Fax from Sarajevo: A Story of Survival

AUTHOR: Kubert, Joe

ARTIST: Joe Kubert (illustrator)

PUBLISHER: Dark Horse Comics

FIRST BOOK PUBLICATION: 1996

Publication History

Ervin Rustemagic founded Strip Art Features in 1972 at the age of twenty, naming the venture after the comics magazine he had started the previous year. He worked diligently to secure artists’ publishing rights with a variety of European publishers; by the 1980’s, he had become the European agent for comics creators Hermann Huppen, Warren Tufts, Joe Kubert, Martin Lodewijk, and others, and he was regularly working with over five hundred comics publishers worldwide.

Rustemagic was a native of Sarajevo and established the city (then part of Yugoslavia) as his business headquarters. Years after the company’s founding, however, Bosnia and Herzegovina declared independence from Yugoslavia in early 1992. On April 6, open warfare began, and Serbs were soon marching through Sarajevo, shelling the city during the night, while snipers fired at people in the streets during the day. Rustemagic and his family were trapped in the city and sent intermittent faxes to Kubert and Lodewijk.

Once Rustemagic and his family were safe, Kubert asked permission to tell Rustemagic’s story in an attempt to highlight what life was like in Sarajevo during that period. He worked with Rustemagic to get the facts and emotions as accurate as possible, and the resulting book, Fax from Sarajevo, was published in hardcover by Dark Horse Comics in 1996. Through Strip Art Features, Rustemagic later helped to get the story translated and published in Germany, Spain, France, and Italy. Dark Horse Comics released an English-language paperback version in 1998.

Plot

In early 1992, Ervin Rustemagic returns to Sarajevo from a business trip to the Netherlands, despite some underlying concerns and confusion about the state of affairs in Bosnia. The city appears the same as when he left, except it is unusually quiet. He enjoys a happy reunion with his wife, Edina, and their two children, Edvin and Maja.

That night, however, a shell explodes just outside their house. They briefly discuss fleeing, but a neighbor warns them that Serbs are killing anyone who tries to leave the city limits. Within a few days, the frequency of bombings has the entire family huddled and trembling together in their basement.

Ervin tries to continue his business in as usual a manner as possible, but the continued attacks make this difficult. Food and cigarettes have become increasingly hard to come by, and Ervin finds himself becoming more of a caretaker, providing first aid to those wounded by shell fire and tending to his feverish son. Still, he is able to continue sending faxes to his friends and contacts in the outside world, explaining his situation to them.

Before long, however, the Rustemagic home is destroyed, sending the family to seek shelter in an abandoned building. Witnessing a man caught in another blast, Ervin manages to drive the man to the local hospital. Seeing the deplorable situation there, he offers his car to the hospital as a makeshift ambulance. Ervin then begins to make overtures to the ministry in Sarajevo to get his family out; they move into a hotel to remain close to the building. Mortar and rifle fire continue to keep them on edge, becoming a near daily occurrence.

After repeated meetings at the ministry, which all come to no avail because of seemingly endless and ever-changing bureaucratic regulations, Ervin eventually realizes he will need as much outside assistance as he can get. Over the ensuing months, friends and coworkers make as many phone calls as they can on his behalf and continue to deposit funds in his bank account to pay for his family’s hotel lodgings.

Taking matters more directly into his own hands, Ervin takes his family on a midnight dash across a protected airfield. They are shot at and forced back into the city. The quasi-legal contacts of Ervin and his friends, who have promised to aid the family’s escape, disappear. Eventually, Ervin’s friends are able to acquire journalistic accreditation for him, which allows him to travel more freely. He is finally able to fly out with the U.S. Air Force but cannot take his family with him.

Once outside the country, Ervin makes his way to Porec, Croatia, where he connects with a friend. Using Porec as a base of operations, Ervin makes as many contacts as he can, both by fax and in person, with various ministries and consulates in an effort to find a way to get his family out of Sarajevo. He works tirelessly, deeply worried about his family’s well-being. After nearly two months of work, Ervin is able to secure Slovenian citizenship for himself, which, in turn, confers citizenship on his wife and children as well, meaning they will be granted permission to leave Sarajevo. Although the departure of the Rustemagic family takes another several months of preparations, in late September, 1993, Ervin finally meets his family members as they step off a U.S. Air Force plane in Croatia.

Characters

•Ervin Rustemagic, the protagonist, is an agent for comic book creators. A proud and practical businessman, he has great love for his family. Throughout the story, he is primarily driven by the need to provide for his family and keep them as safe as he can under the circumstances. That impetus gives him the courage and compassion to help as many people as he can.

•Edina Rustemagic is Ervin’s wife and the mother of their two children. She is largely portrayed as having a traditionally supportive role opposite her husband, taking care of the cooking and looking after the children while he is away. Like her husband, she is also concerned for her family’s safety, though she tends to express her fears more openly. She can see through the brave front her husband displays and tries to hold herself up to his example, though she is not always as successful as he is.

•Butzo, a chain-smoking co-worker of Ervin, remains cheerful and optimistic despite the fighting. He is last seen heading off to find his family just before the Rustemagic home is destroyed.

•Joe and Muriel Kubert are seen only briefly in the book, but it is clear from the faxes exchanged throughout the book that their relationship with Ervin extends beyond business and has become a solid friendship between both families. The Kuberts provide what assistance and encouragement they can from New Jersey.

•Martin Lodewijk is Ervin’s Dutch business associate and friend, who tries to help the Rustemagic family from his home in the Netherlands and passes along updates to many of their friends. Ultimately, he is the one who secures the journalistic accreditation for Ervin.

Artistic Style

Kubert uses a rougher, almost sketchier illustration style than most mainstream comic book artists. This style has made his work well-suited to dark and gritty stories and helped his success on comics such as Our Army at War (1952-1977), G.I. Combat (1952-1956, 1957-1987), Tales of the Green Beret (1967-1969), and, most notably, Sgt. Rock (first appearing in 1959). This distinctive style in war comics was especially appreciated as combat became less and less glamorous in the public’s opinion. Kubert’s somewhat harsh depictions of soldiers and military vehicles reflected a broader attitude shift toward armed combat.

While Fax from Sarajevo is not a war comic in the same sense as the works for which Kubert was previously known, the Bosnian War (1992-1995) is ever-present throughout the story. The rough-hewn faces and ragged clothing, while not generally depicting soldiers in this case, are entirely appropriate for those caught in the crossfire. Indeed, Ervin’s last fax shown in the book notes that his wife and daughter had been wearing the same clothes for nearly a year.

The coloring, too, serves to emphasize the story. The novel has a somewhat dark and musty feel, with lots of browns and muted greens and blues. Though local color is generally used throughout the book, limited light sources provide ample opportunities for creating darker moods and focusing the reader’s attention on the emotional elements of the story.

Interspersed with the comic narrative are replicas of the faxes that were exchanged. They provide a time line for the story and represent the knowledge to which Ervin Rustemagic himself had access. Few portions of the story depict events that Ervin does not witness firsthand, and the faxes serve to establish his perspective more firmly by largely eliminating an omniscient narrative approach.

Themes

The primary theme in Fax from Sarajevo is the importance of the love of friends and family. From the outset of the book, the characters express a desire to be with and support the ones they love. The focus on the Rustemagic family and Ervin Rustemagic’s constant concern for their safety is an obvious indication of this, but it extends through nearly all of the secondary characters and events as well. Early on, Ervin notes that the family has remained in Sarajevo to be near Edina’s father and brother. On the occasions when Butzo is not making jokes, he talks about family. Even a brief interlude in the Kubert household shows their extended family celebrating Passover together, with Muriel expressly citing her pleasure in having everyone visiting. This theme extends to friendships as well. Ervin’s business associates all seem to be comfortable and friendly with the entire Rustemagic family. Butzo makes jokes with Ervin; some of the faxes to Huppen, Lodewijk, and the Kuberts are signed by the entire Rustemagic family; most of the faxes to New Jersey are addressed to both Joe and Muriel. Ultimately, those able to help Ervin are his friends, not any of the politicians, bureaucrats, or government officials who continually make idle promises and insincere gestures of goodwill.

The second theme, no less significant than the first, is the atrocious effect war has on those who are caught between fighting factions. Many civilians are senselessly killed throughout the book, and Ervin’s only goal is to remove his family from the war zone. Sarajevo is all but leveled, largely by unseen attackers, and nearly everyone is forced to run from place to place to avoid the shelling. Kubert clearly wants to make a point about what happened to the everyday people who were not being showcased by the media.

Impact

Fax from Sarajevo is one of three significant comics focusing on the Bosnian War; the other two (Safe Area Goražde: The War in Eastern Bosnia 1992-1995, 2000; The Fixer: A Story from Sarajevo, 2003) were written by Joe Sacco, who visited the area as a journalist in 1994. Together, the three books paint a vivid picture of the Bosnian War that was largely absent from popular American mass media beforehand. Sacco had visited Sarajevo and was working on Safe Area Goražde before Kubert’s book was published, so the works did not directly influence one another.

While working independently of one another, Kubert and Sacco used different approaches to depict the war. Thus, there is little overlap between their works. Though their books are decidedly personal in nature, Kubert’s story shows the war through a decidedly more apolitical perspective. Framed within the context of the Bosnian War, his book provides the backdrop for a larger statement about war in general. There is no real discussion about the politics behind the decisions to attack, and none of the characters express any political opinions themselves. Even the government officials act in a politically neutral manner, expressing basic sympathy for Ervin Rustemagic’s situation but little else.

Prior to Fax from Sarajevo, Kubert had been viewed as a master storyteller, so the book was well received from the outset. It quickly earned praise for both the subject matter and the expert care Kubert provided it, and it remains a hallmark work in his career.

Further Reading

Kubert, Joe. Dong Xoai, Vietnam 1965 (2010).

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗. Yossel: April 19, 1943 (2003).

Sacco, Joe. The Fixer: A Story from Sarajevo (2003).

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗. Safe Area Goražde: The War in Eastern Bosnia 1992-1995 (2000).

Bibliography

Burg, Steven L., and Paul S. Shoup. The War in Bosnia-Herzegovina: Ethnic Conflict and International Intervention. London: M. E. Sharpe, 2000.

Sacco, Joe. Safe Area Goražde: The War in Eastern Bosnia 1992-1995. Seattle, Wash.: Fantagraphics Books, 2000.

Schelly, Bill. Man of Rock: A Biography of Joe Kubert. Seattle, Wash.: Fantagraphics Books, 2008.