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Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel. New York, NY: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2006. ISBN 978-0-618-47794-4

 

Annotation: Bechdel’s graphic memoir investigates her formative life and influences, particularly her relationship with her closeted homosexual father growing up, coming out herself, and how books and text shaped her world.

 

Media: Pen and ink.

 

Rating: 5Q/5P.

 

Curricular connections: English/Language Arts, Biographies/Autobiographies, GLBT.

 

School level: High school.

 

NP 07/29/09

 

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++++

Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic, by Alison Bechdel.  New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2006. 

 

Summary: A dark but funny memoir of growing up in an offbeat family.

 

Rating: 5Q, 5P

 

 

ISBN: 0618477942xc

 

 

Medium: Pen/ink

 

 

Curricular Connections: Great for independent reading, Creative Writing.

Age Group: 10^th – 12^th Grades

 

Potential Obstacles: Dark themes, sexuality, homosexuality

 

 

Challenged:  Deemed “pornographic” by Marshall University Libraries.  While Fun Home is definitely not for younger readers, older high school readers are certainly capable of handling the mature subject matter.  I do not agree with the “pornographic” label, as it is a memoir, and not excessively sexual or particularly distasteful.

 

 

E.K. 7/25/09

++++

 

 

Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel.  Boston: Houghlin-Mifflin, 2006.

Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2006.

 

ISBN: 978-0618871711

 

Alison Bechdel’s graphic novel memoir of growing up as a closeted gay girl with a closeted gay father and a distant mother beats most people’s tales of adolescent angst.

 

Alliteration: Bechdel often employs alliteration, which gives a fluid, literary flow to her words. An example is her description of her father as “an alchemist of appearance” (p.6).

 

Onomatopoeia (and alliteration): Bechdel uses and defines onomatopoeia with her example. “Butch. It was self-descriptive, cropped, curt, percussive, practically onomatopoeic” (p. 97).

Simile: Similes are used to expand unique ideas and make them more universal for readers.  “Our house was like an artists’ colony. We ate together, but otherwise we were absorbed in our separate pursuits” (p. 134).

Personification: Bechdel’s use of personification brings emotions to life. “His shame inhabited our house as pervasively and invisibly as the aromatic musk of aging mahogany” (p. 20).

Sophisticated language: The complexity of this language is balanced by illustrations that demonstrate the meanings of words that may be unfamiliar to readers. “His monomaniacal restoration of our old house” (p.4) is followed by an illustration showing how, when the father is immersed in his house renovation, his oblivious to everyone around him.

Allusion: Bechdel alludes to the writings of Proust, Fitzgerald, Camus, and Joyce via parallels she draws between their storylines and those of her family’s life.

Symbolism: Bechdel uses symbolism throughout the book to foreshadow and build dramatic tension. An apt example of this is an opening illustration of her father reading Anna Karenina with its famous first line about unhappy families (p. 3).

Censorship: Soon after it came out, Fun Home was challenged by a patron at the Marshall Public Library in Missouri. Because of an illustration of a couple having sex, the patron called the book pornographic and declared that it was inappropriate reading material for young adults. Both the National Coalition Against Censorship and the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund stood up in favor of the book, but the library ultimately decided to remove it from the shelves until it could come up with a selection policy that would offer guidelines for how to deal with this book, and with similar book challenges in the future. I searched the internet to see what the outcome of this case was, but could not find any more information, so I am assuming that to date, more than a year and a half after the challenge occurred, no final decision has been made. This makes me wonder if the proposal to develop a selection policy was not just a ploy for removing the books indefinitely.

 

I believe Fun Home should have been kept in the library’s Young Adult collection. I would justify my belief by pointing out that, according to the Supreme Court case Miller v. California, for something to be declared pornographic, it must be licentious and lack serious literary or artistic value. Fun Home has received much praise from places of repute such as the New York Times Book Review. I would also point out that there are many, many young adult books (and probably several of them in the Marshall Public Library) that mention a couple having sex, but what so upset this patron was the visual depiction of this. Yet, images as well as words are protected by the First Amendment, and to censor a book because of its images is as wrong as doing so because of its words.

 

Rating: 5Q/5P

Posted by LA 4/6/8

 

 

Citation: Bechdel, A. (2007) Fun Home. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.

ISBN: 0618871713

Annotation: Bechdel recounts her life growing up with her closeted gay father and her own quest for self discovery.

Media Used: digital illustration
Rating: 5Q/5P

 

Controversy: Fun Home is definitely a mature read, but it should not be kept out of the hands of young adults.  Most of the criticism against it involves Bechdel's images of sex which some critics have described as pornographic in nature.  Although there are images of sexual organs and sexual acts, they are far from pornographic.  Reader's are shown male sexual organs, but they are on the first corpse that Bechdel ever saw and are similar to something found in an anatomy book with more attention being paid to the cadaver's open chest cavity then anything else.  The sex "scenes" are limited to those between Bechdel and her girl friend and are less graphic in nature.  There are breasts and sexual positions, but these images are snapshots not scenes; they are suddenly introduced and just as suddenly dismissed.  Bechdel presents them naturally not sexually, and they are poetic not lurid. Some of the times, the characters aren't even having sex, but rather they are lying about sharing literature together in an intimate situation. There is depiction of oral sex, but it is not detailed and consists of a few panels.  Panels showing masturbation are also simplistic with the character fully clothed and, more often then not, reading (not looking at pornographic images). It should be kept in mind that these sexual images are not a large part of the book, but they are necessary to show the author's struggle to discover herself and to come to terms with her father. 
    As previously mentioned by another contributor above, the Marshall Public Library did remove it from their collection while they created a collection policy.  Fun Home and the other challenged book Blankets were returned to circulation; however, they were taken from the young adult collection and labeled for adults (for more information, please see http://www.marshallnews.com/story/1193923.html).

 

Art Style:   Bechdel’s art style has a documentary feel to it.  She wanted to make it as truthful as possible and relied heavily on photographs and other family objects.  At the 2007 Comic-Con International in San Diego, CA, Bechdel spoke on how she used photographs to help make sure her drawings were as accurate as possible, and she herself would pose in pictures as the various different characters to make sure that perspectives and proportions were correct.  She also mentioned how she would take days working on one panel, re-creating book pages, diaries, and letters to make sure they were as accurate to the original as possible.  However, she also understood that she did not want to eliminate all of her personal style, and took great care to combine the real visual images with her own style and memories.

 

Curriculum Connection: Language Arts    Grades 11-12

 

Literary Devices: Bechdel's background in literature and writing is obvious in Fun Home as it is full of various literary devices. 
    Symbols: Allison Bechdel has visual symbols throughout Fun Home.  On the very first page, we see her father reading Anna Karenina, and although nothing but the cover is shown, Tolstoy's opening lines "All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in it's own way" sets the tone for knowing readers for the rest of the book. She continues to use these literary visual symbols through out her work to add to the story without distracting the reader. 
    Parallelism/Repetition: Bechdel once again uses literary/rhetorical devices to ease her reader's along and to show the dualism and conflicting images of her father. On page six, she describes her father's special talent for interior design; "My father could spin garbage into gold. He could transform a room with a small offhand flourish. He could conjure an entire finished period interior from a paint chip." This repetition builds upon itself with each sentence and each sentence raises her father and his abilities to a higher level. However, the repetition of words is not the only repetition present; there is also a visual repetition that contrast with the words.  In each panel her father appears stern and alone.  He is always interacting with the environment, not the people in it.  This repetition cements in the reader's mind the emotional absence of Bechdel's father which climaxes in the last panel of this sequence when a young Bechdel pronounces "my arm is falling off." These two images of greatness and absence are carried throughout the text as Bechdel struggles to come to terms with them.
    Rhythm/Alliteration: Bechdel's use of parallelism also creates a flowing rhythm for her readers.  Following the previous mentioned verbal repetition, she brings the whole page together with "He was an alchemist of appearance, a savant of surface, a Deadalus of decor." This second use of parallelism in addition to the added alliteration continues the rhythmic flow of the page, but the shortness of it compared to the prior section bring a sense of closer.  The reader is drifting along in the visuals and language of the page, but the change in rhythm brings them back to the story at hand gradually enough to be unobtrusive.
    Metaphor: Bechdel also uses literary stories to explain/explore/enhance her memoir.  One of the earliest examples is the story of Daedalus, the Minotaur, and the labyrinth.  As Bechdel retells this ancient story of a creator making an inescapable labyrinth for a being he had a part of creating, she illustrates it not with classical mythology images, but with images of her and her brother trying to escape the wrath of her father.  Just as the "stray youths and maidens" realized there was no escape from the labyrinth, so too Bechdel felt trapped by her father's passions and unable to escape.  By having the narration and the artwork conflict with each other, Bechdel is able to create a new type of metaphor and tell two stories at once in their completeness without sacrificing either set of imagery.  This creates an in depth and dynamic connection between the two. 
    Simile: Bechdel uses a variety of similes although they are not as plentiful as her metaphors (which are one of her main story telling tools). Her simile's are often very dramatic in nature but are used to discuss every day items or events.  They are also more complex then average similes and range from questions to poetic statements.  Some examples include: "Like a medium channeling lost souls, the filament of a space heater vibrated tunelessly to our footfalls" (Page 39). "In the hot August afternoon, the city was reduced, like a long-simmering demiglace to a fragrance of stunning richness and complexity" (page 103). "Could this Hobson's choice have been a form of divine intervention? Like the goddess Athena's visit to Telemachus, when she nudged him to go find his long-lost dad, Odysseus?" (page 202). "I referred back to Colette herself, basking in her sensualism as perhaps the sea-ravaged Odysseus had in the ministrations of Nausicaa" (page 207). 

Onomatopoeia: Although Bechdel does not use onomatopoeia often as a literary device in Fun Home. She does bring attention to the term and the importance it had on her.  As a child, her older cousins nicknamed her Butch, and while that may not always be looked on as a term of endearment, Bechdel reveled in the sound of the word: "No one needed to explain what it meant.  It was self-descriptive. Cropped, curt, percussive, practically onomatopoeic. At any rate, the opposite of sissy" (page 97).    The terms "cropped, curt, and percussive" continue to emphasize her point; the word "butch" is self-descriptive in and of itself.

 

Lesson Plan #1: For a creative writing class – Grades 11-12

 

Objective:      The purpose of today’s lesson is to teach students how to recognize metaphors and how to discuss/discover the meanings behind specific metaphors.

 

Materials Needed:   Bechdel’s Fun Home and additional books on rhetoric or literary devices to look up additional information if needed.  Student’s will need paper, writing instruments and a copy of Fun Home.

 

Pre-Assignment: Student’s should have already read Bechdel’s Fun Home.

 

Introduction:

 

Anticipatory Set: When students enter the room, make sure the word metaphor is written on the board.  Once students are sitting, ask if anyone knows what metaphor means or can give an example.  Allow a brief discussion.

 

Goals: After the above brief discussion, inform students that the goal for the end of the lesson is for them to have a stronger knowledge of what metaphors are and how they are used in creative fiction.

 

Information:

 

Explain to the students what a metaphor is.

 

                                                              i.      A literary device which uses analogy to compare two seemingly unrelated objects, events or concepts.  This comparison is implied unlike a simile where the comparison is explicit; in other words, a simile will use terms such as “like” or “as” to compare the two things where as a metaphor will not.  They are very similar in nature, and the only real difference is in how they are expressed.

 

1.      Metaphor: “David was a lion in battle.”

 

2.      Simile: “David was like a lion in battle.”

 

                                                            ii.      Metaphors can be much more powerful then similes because it unites the two objects verbally where as a simile still keeps the items separate in a reader’s mind. 

 

                                                          iii.      The Tenor is the idea being expressed or the subject of the comparison while the vehicle is the image being conveyed.

 

1.      In David was a lion in battle, David’s performance in battle is the tenor, but the vehicle in which to describe/convey the image is the lion. 

 

                                                           iv.      The importance of metaphors? Aristotle considered the metaphor to be the greatest device for poets and Ezra Pound agreed with him by calling it “the hallmark of genius.”  Metaphor allows readers to see and understand things differently and often paints a fuller picture of the tenor than simple description.  Metaphors add depth to writing and allows for deeper understanding. 

 

Activities and/or Guided Practice:

 

Guided Practice:       (Use Fun Home for a class discussion)Allison Bechdel is a master of literary devices and the most prominent one that she uses is metaphor. 

 

                                                             v.      Turn to page ___ and reread the page.

 

1.      Does anyone see any metaphors? If so, what is it?

 

2.      What is the tenor and what is the vehicle?

 

3.      What is Bechdel trying to portray to her readers through this metaphor?

 

                                                           vi.      Make sure that the class has a clear understanding of this metaphor before moving on.

 

Group Activity:  Divide the class into groups of three to four students.  Assign each group a section of Fun Home to look through for one metaphor during the class period.  Ask the group to report back to the class on what the metaphor is, what the tenor and vehicle is, and what they think Bechdel is trying to portray through each metaphor. 

 

                                                         vii.      It is ok if the student doesn’t understand the complete metaphor since Bechdel has an extensive literary background and uses many texts and myths in her work.  The importance is that they are able to identify them and have a general sense of what each metaphor is conveying.

 

Independent Practice:         The assignment for the class will be to go home and thoroughly explore Bechdel’s metaphors.

 

                                                       viii.      Look through Fun Home for three more metaphors (one of which has to be one not discussed in class).  If there is a vehicle that you are unfamiliar with, attempt to gather additional information on it.  This means you may have to look up information on other literary works such as Ulysses or The Odyssey.  Make sure you include the following:

 

1.      The metaphor itself or a summary of the metaphor with page numbers on where to find it.

 

2.      The tenor and the vehicle

 

3.      Your interpretation of what Bechdel is trying to convey

 

4.      Additional research notes which help explain the metaphor. 

 

Evaluation of class session/Closure:        Spend the rest of the class period answering questions or further discussions to make sure that student’s have a clear understanding of the assignment and what is being asked from them.  Restate that they are looking for metaphors, tenors, vehicles, and interpretations. 

 

Next Class:

 

Evaluation: The next class period will be spent on discussing the student’s findings.  Make sure to look for the following points of understanding:

 

                                                           ix.      Ability to identify metaphors

 

                                                             x.      Ability to identify the tenor and vehicle of a metaphor

 

                                                           xi.      Abillity to discuss interpretations of metaphors.

 

Self grading: Ask that students take notes during the discussion to either correct or add to their homework. This should be done on a separate sheet of paper form the original homework.  At the end of class, collect the original homework and the notes for grading. 

 

 

 

Posted by AMelilli 4/16/08

 

Fun Home: a family tragicomic by Alison Bechdel. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2006. ISBN: 978-0-678-47794-4

 

 

 

Alison Bechdel (From long-running independent comic strip Dykes to Watch Out For), writes her memoir of growing up in a house of secrets.  Her father’s closet homosexuality, his obsession with renovating his Victorian home, and his two jobs as an English teacher and funeral home director collide in a true story about identity and the tragedy of not living your true life.

 

 

 

Black and white comic book style (a la Dykes to Watch Out For)

 

 

 

Author Alison Bechdel is famous for her independent comic Dykes To Watch Out For (DTWOF).

 

Her website features archives of that groundbreaking comic and includes on-going press and blogs about Fun Home.

 

Fun Home continues to experience controversy and challenges that Bechdel stays current on.

 

http://www.dykestowatchoutfor.com/index.php

 

 

Curriculum Connections

English/Language Arts

Biographies/Autobiographies/Memoirs

 

 

 

(DM 4.23.08)

 

 

 

APA Citation	Bechdel, A. (2006). Fun home: A family tragicomic. New York: Houghton Mifflin.
ISBN	978-0-618-47794-4	Rating	4Q/4P	Top 10	no
Media	Pen, watercolor		Grades/Subject	9+
Annotation	Growing up with a distant and controlling father who was a closeted homosexual and possible pedophile, Alison draw parallels between her own blossoming sexual identity and her father’s strangled adulthood.

 

 

 

 

Citation: Fun Home: A Family Tragicomedy by Alison Bechdel. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2006.

 

 

ISBN: 0618871713

 

 

Annotation: Bechdel recounts growing up with a dysfunctional family, her closeted gay father, and coming to terms with her own sexual identity.

 

 

Media: Digital Illustration. Comic-book style.

 

 

Rating: 4Q/4P

 

S.F 06/21/09