Nothing comes close to the success of Paul, the phenomenon of Quebec comics. Michel Giguère, generous connoisseur of 9and art, proposed to Michel Rabagliati to come back to his work and dismantle the mechanics. The result is a work that is both scholarly and accessible, full of humor and unpublished images.
Posted at 9:00 a.m.
The two Michels – Rabagliati, the author, and Giguère, the analyst – obviously know each other well. They laugh, relaunch each other, add to each other’s answers and flirt with each other with that familiarity that one notices in people between whom the current passes. It happened to them a few times to talk about Paul and comics together in front of an audience. “We had a misfortune each time,” said Michel Giguère, delighted.
Paul: interviews and comments is, neither more nor less, the transposition into a book of the kind of interview and analysis that this comic book specialist is used to doing in his Comic book meeting.
The idea is to address the general public, to take them by the hand to involve them more deeply in their thinking. [au sujet de la BD].
Michel Giguere
The idea of doing in book form what he does in front of an audience came to the fore… at the start of the pandemic. “To do that in a mainstream book, it took an attractive subject,” he says. Michael [Rabagliati] is a safe bet, which people think they know if only by reading Paul. »
A book for everyone
The exchange between the two Michels results in a work of imposing scope. “It’s no longer a coffee table book, it’s the whole table!” laughs the cartoonist. On more than 300 pages, he and his analyst come back to the story of Paul, the situation of comics in Quebec, the development of the characters, the narrative mechanics at work in his books or the necessary delicacy that is essential. when you tell your life… and a little about that of others.
“I don’t know of any analysis of comics such as Michel proposes, that is to say to stop at the boards and take your time to look at the effect produced by the arrangement of the cases”, observes Michel Rabagliati, who says he is “flattered” that his work has been the subject of such attention.
Excerpts from Paul: Interviews and Comments
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IMAGE PROVIDED BY WATERMELON
A host of “curiosities” are offered at the end of the album.
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IMAGE PROVIDED BY WATERMELON
The analyzes are based on a profusion of images, so that the subject is clear and dynamic.
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IMAGE PROVIDED BY WATERMELON
The interviews conducted by Michel Giguère are searched and pass from the personal to the professional.
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IMAGE PROVIDED BY WATERMELON
Lettering, cultural references, cutting, framing, language levels: Michel Giguère subtly dismantles all the mechanics at work in Michel Rabagliati’s books.
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IMAGE PROVIDED BY WATERMELON
The album ends with a host of unpublished drawings and plates, little known or published elsewhere than in the adventures of Paul. The nod to Tintin is obvious here.
1/5
Michel Giguère does not pay into complex theories or academic language. Paul: interviews and comments is a casual scholarly book. “Me, I come with the technical side, but it would be a little dry if it was only that, and Michel [Rabagliati] arrives with so much humor and humanity that it strikes a nice balance. »
An unexpected fate
The technical aspect may be important in this book, but the approach remains sensitive. “I hope it seems that I am also interested in the mechanics of emotion”, specifies Michel Giguère. This is the case and not only in these analyses, but also in the long interview that he leads with the cartoonist and during which he moves fluidly from the professional sphere to the personal sphere.
It is particularly interesting to see the two Michels return to the beginnings of Paul. Michel Rabagliati had then made a small comic strip which he intended for his relatives. It was by chance that he met the two founders of La Pastèque.
What happened is unexpected. And there is also that I was persevering. We wouldn’t be talking about me today if I hadn’t hit the same nail for 23 years…
Michael Rabagliati
It must be said that Paul arrived at the right time in the landscape of Quebec comics. Drawn & Quarterly (which had notably published Julie Doucet, Chester Brown and Seth) had opened the door to a new type of comics for adults. In Europe, The Association had a similar approach. Michel Rabagliati, who had no interest in youth comics, found his place in this new wave.
His art, which borrows heavily from classic Franco-Belgian comics (“I use the same tricks as Uderzo and Hergé,” says Michel Rabagliati), has become a way of observing himself. “I like it when an author does not spare himself, says the cartoonist, citing in particular Emmanuel Carrère and Michel Houellebecq. I have no shame about that, I’m able to show my bad sides. I treat myself to therapy with this: instead of paying $100 per session, I do my planks with Paul in it and it makes me feel good. »
This large volume does not mark the end of Paul. “I still have things to say”, assures its author. He is currently working on a novel that will include lead illustrations. “These are fairly large drawings, encapsulated in a fairly classic novel layout with indented dialogues, explains Michel Rabagliati. I don’t compare myself to a writer, but I’m able to write texts that aren’t too bad and I take advantage of my drawing talent because often writers aren’t able to draw! »
Paul: interviews and comments
Michel Rabagliati and Michel Giguere
The watermelon
302 pages