"Fun Home" by Alison Bechdel is an autobiography expressed in the form of a graphic novel. In this memoir, Bechdel outlines the events that unfold in her childhood and young adult life surrounding her father in what she describes as a 'family tragicomic." Throughout this novel, Bechdel lays a thick foundation of literary references that insinuate themes in her own life. Within this multitude of references, Bechdel develops a scaffolding to better understand and categorize the experiences she has in her own life and establishes her own reality. While there are several literary comparisons made throughout this novel, Bechdel writes two particularly extensive metaphors with the tale of Daedalus and The Odyssey.
Bechdel exhibits the importance …show more content…
It is not until the end of the novel that she forms a concrete conclusion on the way this metaphor fits with her story. In an elegant parallel to the first image in the novel, Bechdel ends the book on a matching note. She depicts two images on the page: one of the truck that contributed to her father's demise and one of herself once again as a small child, jumping into the arms of her father. The text on the page goes to say that while her father is truly Icarus-unable to heed warnings and plummets to his death-she, too, is Icarus. The primary difference being that she was able to look at his example and not make the same mistakes. She looks at his struggles with living a life of suppression, unhappiness, and an inability to form personal relationships and understand that while he lived a life of tragedy, falling into the water, when she to leap into the deep end, he would be there to catch her spiritually to prevent her from the same fate he encountered. It is the complex interworkings of this metaphor Bechdel ultimately makes sense of the events in her life.
Delving even deeper into the idea that she needs fiction to understand herself, Bechdel can be seen on the pages discovering that she is a lesbian, not through experience, but rather through reading. In the last chapter of her memoir, Bechdel drapes her journey in a shroud of references the novel The Odyssey. In the midst of her journey, she realized she was a lesbian amongst books and kicking off the tale in the middle of her journey, similar to the way that Homer begins telling his novel midway through Odysseus's
Bechdel exhibits the importance …show more content…
It is not until the end of the novel that she forms a concrete conclusion on the way this metaphor fits with her story. In an elegant parallel to the first image in the novel, Bechdel ends the book on a matching note. She depicts two images on the page: one of the truck that contributed to her father's demise and one of herself once again as a small child, jumping into the arms of her father. The text on the page goes to say that while her father is truly Icarus-unable to heed warnings and plummets to his death-she, too, is Icarus. The primary difference being that she was able to look at his example and not make the same mistakes. She looks at his struggles with living a life of suppression, unhappiness, and an inability to form personal relationships and understand that while he lived a life of tragedy, falling into the water, when she to leap into the deep end, he would be there to catch her spiritually to prevent her from the same fate he encountered. It is the complex interworkings of this metaphor Bechdel ultimately makes sense of the events in her life.
Delving even deeper into the idea that she needs fiction to understand herself, Bechdel can be seen on the pages discovering that she is a lesbian, not through experience, but rather through reading. In the last chapter of her memoir, Bechdel drapes her journey in a shroud of references the novel The Odyssey. In the midst of her journey, she realized she was a lesbian amongst books and kicking off the tale in the middle of her journey, similar to the way that Homer begins telling his novel midway through Odysseus's