Our Cancer Year

AUTHOR: Pekar, Harvey; Brabner, Joyce

ARTIST: Frank Stack (illustrator)

PUBLISHER: Four Walls Eight Windows

FIRST SERIAL PUBLICATION: 1994

FIRST BOOK PUBLICATION: 1994

Publication History

Our Cancer Year can be regarded as another installment of American Splendor (1976-2008), Harvey Pekar’s autobiographical comic book series, but can also be read on its own. Its genesis stemmed from tragic circumstances. When Pekar was diagnosed with cancer in 1990, his wife and fellow comics writer, Joyce Brabner (who edited Brought to Light, 1988), proposed that he write a comic book about the experience as a way of helping him deal with the disease. With Pekar having already arranged a book deal with a small literary publisher, the novel was originally conceived as a Pekar solo piece (he was planning on writing about whatever happened to him during that time). Brabner was brought in as the co-author partially because of Pekar’s memory loss from the cancer treatments but also to include her point of view, since the battle against the disease soon engulfed them both.

Veteran underground comics artist Frank Stack (perhaps best known as the creator of The New Adventures of Jesus, 1969) joined the pair after writing Pekar a letter of admiration and being invited to collaborate. He used a yearlong sabbatical from his art professorship at the University of Missouri to complete the novel, even staying with Brabner and Pekar for a time. Originally published in 1994 by Four Walls Eight Windows, Our Cancer Year has been kept in print continually, even though the original publisher was absorbed over the years by other companies such as Avalon/Thunder’s Mouth Press and Perseus/Running Press.

Plot

Divided into eleven chapters, Our Cancer Year documents an approximately twenty-month time span in the lives of Brabner and Pekar. Readers accustomed to either writer’s previous work found the novel familiar territory, but the relationship between the authors also resulted in a marriage of artistic sensibilities (autobiography mixed with political journalism) that is distinct from their previous individual work. The novel opens in January, 1990, with Brabner and Pekar learning that they may have to move from their apartment, where they have lived for a long time. They decide to buy a house, though Pekar has many misgivings about the move. Brabner attends a student peace conference and meets youth from around the world, many of whom grew up during wartime.

After the couple buys a house, Brabner, working on a comics series about peace activists, travels to visit her young friends from the conference. Her travels are haunted by the unfolding of the Gulf War (1991). Soon after Brabner’s return, the work on the new house is challenged when Pekar learns that he has lymphoma.

After receiving surgery, Pekar undergoes chemotherapy and radiation treatment. Pekar’s initial refusal to take off work causes many arguments with Brabner. Despite the cancellation of Brabner’s comics series by the publisher, she stays in touch with her friends from the conference and worries about her friends in the Middle East while she takes care of and worries about Pekar.

As Pekar’s health worsens, the couple battles medical bureaucracy and Pekar considers suicide. Pekar’s brother assists them by paying for a home health-care aide. The arrival of the aide, Delores, eases the couple’s burdens, and Pekar completes his cancer treatment. However, he suffers from depression after returning to work too early.

Taking some more time off, Pekar recuperates while Brabner’s young friends (Dana, Jessie, Ju, Saroeum, and Suy Khim) arrive to visit. The novel ends in the summer of 1991 with Pekar bonding with the peace activists and learning that his cancer has been eradicated.

Characters

•Harvey Pekar, the co-protagonist, is a middle-aged, balding file clerk at the Veterans Administration Hospital in Cleveland, Ohio. He writes the comic book series American Splendor and is married to fellow comics writer Joyce Brabner. He is somewhat neurotic; his worrying increases when he buys a house and is diagnosed with cancer.

•Joyce Brabner, the co-protagonist, is slightly younger than her husband, wears glasses, and has long hair. She is a social activist who lives in Cleveland. She serves as Pekar’s primary caretaker when he is diagnosed with cancer. Working on a comic book series about children during wartime, she meets a number of student peace activists from around the world.

•Dr. Rhodes is a female oncologist with long hair who treats Pekar. Having a degree in literature in addition to her one in medicine, she discusses books with Pekar and reads some of his comics. Her description of a chemotherapy course as twelve weeks rather than twelve treatments causes Brabner and Pekar much difficulty, but in general she is highly regarded by the couple since she goes out of her way to work around Pekar’s neuroses.

•Lennie Pekar, Pekar’s brother, has a scar on the right side of his forehead and works for a pharmaceutical company in Indiana. Though they have fallen out of touch somewhat, the brothers reconnect, and Lennie helps his brother through the cancer crisis by paying for a home health-care aide.

•Delores is an African American home health-care aide. She helps Pekar develop a routine of errands when he is off work, which helps him deal with depression. Though she has family problems, she grows close to Brabner and Pekar. However, after Pekar’s treatment is complete, the characters drift away from one another.

Artistic Style

Stack’s expressionistic illustrations adjust themselves to the emotional resonance of the events being depicted by shifting style and layout as appropriate, ranging from impressionism to near photorealism. The one use of color on the pastel cover designed by Brabner strikingly encapsulates the entire novel, depicting a scene of two small figures unloading groceries in front of a house with snow on the ground. The groceries have fallen in the yard, and Pekar is kneeling on the ground, with Brabner bending over him, trying to coax him inside. A yellow ribbon, a symbol of support for American involvement in the Gulf War, is tied on a neighbor’s tree. The richness of the cover makes the starkness of the art inside the novel even more striking.

Stack seizes on the emotional intensity of a moment with some panels rendered free of background and shading, which helps readers focus on the interactions among characters. Word balloons and caption boxes tell the part of the story not communicated through the art itself. Even in the many scenes involving characters merely talking, Stack somehow manages to maintain visual interest, often by shifting perspective. However, the dynamism of the illustrations is subtle and always in support of the narrative.

Readers accustomed to the more “meat-and-potatoes” realism of many of Pekar’s other collaborators might find Stack’s occasional artistic distortion a bit off-putting, but, as Pekar’s most famous collaborator, Robert Crumb, noted, no one could have suited the subject matter of the novel, a slice of life punctuated occasionally with the drama of death, better than Stack. Pekar and Brabner were similarly pleased: Even years afterward, Pekar named Stack as one of his best collaborators.

Themes

Though many would regard cancer as the principal topic of the novel, Brabner stated that the book is more about marriage, which is why “cancer year” is prefaced with “our.” Accordingly, the novel begins with a home (Brabner and Pekar’s apartment) “under siege”–their landlord is rumored to be selling the apartment building, with the tenants likely to be evicted. This happenstance is soon magnified by Pekar’s body being under threat from cancer and the whole world being under threat from war.

In fact, invasion of territory, whether by disease or war, seems to be a major preoccupation in the work. Just as Iraq invades Kuwait and refugees search for new homes, the characters in the book weather invasions and search for homes. How people respond to such trying circumstances becomes the major theme of the work, a theme deepened by including the experiences of the student peace activists, many of whom have had to battle similar existential threats. At one point, Pekar is so weakened by the cancer treatment that his identity completely breaks down, and he wonders if he is a human being or just a character in a comic book.

Through collaboration, determination, and humor, the characters manage to overcome their challenges, and the novel ends with Pekar, free of cancer, and Brabner hosting the activists in their home. This last invasion of territory turns out to be a pleasant one. The wordless final page of Pekar visiting a nearby waterfall with Ju suggests that despite the suffering, life is worth fighting for. However, the inclusion of someone stepping in dog feces on the final page also shows that even in its most pleasant moments, life is far from perfect.

Impact

Our Cancer Year came after the landmark graphic novels of the 1980’s such as Batman: The Dark Knight Returns (1986), Maus (1986), and Watchmen (1986-1987), and some critics began to wonder whether the graphic novel had really come of age. In intervening years, some celebrated works, such as Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman (1989-1996), had appeared, but most of the comics industry was experiencing an overkill of grim and gritty superheroes. An original graphic novel published by a non-comics book publisher, Our Cancer Year reminded many that comics could deal with topics far removed from the fantastic and the supernatural.

Unlike many comics (even Maus, which, despite the seriousness of Holocaust subject matter, still used the fantasy trope of animals to tell the story), Our Cancer Year was thoroughly realistic. As such, it was a milestone critically acclaimed work and helped to solidify the presence of graphic novels in bookstores. It also raised awareness about the presence of alternative and independent comics, an aspect of the comics industry not always widely represented in conventional comic book stores. It showed that serialization was not an artistic necessity and that an audience existed for long-form graphic stories published as a whole.

Pekar’s work in general has been influential on subsequent comics creators, particularly those dealing in autobiography and documentary, but Our Cancer Year has a particular resonance, being his longest story and perhaps his best work, due to the involvement of Brabner and Stack. It also predated many subsequent cancer stories told in the graphic novel form such as Lisa’s Story: The Other Shoe (2007) by Tom Batiuk, Mom’s Cancer (2006) by Brian Fies, Janet and Me: An Illustrated Story of Love and Loss (2004) by Stan Mack, and Cancer Vixen (2006) by Marisa Acocella Marchetto.

The novel remains in print and continues to inspire beyond the world of comics. For example, in the fall of 2010, Purdue University used the work in a cancer conference in West Lafayette, Indiana, complete with a gallery show and visits from Brabner and Stack. Though the novel has been criticized for being uneven and overly downtrodden, it has encouraged many people dealing with cancer and helped those around them understand the effects of the disease.

Pekar’s work in general has been noted for its difference from much of the rest of comics; it was landmark work during the 1970’s, serving as a bridge between the underground “comix” of the 1960’s and the alternative comics of the 1980’s. Though Pekar’s work never changed much in tone, modern comics have increasingly come to resemble his work, in the tradition of autobiographical comics, which includes work by authors such as Chester Brown, Joe Sacco, and Seth, and even in the dialogue-heavy superhero work of Brian Michael Bendis.

Films

American Splendor. Directed by Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini. HBO Films, 2003. This adaptation of American Splendor and Our Cancer Year stars Paul Giamatti as Pekar and Hope Davis as Brabner, though Brabner and Pekar also appear as themselves. Several scenes from the novel are dramatized, and some of Stack’s art is used. To form a composite character named Fred, Stack himself becomes merged with another cartoonist, who is the biological father of Danielle, Brabner and Pekar’s adopted daughter. The film was well received, winning the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival, and it brought Brabner’s and Pekar’s work greater renown.

Further Reading

Brabner, Joyce, et al. Brought to Light: Thirty Years of Drug Smuggling, Arms Deals, and Covert Operations That Robbed America and Betrayed the Constitution (1989).

Pekar, Harvey, et al. American Splendor (1976-2009).

Stack, Frank. The New Adventures of Jesus: The Second Coming (2006).

Bibliography

Harvey, Robert C. The Art of the Comic Book: An Aesthetic History. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1996.

Hatfield, Charles. Alternative Comics: An Emerging Literature. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2005.

Levin, Bob. Outlaws, Rebels, Freethinkers, and Pirates: Essays on Cartoons and Cartoonists. Seattle: Fantagraphics Books, 2005.

Rhode, Michael G., ed. Harvey Pekar: Conversations. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2008.

Witek, Joseph. Comic Books as History: The Narrative Art of Jack Jackson, Art Spiegelman, and Harvey Pekar. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1989.