Trauma In Graphic Novels

Trauma comes in different forms and in today’s society it has a big focus. With the extensive news coverage on traumatic events occuring in the world such as shootings and terror attacks, people who are not a part of the trauma per say, will become a part of it. Recently there has also been an increasing focus on mental illnesses arising from personal trauma such as post traumatic stress disorder anxiety. However, the occurrence of trauma is not anything that has recently increased, just the amount of media reporting on it. That trauma has always been around us is seen in literature and this essay will be focused on the two graphic novels Maus by Art Spiegelman published in 1980 and Watchmen by David Moore and Alan Gibbons published in 1987. The two novels have different contexts, but both have the underlying political background. Graphic novels are used as a medium that is used in different genres. Both of the novels that are to be discussed can be classified as trauma fiction however, it has been debated whether or not Maus could be classified as non-fiction. For the sake of this analysis it will be looked at as a mixture since also Watchmen contains some form of reality.

In Watchmen, Moore and Gibbons attempt to pick apart the idea of a superhero in all its forms. The society depicted is set in 1985 during a time where the public has become more and more critical of superheroes and what they do, so much that a law has been instated, banning them. However, only one character in Watchmen has actual superpowers, while the rest are just masked heroes. On top of this, there is a political tension in the background where the United states and the Soviet union are bordering on a nuclear war. Maus on the other hand plays out in two different time periods. The novel is illustrating a son of a holocaust survivor who is questioning his father regarding his experiences. There are two plots playing out where one is set in the 70’s-80’s when the interaction between the father and son takes place and the other is the onset and during the second world war, which is the fathers storytelling regarding his experiences. The two novels have similar overarching ideas of trauma which are portrayed with the same medium, graphic novels but they create different effects and view the topic of trauma differently. CharactersWatchmen portrays a series of complex characters that all have troubling backgrounds. One that is especially interesting is Walter Joseph Kovacs or as he is mostly know, Rorschach. He is a part of the Watchmen and as most other characters, he does not hold any superpowers but is merely an intelligent man. Rorschach is a main character in Watchmen and a large portion of the plot is revolved around him, his plans and conspiracies.

After the death of the Comedian he is developing a theory where he believes that someone is targeting all superheroes, and he could be next. He then attempts to inform his former colleagues about the perceived danger, but is struggling to get his message through. It is not until later in the novel, about half way through the readers get to know about his backstory. This is after he gets arrested for killing a serial rapist. Rorschach gets exposed to a Rorschach test where he is shown multiple inkblots and then asked what he sees in them, there is an iorny in this since the mask that Rorschach uses when he becomes the superhero resembles an inkblot similar to those used in the test. To the psychologist performing the test, Rorschach lies and says what he believes the researcher wants to hear but the readers then get taken into a flashback of his from his childhood where he sees his mom, who we find out is a prostitute, engage with a man. The fact that the readers get taken into the event through images and text makes it more real and relatable.

The first panel of the flashback is two dark silhouettes of his mother and the man. This creates the idea of that they are abstract and not real, just two dark figures causing trauma for the young child who grows up to be Rorschach. These figures are compared to those on the Rorschach test, which shows how these abstract shadows have a connotation unto them that is traumatic. If this is then viewed from a psychological perspective we can see how Rorschach is potentially suffering from post traumatic stress disorder where flashbacks are being triggered by certain items or thoughts. The childhood trauma that Rorschach has experienced has created who he is as a character. In an article written by Brian Doherty, published 2006, the idea regarding Rorschachs ink blot mask is taken up where it represents the personality of his character. Rorschachs has been desrcibed by many as an objectivist and in the article this idea is brough up and states that “he’s willing to bear any burden, let the very heavens fall, to stay square with reality”.