Text and Image Interactions in Hybrid Narratives - Essay Example

Text and Image Interactions in Hybrid Narratives Persepolis by Satrapi portrays a well detailed graphical story on the history ofIran, from its first occupation by the Indo-European nomads, through the establishment of the Persian Empire, and to the 1979 Islamic revolution that placed Iran under Islamic rule. The main purpose of this book is to portray dynamics in the Iranian history, and criticize the view portraying Iran as a country inhabited by fundamentalists in its history. The writer portrays these characterizations as false, and misplaced. On the other hand, The collected Works of Billy the Kid by Ondaatje is a montage of methods, and techniques used in catching and recording the process of collection. The author utilizes poetry, images, and proses to assemble different perspectives on the life of Billy the Kid, and explores the craft that shaped his life. These include the machine guns, a camera, and a pencil. The two books are hybrid narrations, where texts and images are integrated in different ways to make a captivating story, in making the reader more involved in the narration as compared to the use of text alone. In both cases, there are the themes of war and courage in resisting changes, presented through images and texts. Therefore, the use of text and images in these hybrid stories helps in creating an audience’s perspective, away from the perspective presented by the author, and making the reader more involved in the narration. Satrapi (3) introduces the story by presenting the images of Marjane, and her classmates in wearing veils. To reinforce this Satrapi explains, “This is me when I was 10 years old. This was in 1980” (Satrapi, 3). The use of text alongside this image provides the audience with the actual picture of Marjane after the Islamic revolution of Iran in1978, and the effects of the revolution, in enforcing all students to wear veils. In addition, Satrapi presents an image to explain how the revolution occurred, symbolizing a change by mass actions by the general public in favor of having an Islamic State, away from Shah’s rule that inclined much to the Western ideals; especially towards America, “two families who had been imprisoned by the Shah for communist learning, and tortured by CIA agents were released under Khameini” (Satrapi, 49-50). Satrapi (3) has used images to portray how life was before this revolution, and the disparity that existed among the students in schools, before the revolution. Without these graphics, the reader may not accurately figure out how the veils changed Marjane, and others who did not know the meaning of a veil. The images portray how students were united and yet divided, as one student exclaims, “Give me my veil back,” while her companion shouts, “you will have to lick my feet” (Satrapi, 3). The images as integrated with text brings out the tensions and divisions among the students; a reflection of the larger population. “We did not like to wear the veil, especially since we did not understand why we had to” (Satrapi, 3). This text is contrasted by the images presented after the revolution, showing all students wearing veils, and teachers commanding students to wear the veils, though they did not know the meaning. Images help the reader to understand the effects of the revolution, and link this to historical perspectives. While text is used to advance the details of the setting, it is through images that the author presents the seriousness and exact emotions of the happenings. The effect of this has been to invite the audience to make their own emotional attachments, and conclusions from those made by the author through text. It is easier to understand the magnitude of the situation after the revolution, and the extent to which it affected these students. Likewise, Ondaatje has used a number of images and photography in a bewildering approach. The author utilizes photographs in various ways in presenting his themes. Throughout the text, Ondaatje utilizes poems, prose, and photographs and in fact implies equivalence between the three; written sections have to be viewed as photographs also. Throughout the book, Ondaatje’s photographs or images are fragmented, disconnected; and the book is organized as an album in a non chronological way. Photography as used by Ondoaatje, represents arresting of motion, and it is through this motion that he shapes his poems, and attaches his themes. Before the narration, Ondaatje initiates the collections by quoting,”I send you a picture of Billy made with the Perry Shutter as quick as it can be viewed…” (Oondatje, 5) Life is the only phenomena too fast to elude the camera; many photographs in the book lack the vibrancy of life, and are either incomplete or with small frames to be clearly visualized. Ondootje utilizes photography to explain Billy’s life. At the beginning, Oondotje utilizes descriptions characteristic of album collections to describe his narration. For example, Christmas at Fort Summer (Oondotje, 3), is a heading that can be related to a collection of several elements or photographs relating to Christmas events. These headings have no relation to the flow of the text; Ondootje in narration about Bill utilizes text as images to represent his ideas, and to describe Billy’s emotions. Fragmentation is observed in the images created by Billy when taken to Messilla for trials. The sun in this case becomes one of Billy’s hands, “the hands were cold as porcelain, one was silver, and one was old bone stripped oak white eastern cigarette white sky the eye core of the sun. Two hands, one dead, one born from me, one like crystal, and one like shell of a snake found in spring. Burning me like dry ice” (Oondotje, 77). This body fragmentation is symbolic of the fragmented approach in which the author presents his ideas throughout the story. The shape of some texts has been blocked in white space to present how Billy’s visual memory has been defined;”white wails on neon in the eye,” and he light acres the surface (Oondotje, 58). Billy on the other hand is presented as being motionless, and he presents himself as a camera, which records a track of flies across a white surface against the night sky, “waiting nothing breaks my vision but flies in their black path like inverted stars (Oondotje, 74).” Oondotje creates these images in his book in addition to the presented photographs, in illustrating actors, and explaining their emotions. These images would help in describing the emotions of the narrative in visual literature, without the author describing any of the emotions. Many photos as presented by Oonditje are incomplete images representing movement, but cannot actually move. For example, the ‘word picture’ is sometimes incomplete, the poems have no emotions, and the prose section lacks emotions compared to the photographs that Oondatje has included. For example, Oondatje starts with a poem on ‘These are the killed’ (Oondatje, 3) that seems to have been written upside down, does not present any emotion, and lacks coherence of a normal poem. It is just an emotionless image. The collected works as, representing the title of the book are themselves photographs in that Billy is a photographer, which means the structure of the book is a mirror of a protagonist vision of Ondaatje, with his life as presented in the collected works. “I am very still/ I take in all the angels of the room” (Ondootje, 20). Billy’s perception is visual; a room turns to be a picture; a day; a series of frames. The effects of these photographic events, and images in the collected works presents Billy as being static, and resisting change in respect to experience. His ideas, just as the photographic pictures and images presented are static, and his vision does not change. Through the static portrayal of Billy, the author presets the attitude of Billy’s refusal to change with respect to the unfolding brutal war; with his behavior remaining steadfast, and unchanging, which necessitates the use of images and photographs that are still and sometimes incomplete. Therefore, the images are powerful tool in constructing the characters. In Persepolis the use of cartoons and images for students is to make it interesting and encourage the reader through visual interaction. There is an inseparable fusion of images and text narratives. The successful binding of text, and the visual arts used makes the reader to follow the flow of the narrative, and interacts the emotions of the reader with the story in a way that text alone cannot convey. For example, Satrapi (5) portrays how the majority of Iranians advocated for the revolution by calling for freedom to wear veils, while others opposed it; “everywhere in the streets there were demonstrations for and against the veil.” This can be connected to the power of religion in Iran as Satrapi presents it as an essential part of existence in Iran, “I was born with religion” (Satrapi, 6). This is portrayed as Marjane finds herself almost to be arrested when she coins an escape strategy, a “cool” instinct for survival (Satrapi, 133). The tension presented by these images explains the fear that political dissidents have in the country. The careful integration of text and images makes the reader to realize the evils, and immoralities in the society; in political suppressions, and killing of the innocent, to an extent that Marjorie as a young girl has already made up her mind at the age of 6 to be a prophet, “I wanted to be a prophet” (Satrapi, 5), which was not normal for a woman. In all these images, Setrapi uses Marjane to portray how the westernized culture, and the Culture in Iran clash, the repercussions being political prisoners, executions, and exiles to escape these vices. For example, the images of Marjane walking separately from her friends at a ski resort, while the text explains how the other girls are disappointed at her turning into a “Decadent western woman” (Satrapi, 270), the graphics portray the intensity of their isolation. These graphics portray the suspicion with which westernized ideals are treated in the country. Images in both books make the presentation of ideas to be comical, and lighter than could be expressed in text alone. Text alone could have produced a serious flow of information that might capture the mind of the reader, resulting in different perceptions. The intrusion presented by these graphics makes Satrapi to interfere with the flow, and readers’ concentration, to diffuse tensions, and emotions created by the narration involving war, religion and the immorality in the societies. The facial expressions observed in Marjorie on new experiences such as smoking a cigarette (Satrapi, 117) are powerful expressions, which could not be explained using text alone. The integration of text and images aims at portraying the emotions of actors in the book, while cooling down emotions from readers in a comical use of graphics; examples being the use of extensive interactive graphics by Satrapi. In hybrid fictions, text and images can interact effectively in presenting emotions, and cooling down emotions from readers through a comical perspective presented by these images. Through images, authors are able to express ideas that could not have been expressed using words alone. In addition, the interaction of images and text aids the reader to make subjective and objective conclusions, away from the view of the author. These narratives are powerful visual story telling mediums in helping visual thinkers to explore the subject, and interpret matters ranging from historical to fantastical matter in diverse ways with no restrictions. The use of symbolism, allegory, metaphors, and simile makes the reader to dig much deeper as compared to the traditional books or narratives. Works Cited Oondatje Michael. The Collected Works of Billy the Kid. NY: Vintage Books, 2008, Print. Satrapi, Marjane. Persepolis: The Story of Childhood. Paris: L’Association, 2003, Print. Read More