Text - Rhodes University

The transitions between panels are transitions of mood. Nothing happens. Yet they are
also transitions of action, because nothing happ,?ns over and over again, so that successive
frames are not functioning as scenesetters, cinematically, but are narrating a lack of
events.
Figure 19 Van Zyl Die Besoek p4
The one soundeffect 'thwack' [fig 19] does not work. It is read as a word, an English
word, rather than heard as a sound. Perhaps it is because the story is in Afrikaans and
so unlike a cornie, that this conventional comic element stands out. All the action
happens in a shallow space, indeed a vacuum, and is depicted visually without suggestions
of sounds or smells or even textures. Perhaps the inclusion of the sound effect was
intended to produce a moment of shock, a climax, but the next frame has more impact
114