Jay A. Gertzman

Or, an almost invisible wink. On the dust jack of Bill Griffith’s exceptional graphic memoir _Invisible Ink_, the woman on the cover—an image of his mother, Barbara-- is winking. A wink is a gesture, some of them jolly ones, esp. between mother and son. This one has many meanings, for the artist and the viewer. The book is an achievement full of subtle ironies. It is a son’s story, a father’s story, and a story of illicit love between two intelligent suburbanites who deeply love each other, while being able to live in two worlds, both of which are deeply ingrained in their souls and to both of which they pay deep attention and respect.  Read More 

Joseph K changes his identity completely in the course of the novel. One might say it is changed for him, but the very distant narrator avoids not only emotional involvement, but anything definite about what is going on (or even how things began or ended). He says “someone must have slandered Joseph” on the first page and “It seems the shame was to outlive him” at the end. It’s like the comedian’s shrug of the shoulders after telling a howler.

To me, he is a kind of everyman, a person in pain, protesting too much about his sense of security, but going through a metamorphosis. He does not seem to know where he stands with people, and Fraulein Burstner seems to wearily tolerate him. At the start, Joseph is kind of like Gregor in THE METAMORPHOSIS—his family is proud of him, and he had learned to maintain his status, at some cost to his self-esteem.  Read More