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simply by its silence and inexplicability. To assume that an element will work in a comic simply because it is a comic convention is hopeful, but a desperate hope that is here disproved. This particular frame also demonstrates, by its lack, the skill needed to smoothly combine words and pictures in a purely visual medium. Returning to Dog's work, it seems that his more surreal stories like A Boy Called Julia owe much to literature, especially in terms of narrative style. A Boy Called Julia: Part 1 contains a single instance of direct communication, even to the extent of timing an appropriate speaking pause [fig 20]. The drawings show a specific face because it is a portrait of the narrator and also a portrait of the artist. This passage highlights the artificiality and chaos of the rest of the comic, which is represented as reality in the story. This is another deconstructive device; it could be used to make the comic more real, but instead it is used to make the comic more surreal. Bitterkomix 3 (Pulp vir Papkoppies) and 4 (Verkoop Jou Siel vir Security) contain work by several outside contributors, and much more formal experimentation. Do a Dance for Daddy, Die Mens and Siembamba are all illustrated texts. These lead into purely visual exercises, storyless stories which are a more systematic exploration of the mechanisms of comics: Verdwaalde Harte, Rewerie, Alcohol, Myself and my Heroes, and, in more extended form, Die Hero van die Bitch. Botes and Dog each produce a longer comic that combine this experimentation with a narrative: Klapmuts Polisie Slaan Toe, by Botes, and A Discreet Selection from the Proverbs of Hell, by Dog. Do a Dance for Daddy is an illustrated poem, and a collaboration between Joe Dog and Claudette Schreuders. Meaning is generated by the almost arbitrary connections between the words and the pictures. The two texts, verbal and visual, comment on each other by 116
surpnsmg juxtapositions. This mechanism, of juxtaposition and contradiction, is highlighted by the combination of Dog's linear pen' drawings and Schreuders' photographic pencil drawings. Do a Dance for Daddy recontextualises the original poem by including elements that refer to a specifically South African situation [fig 21]. The poem is rewritten in classic Bitterkomix style: the subject is the horror of Afrikaans culture, and the depiction relies on a wealth of references and significant details. Om haar ontwil behou Blank SA BE HIS LITTLE flNGEL Figure 21 Dog Do a Dance for Daddy pI Die Mens [fig 22], by Botes, is fresher and more original than Do a Dance for Daddy. Its format is similar, being an illustrated rhyme, but the pictures and the words form two parallel texts, echoing each other. The illustrations refine the meaning of the text, and pin down one possible interpretation of it. In clarifying the text and drawing details from it, the pictures are given such substance that they could stand alone and still convey the essence of the comic. Die Mens is more concise and limited, and therefore more forceful than Do a Dance for Daddy. 117
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A CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF SOUTH AFRICA
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dialect differs from the language o
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"Does he paint? He fain would write
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1. INTRODUCTION What I am attemptin
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existence ... until food gets short
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is making comics respectable in the
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Most of these comics are produced a
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2. DEFINITIONS AND TERMINOLOGY The
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In addition, extraverbal sounds, or
Page 19 and 20:
The decision as to whether visual l
Page 21 and 22:
For the first two decades of the tw
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Wertham's book The Seduction of the
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Undergrounds were amoral, sexual, s
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coalesced into comics intended for
Page 29 and 30:
3. ANALYSIS Four different groups o
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incomprehensible passages are incom
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positive shapes, even or especially
Page 35 and 36:
3.2. KOMIKSOC The confessional aspe
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,0 ::l£~) \e B . f"'CM P'!~t .....
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Figure 2 Franklin After the Plagues
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Sididis's Tripping uses comic conve
Page 44 and 45:
example of how the appearance of a
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M\..I.A i H !lVIE ou~ rut", """" ""
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The artist only solves this problem
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text. Yet the frames function in su
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of the text, which is the reason fo
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omb) are lost in an attempt at pers
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a single emotion, depicting various
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Figure 19 Breytenbach Eddie Jumped
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Content is sometimes allowed to esc
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Sorfa's technique saves, lives up t
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Figure 23 Casey Showcase: Item 1 pI
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Two people, a scriptwriter and an a
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Sorfa's collaboration with scriptwr
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Casey's understanding of blacks and
Page 72 and 73: From the whimsical, poetic scripts
Page 74 and 75: This same regularity forces pace to
Page 76 and 77: In previous comics, my 'visual writ
Page 78 and 79: The comic was drawn full-size on A4
Page 80 and 81: Text shifts between narrative, spee
Page 82 and 83: Teo iNTE.N5E · Figure 38 Sorfa Spi
Page 84 and 85: ' .. Figure 1 T. Begg The Battle of
Page 86 and 87: The text of Bone Staircase, by Freu
Page 88 and 89: of solid blacks and a subjective vi
Page 90 and 91: Rue, by Sididis, begins well. The f
Page 92 and 93: completely resolved. Possibly his p
Page 94 and 95: seems to pick out elements, without
Page 96 and 97: The awkwardness of this comic is a
Page 98 and 99: 3.4. BI'ITERKOMIX Bitterkomix start
Page 100 and 101: From Case No. 308, the story of Tom
Page 102 and 103: Figure 3 Botes, Dog The Tommy Saga:
Page 104 and 105: 'Tj ~. (1) ..,. tj o OQ ;l ,(1) VEI
Page 106 and 107: etween form and content, but also p
Page 108 and 109: Another example is figure 8, from A
Page 110 and 111: structured. Familiar sources, conte
Page 112 and 113: Some verbal comic conventions are m
Page 114 and 115: Both artists make use of a great va
Page 116 and 117: character, Chico D, into a martyr a
Page 118 and 119: Figure 17 Van Zyl Die Besoek p5 112
Page 120 and 121: The transitions between panels are
Page 124 and 125: Figure 22 Botes Die Mens 118
Page 126 and 127: Verdwaalde Harte [fig 23J, also by
Page 128 and 129: Figure 27 Dog, Winterbach Rewerie p
Page 130 and 131: In Die Hero van die Bitch [fig 29],
Page 132 and 133: draws the reader's attention to the
Page 134 and 135: Figure 32 Bates Siembamba 128
Page 136 and 137: The Proverbs are selected and reint
Page 138 and 139: In Klapmuts Polisie Slaan Toe, Bote
Page 140 and 141: Ina van Zyl is more concerned with
Page 142 and 143: I ROSIE is NUUT deur Ina van ;Zyl I
Page 144 and 145: M y DEliO !r1OTHER H I..4NG UP I LE
Page 146 and 147: Botes is very good at acidic social
Page 148 and 149: The second episode of Missileman, b
Page 150 and 151: In Kanker Botes' subject is again t
Page 152 and 153: coincides with the appearance of th
Page 154 and 155: closeup, then pulls away to explain
Page 156 and 157: stories in issue 1 are in English,
Page 158 and 159: 4. CONCLUSION The comics are all pr
Page 160 and 161: The most common genres (my definiti
Page 162 and 163: the first generation whose world is
Page 164 and 165: ways of creating this entrance poin
Page 166 and 167: S. BIBLIOGRAPHY BARKER, M. 1989. Co
Page 168: Thames and Hudson. NEAL, C. 1987. T
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