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eely225 's review for:
The Art of Charlie Chan Hock Chye
by Sonny Liew
Decidedly in the "couldn't put it down" vein because, well, I didn't put it down until I finished it. This pointed piece of alternate universe biography stands out, first, for the breadth of its art style. In trying to create a fictional biography, Liew has to show his subject's artistic development from youth to old age. The result is undeniably impressive, a fully realized world that feels realer than reality.
Of course Liew concludes the book with Charlie writing his own alternate history of Singapore in which the Socialist party took power after independence instead of the PAP. It's here that he shows his nuance. Liew does not pretend that things would have been ideal. His critique of the PAP is the same one he levels at their historic opponents: that they couldn't abide critique. He resents, above all, paternalism, while still giving the government credit for successes where they come.
The book grew to prominence because the Singaporean government pulled its support for the publication, evidence of exactly the discomfort with dialogue and critique that Liew write about. But despite some cynicism in his work on that subject, it was popular indignation over the government's heavy-handedness that built the book's notoriety. And it was that popular backlash that led to global distribution of his message, the only way his work ever would have ended up at the public library in Des Moines, Iowa where I found it.
For anyone interested in the power of graphic novels to fuel political discourse, this is an excellent place to start.
Of course Liew concludes the book with Charlie writing his own alternate history of Singapore in which the Socialist party took power after independence instead of the PAP. It's here that he shows his nuance. Liew does not pretend that things would have been ideal. His critique of the PAP is the same one he levels at their historic opponents: that they couldn't abide critique. He resents, above all, paternalism, while still giving the government credit for successes where they come.
The book grew to prominence because the Singaporean government pulled its support for the publication, evidence of exactly the discomfort with dialogue and critique that Liew write about. But despite some cynicism in his work on that subject, it was popular indignation over the government's heavy-handedness that built the book's notoriety. And it was that popular backlash that led to global distribution of his message, the only way his work ever would have ended up at the public library in Des Moines, Iowa where I found it.
For anyone interested in the power of graphic novels to fuel political discourse, this is an excellent place to start.