Written by: Paige Gavin 

Date Posted: Jan 2, 2025.

Graphic novels have long been a popular form of media for people of all ages, even gaining attention from the Smithsonian curator Josh Bell for the new Cell Phone exhibit. The use of visual media for narrative storytelling is a creative way to engage an audience outside of writing. Recently, I picked up the graphic novel COVID Chronicles: A Comics Anthology by various comic artists, who all experienced the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown differently [as we all did]. Grief, anxiety, hope, community, anger, frustration, love, care, creativity, politics, and despair are all themes touched upon through art in this anthology in ways I have not even thought of. The premise underlying this anthology is the concept of graphic medicine, in which “comics articulate complex or unsettling ideas, especially as they relate to important issues surrounding illness, disability, and healthcare” (Boileau 2021). Using the media of graphic novels to portray health issues is not novel, yet anthropologists have been slow to pick up on the benefit of studying graphic novels outside of superhero comics.

Visual art brings to the table a different way of seeing and conceptualizing life experiences.

COVID Chronicles is a great example of why researching other forms of storytelling and narratives is important to understanding events from perspectives we wouldn’t have thought of before. Visual art brings to the table a different way of seeing and conceptualizing life experiences. The use of art in storytelling allows for a broader audience by relying on the graphics rather than words. Anthropologists have used forms of drawing before, such as genealogy diagrams or artifact assemblages, yet, there has rarely been the use of graphic form of art in ethnography until now. The anthropologist Letizia Bonano has written about “drawing as a form of translation,” in which words in different languages were not sufficient to explain the complexities in her fieldwork; therefore, she turned to drawing her field sites and interlocuters to convey more than words could hold. 

The strength of this novel comes from the different artists drawing and storytelling styles, because the art style would match the tone of the narrative in the short comic, as Marshall McLuhan says, “the medium is the message” (1967). For example, few of the comics in this anthology are dedicated to depicting the pandemic from a child’s point of view, which are reflected in the art style. The artist Justin Larocca draws about a little boy who is frustrated and feels helpless when he can’t see his friends and worries about his nurse mom leaving for work. However, the little boy feels empowered by imagining himself as a superhero who fights against the COVID virus. Larocca depicts the boy in a Marvel-esque superhero suit who punches a personified COVID-19 virus. It is a lighthearted comic, because it plays off of the imagination of a kid who has yet to understand how viruses work, but still sees hope in fighting it off by washing his hands, wearing a mask, and creating art.  

In another comic titled Ripples by Amy and Brian Canini, a girl is upset and disappointed that she is doing all she can to protect her family and community by wearing a mask, yet she sees her friends going to each other’s houses in the middle of lockdown – a feeling felt by many kids across the nation. The girl’s parents are able to calm her down by telling her that what she is doing is helping and that, “at the end of the day, all of our actions have a ripple effect; whether they help or harm others is up to our choices.” Both of these comics touch upon a topic that we, as Rituals in the Making, have not fully engaged with and that is of the viewpoint of children and teens during the pandemic lockdown. 

Furthermore, the graphic novel depicts stories of horror and despair, artists dealing with the Trump administration and worrying about loved ones in healthcare. The artist Kang Jing writes and draws the story The Hero in My Heart, which is about a doctor who loses his wife to COVID. The doctor feels despair when he cannot save his wife, yet his wife encourages him in her last breath to continue treating patients. The story draws you in with the shading and detailing that emphasizes the seriousness and anguish that represents the experiences of healthcare workers during the peak of COVID cases and deaths during the pandemic. This anthology even has a dedication to the frontline workers who lost their lives to COVID-19. 

One comic that stood out the most to me in terms of art style and topic was The Right to Breath by Maureen Burdock and Joanna Regulska. The comic itself is drawn with black and deep aqua/green colors with the only other color being a blood-red color. Burdock and Regulska use the parasite tick as a symbol for greed and corruption that intensified the social injustice and civil rights issues that happened leading up to and into the COVID-19 pandemic. The Black Lives Matter protests are drawn in the comic with the large “corruption monster” with Trump on the back of it. The comic brings to light the issues that were underlying the pandemic and how “flattening the curve” became difficult with these issues.  

Overall, I’d highly recommend this graphic novel for those looking to learn more about the different experiences and perspectives during the height of the COVID-19 Pandemic. This anthology would be great to use in future lectures or classes on the 2020 pandemic, because of the diverse themes and topics related to the pandemic.