Unique reading experiences are something I am constantly looking for.
I find that most people nowadays, myself included, are desensitized to most media and it’s hard to find something new and exciting. After getting a recommendation from a friend for a graphic novel, I was skeptical that it could live up to the hype. I was wrong. “Asterios Polyp” by David Mazzucchelli was like nothing I had ever seen.
“Asterios Polyp” is the name of the main character, a professor of architecture at Cornell University in Ithica, N.Y. Polyp’s apartment burns to the ground after being struck by lightning. With so many bad things happening in his life, Polyp gets on a bus and goes as far as his money will take him. He ends up in Apogee, a middle-of-nowhere small town. Polyp takes a job at an auto repair shop where he ponders his life. Scenes of Polyp’s past, dreams and failed marriage are narrated by his stillborn twin brother Ignazio.
Though the storyline was quite captivating, loosely based off of “The Odyssey” with allusions to Greek mythology, it is not the star of this graphic novel. The illustrations are what make “Asterios Polyp” the wonderful piece that it is. Each character is drawn in a different style, sometimes meshing or clashing with others, and their speech bubbles use different text.
Color plays a large role in the novel. When Polyp and his wife are shown in memories of the past, he is blue and she is red, but when they are getting along, purple is made. The present-day scenes are shown in purple and yellow to distinguish from the past. The different drawing styles and details for each person is something I had never seen before, and made me want to stare at the illustrations to make sure I wasn’t missing anything.
Eastern Michigan University student Leijah Petelka has read the graphic novel many times. She said that it is unique and stands out from other graphic novels because Mazzucchelli “hides things in the story” and by doing this he “takes it further than a lot of writers and artists do.” He takes small details and integrates them later into the story, details that Petelka says are “things you don’t notice unless you know art or know the story,” and each time she reads it she notices something new. Since its release in 2009, “Asterois Polyp” has sold over 40,000 copies.
“Asterios Polyp” is Mazzucchelli’s best-known work, and has won awards including three Harvey Awards and multiple Eisner Awards. He has also worked with Frank Miller on “Batman: Year One” and “Daredevil: Born Again,” both of which he did the illustrations but not the story.
