of capturing and interpreting world and personal history when both are fast unfolding. It's well-known that it took Spiegelman 10 years or more to determine how to distill his parents' story of personal and world tragedy into a graphic "novel"---to expect that level of synthesis from such a short temporal distance is probably unrealistic. Nonetheless, I'm grateful I read this in a library copy: paying money for just 10 broadsheets of original work padded out by unnecessary reproductions of old comics would have felt rather like being gypped.
booksnpunks's review against another edition
3.0
This was not as good as Spielgelman's [b:The Complete Maus|15195|The Complete Maus (Maus, #1-2)|Art Spiegelman|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1327354180s/15195.jpg|1658562], but I'm beginning to think that comics and graphic novels have an unparalleled way of representing memory.
This documented Speigelman's experience of the events of 9/11 and was one of them most fragmented and disorientating comics I've read. But I think it works that way - in fact it works in only that way. Maus is a lot more linear in it's presentation, but as an artist who is documenting a story being told to him in a spoken narrative, it inevitably takes on more of an easy structure. This text doesn't seem to begin or end anywhere and it's disjointedness acts as an authentic reflection of a first-hand experience of a traumatic event, rather than a second-hand one.
It was a very avant-garde graphic novel and so wouldn't recommend it to everyone. But if you are interested in trauma and memory, especially in the post-modern sense, then you would find this work very interesting.
This documented Speigelman's experience of the events of 9/11 and was one of them most fragmented and disorientating comics I've read. But I think it works that way - in fact it works in only that way. Maus is a lot more linear in it's presentation, but as an artist who is documenting a story being told to him in a spoken narrative, it inevitably takes on more of an easy structure. This text doesn't seem to begin or end anywhere and it's disjointedness acts as an authentic reflection of a first-hand experience of a traumatic event, rather than a second-hand one.
It was a very avant-garde graphic novel and so wouldn't recommend it to everyone. But if you are interested in trauma and memory, especially in the post-modern sense, then you would find this work very interesting.
alexriviello's review against another edition
3.0
Works great as an outpouring of confusion and anger and fear... just not really as a book. There's only a handful of comics here, nothing to really justify its (physical) size.
kmatthe2's review against another edition
4.0
Good, but not as good as Maus. A smaller scale and more self-contained in some ways.
tracithomas's review against another edition
3.0
Some of this is really sharp and poignant and satirical. Some of this went fully over my head. Spiegelman is a cynic and he was ahead of his peers in media on the skepticism around Bush and nationalism etc. I just don’t think I got it as a complete book/collection.