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The Listener Arbeiter Ring $19.95)
Weighing in at a meticulous 312 pages of original art, David Lester's The Listener Arbeiter Ring $19.95) is a graphic novel that manages to combine the rise of Hitler with a contemporary woman's search for meaning in the great art of Europe.
The Listener, on its historical and political level, revisits how Adolf Hitler was one of the original spin doctors, turning his party's narrow electoral victory in the state of Lippe, in 1933, into an alleged "massive victory" that enabled him to be appointed chancellor of Germany, by President Hindenburg, just two weeks later.
On an intimate and personal level, Louise - the listener of the title - takes a sabbatical tour of the museums of Europe, trying to overcome guilt and sadness after a young activist, inspired by one of Louise's sculptures, fell to his death while hanging a protest banner off the Woodward's W tower in Vancouver. She receives letters blaming her for the death of the activist.
As an antidote, Louise re-explores famous and favorite paintings and sculptures throughout Europe. The politics behind these works of art swim
in her mind. Along the way, she meets various people who affect her life.
In Austria, she meets Tomas, a man interested in the people behind the works of art, specifically destructive people who were artists or poets (Hitler was a painter; Stalin and Mao were poets). Tomas and Louise visit a concentration camp where Louise struggles to absorb the atmosphere, but she feels unable to comprehend the magnitude of what occurred there. As they journey through Europe, they discuss how they became artists, and what inspires them.
They discuss the nature of the art (Do people see what they're meant to see, learn what they're meant to learn, or see what they already understand?) and the possible obligations of artists to the world. Of particular note is a story about Orson Welles who was once asked to run for the senate and declined, whereupon Joseph McCarthy won that election.
The rise of hitler is told through the
memories of an older couple that Louise meets, Marie and Rudolph. In flashback scenes, Marie and Rudolph recall working for a newspaper in the conservative state of Lippe, in Germany, in the 1930s.
Louise listens as the couple recall joining the DNVP (German National People's Party), hoping for the return of the monarchy in Germany. The world slowly begins to change around them, and the Nazi party grows, along with attacks on Jewish people.
A crisis in the federal government is approaching as Hindenburg dithers in selecting a new chancellor of Germany. The top picks are DNVP's Alfred Hugenberg (who owns the paper where Marie and Rudolph work) and Adolf Hitler.
Along comes the state election in Lippe. Prior to this election call in Lippe, the Nazi Party was losing its appeal. Hitler's stubborn desire to hold all the power in his hands or none at all was hurting the party. But Hugenberg chose to strike a deal with Hitler, under the guise of national unity, hoping for a position of power in a Hitler-led government.
This compromise of principles by Hugenberg has disastrous consequences almost immediately. First, Marie and Rudolph's newspaper is ordered by Hugenberg to cease attacks on the Nazi Party. Hitler's party is in deep financial trouble and the Lippe election fight may be his last. The Nazi party throws everything they have into the campaign. His stormtroopers arrive from across Germany, converging on Lippe. DNVP campaign posters are covered over with Nazi posters. Local rallies are manipulated and members of the opposition are brutally attacked at their own rallies.
Newspapers backed by the Nazis spread their propaganda while the DNVP silences its own papers and reporters, shuts down its rallies, and allows the Nazis to dominate the campaign without protest.
The Orson Welles anecdote, as previously mentioned, now takes on greater significance to the reader.
The Nazis won the Lippe election in January of 1933 with only 39% of the vote. They had increased their vote count by only 4,000 votes from a preceding federal vote that was held in Lippe only three months earlier, in November.
After Hitler was subsequently appointed to serve as chancellor, other political parties were banned. The DNVP was dissolved, opposition leaders were found dead, citizens suspected of being Jewish or communist were beaten, and persecution of the Jews was escalated. That narrow victory in Lippe became an annual celebration in which Hitler skillfully presented himself as Germany's hero.
Marie and rudy express their regrets for not having done more, and Louise returns home with their memories and a special gift.
Back home, Louise is even more lost than before, and slips back into her previous lifestyle, returning to the man she had broken up with.
After several months, a man named Walter appears. He's an acquaintance of the Cambodian-born activist named Vann, who plunged to his death near the outset of the story.
This time Louise listens as Walter tells her the life story of Vann, a Cambodian doctor who survived genocide under the Pol Pot regime. Vann lost his parents and was never able to overcome his survivor's guilt. Because the Pol Pot regime particularily targeted artists for execution, Vann took a great interest in art, wondering what made artists so dangerous that so many had had to die.
Rather than blaming Louise for Vann's death, Walter has come to tell her that Vann was inspired by her work. Walter reassures Louise that Vann was solely responsible for his own death. Louise is moved by the story and takes solace from Walter's absolution of her culpability.
As far-right-wing activities are again coming to the fore in Germany, at the outset of the 21st century, including anti-Semitic activity and violent confrontations, Louise is inspired to create a new sculpture that is the culmination of all she has learned on her journey through Europe, and all her "listenings."
Louise is more comfortable expressing and explaining herself through drawing than talk, and I'm much the same with the written word. She is more of a listener, an observer, absorbing everything around her, and I found I could easily relate to her. I could sympathize with the way she runs from her guilt, even as it chases her every step of the way, until she is finally able to absorb Vann's actions and create her masterpiece.
The stereotypical artist is a "beautiful soul" putting passionate feelings to canvas, print, stone, or song. It's not often that artists are presented as mass murderers or power hungry dictators. But one of Hitler's greatest regrets is that he was never able to build a museum to house his personal collection of art.
It's depressing to think that someone who enjoys expression and creation could so love destruction. I prefer to write Hitler off as nothing more than a delusional, paranoid psychopath, someone who saw himself as Germany's new Siegfried, the Motherland's hero come to destroy the Nibelungs, the Jews.
But it's impossible to deny his artistic "flair," or the way in which he and his party so skillfully maneuvered a victory. Lester inserts several images and quotations of the
propaganda used by the Nazis. The xenophobia is rampant. The vitriol is truly horrific and saddening. Such propaganda ignited an entire nation and motivated the murder of millions.
For anyone interested in serious questioning of the role of art in society, The Listener is rich with quotations on the subject and Lester uses many excellent quotes as chapter headings. At first I thought, hey, real people don't talk like that. But people who live deeply in art probably do. Artists aren't exactly "normal." So The Listener reveals that when you live and breathe art on a daily basis, it becomes a central part of your life even outside its most practical uses.
So The Listener is a good story for people familiar with artists and art movements. Lester deftly slips these things, their history, their impact, into conversations between his characters, and ingrains them into their lives. As for Lester's art, it sweeps across the pages, changing as if it is alive with his thoughts.
This is far from a traditional comic book. It doubles as an intriguing read for anyone with an abiding interest in the psychology of Hitler and the propaganda machine that was the Nazi Party. The Listener is not something you can flip through in an afternoon. I spent hours going through the book, taking notes, forming thoughts.
Much of the dialogue from Hitler (and other Nazi party leaders) contains direct quotes from his speeches and writings. Lester details what is historical fact and what is his own making in the back of the book, which also includes an excellent timeline of the rise and fall of the Nazi
party.
Another nice inclusion is a collection of small biographies of several Nazi or pro-Nazi animators, filmmakers, and cartoonists, detailing their specific involvement in the Nazi propaganda machine, and their lives after the fall of the Third Reich. 9781894037488
A longer version of Kristin Bomba's review appeared in ComicAttack.net
The Listener, on its historical and political level, revisits how Adolf Hitler was one of the original spin doctors, turning his party's narrow electoral victory in the state of Lippe, in 1933, into an alleged "massive victory" that enabled him to be appointed chancellor of Germany, by President Hindenburg, just two weeks later.
On an intimate and personal level, Louise - the listener of the title - takes a sabbatical tour of the museums of Europe, trying to overcome guilt and sadness after a young activist, inspired by one of Louise's sculptures, fell to his death while hanging a protest banner off the Woodward's W tower in Vancouver. She receives letters blaming her for the death of the activist.
As an antidote, Louise re-explores famous and favorite paintings and sculptures throughout Europe. The politics behind these works of art swim
in her mind. Along the way, she meets various people who affect her life.
In Austria, she meets Tomas, a man interested in the people behind the works of art, specifically destructive people who were artists or poets (Hitler was a painter; Stalin and Mao were poets). Tomas and Louise visit a concentration camp where Louise struggles to absorb the atmosphere, but she feels unable to comprehend the magnitude of what occurred there. As they journey through Europe, they discuss how they became artists, and what inspires them.
They discuss the nature of the art (Do people see what they're meant to see, learn what they're meant to learn, or see what they already understand?) and the possible obligations of artists to the world. Of particular note is a story about Orson Welles who was once asked to run for the senate and declined, whereupon Joseph McCarthy won that election.
The rise of hitler is told through the
memories of an older couple that Louise meets, Marie and Rudolph. In flashback scenes, Marie and Rudolph recall working for a newspaper in the conservative state of Lippe, in Germany, in the 1930s.
Louise listens as the couple recall joining the DNVP (German National People's Party), hoping for the return of the monarchy in Germany. The world slowly begins to change around them, and the Nazi party grows, along with attacks on Jewish people.
A crisis in the federal government is approaching as Hindenburg dithers in selecting a new chancellor of Germany. The top picks are DNVP's Alfred Hugenberg (who owns the paper where Marie and Rudolph work) and Adolf Hitler.
Along comes the state election in Lippe. Prior to this election call in Lippe, the Nazi Party was losing its appeal. Hitler's stubborn desire to hold all the power in his hands or none at all was hurting the party. But Hugenberg chose to strike a deal with Hitler, under the guise of national unity, hoping for a position of power in a Hitler-led government.
This compromise of principles by Hugenberg has disastrous consequences almost immediately. First, Marie and Rudolph's newspaper is ordered by Hugenberg to cease attacks on the Nazi Party. Hitler's party is in deep financial trouble and the Lippe election fight may be his last. The Nazi party throws everything they have into the campaign. His stormtroopers arrive from across Germany, converging on Lippe. DNVP campaign posters are covered over with Nazi posters. Local rallies are manipulated and members of the opposition are brutally attacked at their own rallies.
Newspapers backed by the Nazis spread their propaganda while the DNVP silences its own papers and reporters, shuts down its rallies, and allows the Nazis to dominate the campaign without protest.
The Orson Welles anecdote, as previously mentioned, now takes on greater significance to the reader.
The Nazis won the Lippe election in January of 1933 with only 39% of the vote. They had increased their vote count by only 4,000 votes from a preceding federal vote that was held in Lippe only three months earlier, in November.
After Hitler was subsequently appointed to serve as chancellor, other political parties were banned. The DNVP was dissolved, opposition leaders were found dead, citizens suspected of being Jewish or communist were beaten, and persecution of the Jews was escalated. That narrow victory in Lippe became an annual celebration in which Hitler skillfully presented himself as Germany's hero.
Marie and rudy express their regrets for not having done more, and Louise returns home with their memories and a special gift.
Back home, Louise is even more lost than before, and slips back into her previous lifestyle, returning to the man she had broken up with.
After several months, a man named Walter appears. He's an acquaintance of the Cambodian-born activist named Vann, who plunged to his death near the outset of the story.
This time Louise listens as Walter tells her the life story of Vann, a Cambodian doctor who survived genocide under the Pol Pot regime. Vann lost his parents and was never able to overcome his survivor's guilt. Because the Pol Pot regime particularily targeted artists for execution, Vann took a great interest in art, wondering what made artists so dangerous that so many had had to die.
Rather than blaming Louise for Vann's death, Walter has come to tell her that Vann was inspired by her work. Walter reassures Louise that Vann was solely responsible for his own death. Louise is moved by the story and takes solace from Walter's absolution of her culpability.
As far-right-wing activities are again coming to the fore in Germany, at the outset of the 21st century, including anti-Semitic activity and violent confrontations, Louise is inspired to create a new sculpture that is the culmination of all she has learned on her journey through Europe, and all her "listenings."
Louise is more comfortable expressing and explaining herself through drawing than talk, and I'm much the same with the written word. She is more of a listener, an observer, absorbing everything around her, and I found I could easily relate to her. I could sympathize with the way she runs from her guilt, even as it chases her every step of the way, until she is finally able to absorb Vann's actions and create her masterpiece.
The stereotypical artist is a "beautiful soul" putting passionate feelings to canvas, print, stone, or song. It's not often that artists are presented as mass murderers or power hungry dictators. But one of Hitler's greatest regrets is that he was never able to build a museum to house his personal collection of art.
It's depressing to think that someone who enjoys expression and creation could so love destruction. I prefer to write Hitler off as nothing more than a delusional, paranoid psychopath, someone who saw himself as Germany's new Siegfried, the Motherland's hero come to destroy the Nibelungs, the Jews.
But it's impossible to deny his artistic "flair," or the way in which he and his party so skillfully maneuvered a victory. Lester inserts several images and quotations of the
propaganda used by the Nazis. The xenophobia is rampant. The vitriol is truly horrific and saddening. Such propaganda ignited an entire nation and motivated the murder of millions.
For anyone interested in serious questioning of the role of art in society, The Listener is rich with quotations on the subject and Lester uses many excellent quotes as chapter headings. At first I thought, hey, real people don't talk like that. But people who live deeply in art probably do. Artists aren't exactly "normal." So The Listener reveals that when you live and breathe art on a daily basis, it becomes a central part of your life even outside its most practical uses.
So The Listener is a good story for people familiar with artists and art movements. Lester deftly slips these things, their history, their impact, into conversations between his characters, and ingrains them into their lives. As for Lester's art, it sweeps across the pages, changing as if it is alive with his thoughts.
This is far from a traditional comic book. It doubles as an intriguing read for anyone with an abiding interest in the psychology of Hitler and the propaganda machine that was the Nazi Party. The Listener is not something you can flip through in an afternoon. I spent hours going through the book, taking notes, forming thoughts.
Much of the dialogue from Hitler (and other Nazi party leaders) contains direct quotes from his speeches and writings. Lester details what is historical fact and what is his own making in the back of the book, which also includes an excellent timeline of the rise and fall of the Nazi
party.
Another nice inclusion is a collection of small biographies of several Nazi or pro-Nazi animators, filmmakers, and cartoonists, detailing their specific involvement in the Nazi propaganda machine, and their lives after the fall of the Third Reich. 9781894037488
A longer version of Kristin Bomba's review appeared in ComicAttack.net
Submitted on June 3, 2011 in By David.
