“All stories are either love stories or war stories. In Belfast they are both.” This is the subtitle of the news comic strip Nancy designer Vincent Bailly and Breton screenwriter Kris: Irish Sheet Music – First Verse. Six years after their last comic book collaboration My father was a boxerthe two authors return with this first part, centered on a particular love story, in a contemporary Northern Ireland.
The story tells the adventures of Tim, Protestant, and Mary, Catholic, two young Irishmen in 21st century Belfast. Both will meet, get to know each other, love each other and face the echoes of a tormented past that will catch up with them. After writing more classic war stories like Our Mother War (2009)A man is dead (2006)or Dark night over Brest (2016), the screenwriter Kris wanted to lend himself to the game of a more intimate and personal story.
A desire shared by his lifelong draftsman sidekick, Vincent Bailly, whose first comic strip collaboration dates back to 2008 with the album Irish denominations. “We wanted to pick up the reader a bit with this story of two lovers and make it something different. We want to bring the reader in turn to be romantic and in love“, explains the designer.
In this album, the authors depict the past of a country weakened by the conflict in Northern Ireland. A period of war and political unrest between Protestants and Catholics. It only ended in 1998 after thirty years of bloody unrest. A historical approach assumed by these authors: “The idea was to revisit Northern Ireland over the last thirty years. We are going to have a moment when national and personal history will catch up with them”, says Vincent Bailly.
By its context, the album makes you think about questions that everyone could ask themselves. Pcould we build ourselves despite our differences? Should we accept ourselves as we are? Are we victims and heirs of the debts of the past? Ua personal approach with a view to universal scope.
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“Irish Scores – First verse”, by Kris and Vincent Bailly. Published on April 13, 2022 at Futuropolis editions 64 pages – €14.90.