Abstract
The main focus of this thesis is to discuss how testimony is communicated in the three graphic narratives of Maus: A Survivor’s Tale by Art Spiegelman, Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel and Waltz with Bashir by Ari Folman and David Polonsky. Furthermore, I aim to show how the comics medium is, due to its interdisciplinary nature, particularly suited for communicating testimony. The chapters will focus on the relationship between the graphical and the textual aspects of the narratives, and how this interaction steers the reader’s understanding of the graphic memoirs. The relationship between text and image is a natural part of the comics medium, this, in turn, gives witnesses of trauma a unique outlet for voicing what has been experienced. Testimonies presented in artistic mediums are normally given in a mono-modal manner. The exploration of testimony in bi-modal expressive forms seems particularly interesting, both in relations to how the artist expresses him or herself, and how the reader understands this. The three chapters are structured around a few aspects of each of the narratives that I claim are the chief factors used by the artist(s) in order to be able to give their testimonials. Terms such as "postmemory”, “closure” and “collaborative testimony” will, consequently, be explored in-depth.