In this article, a writer and English professor reviews various graphic narrative depictions of aging including Joyce Farmer’s Special Exits, Roz Chast’s Can’t We Talk about Something More Pleasant?, and most prominently Nigel Baines’ Afloat: A Memoir about Mum, Dementia, and Trying Not to Drown. Venema summarizes each of these books’ plotlines and connections to their authors own lives, specifically as retellings of their parents’ experiences. She also explores the benefits of using comics and graphic narratives to tell end-of-life stories in complex, unconventional, temporally warped, and often nonlinear formats. Each of these books could be used as resources in class syllabi on aging, healthcare systems, and care from family and friend support systems, but this comprehensive review could be a useful introductory material for a graphic medicine course.
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- Link: https://thepolyphony.org/2022/07/04/graphic-perspectives-on-caring-ageing-and-end-of-life/
Details
Language: English
Type of Story: Journal Article
Medium: written
Contributed by: Rosalie Zuckermann ( rzuckermann@lclark.edu )
Citation:
Venema, Kathleen. (July 4, 2022.) “Graphic perspectives on caring, aging and end-of-life.” The Polyphony
https://thepolyphony.org/2022/07/04/graphic-perspectives-on-caring-ageing-and-end-of-life/