Thursday, June 18, 2009

OK, That Actually Kinda Makes Sense Now


I was reading about some movie that was being made recently, and the blurb mentioned that the script is based on a children's graphic novel. Up to that point I had always thought about the term "graphic novel" in a not quite accurate way. I had always associated the "graphic" part with gore or violence. I guess this was because when I first started hearing about them I was young enough to still be reading comic books. And the comics I read were pretty tame. But this new "graphic novel" genre was dark and violent and complex. So it made sense to me at the time that it couldn't be called a "comic book" (it wasn't comical after all), hence the new term "graphic novel". And ever since that time I had always took a less literal meaning to the graphic descriptor. So imagine yourself in this frame of refernce and what would you think when you heard there were graphic novels for children. Some of my thoughts:
"What is this world coming to? Parents are pushing children to read novels? And they are graphic?! Filled with sex and violence?!"
I felt pretty dumb a couple seconds later when I figured out what "graphic novel" meant... only 20 years late. I feel a little better about this world now.

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