Customer Reviews

Adolescence (Jew in Communist Prague) (v. 2)

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This second installment of Italian cartoonist Giardino's graphic novel series about a Jewish boy growing up in Communist Prague finds Jonas Finkel unable to attend school due to his father's status as political prisoner. Forced to work, he toils as a laborer on a building site before falling in with Slavek, a fatalistic, drunken storytelling plumber. From this substitute father-figure, he moves on to work in a bookstore, where his love of books can be nourished, and where he meets a club of teenage intellectuals who meet in the park to read forbidden poetry and sing banned songs. Jonas's outsider status is highlighted by his awkward fumblings in trying to attract the attention of Tatiana, one of the intellectual girls. Interspersed with his is some of the political goings-on of the time, the death of Stalin, counter-revolutionary efforts by the secret police, and soforth. These feel rather forced and shoehorned in when contrasted with the simple tale of Jonas growing up without his father. Perhaps the effect is lessened when the series is read in its entirety, instead of in sparse 48-page installments. It'll be interested to see where it'll all lead. As to the art, the story is drawn in the lovely realistic style I tend to associate with European cartoonists, and colored with an appropriately subdued palate of greys and browns.