Tracing the rise of the Graphic Novel to respectability - Royal Society of Literature 'Only Connect'

It was my honour to contribute to the British Royal Society of Literature's "Only Connect" newsletter (RSL started this 'tinyletter' to help people during pandemic-induced isolation). The idea is to respond to one of their events or articles in the library from over the years.

Today’s Only Connect comes from executive coach and novelist,?Jyoti Guptara,?who has?chosen?Paul Gravett's?2006?RSL?Review?piece,?tracing the rise of the graphic novel to respectability.

"I grew up pitying classmates who had to read comics after I had graduated to reading ‘real books’. Last year, I repented and bought my own first graphic novels by MacArthur Fellow, Gene Luen Yang, which I’m no longer ashamed to say I enjoyed more than many a novel in 2021. In an age when every other blockbuster seems to be based on a comic, Paul Gravett gives important context to the rise, fall and reincarnation of a maligned medium whose karma has propelled it to new heights. If Dickens and Goethe approved, who are we to object?"

Where I'm Writing From...

I'm writing from my office in Switzerland, which is currently set up as a studio to help me give virtual performances. Of course, I turn my screen so the books are my background.

Jyoti Guptara?is a best-selling novelist and executive coach, who helps companies apply narrative techniques to their business. Jyoti has been invited to speak at meetings in four continents.?As a British Indian, he is finally reading?The Far Pavilions?by M. M. Kaye!?

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"Only Connect" is a phrase from E. M. Forster's novel?Howard's?End?(to be precise, the epigraph to it). There, the phrase was intended to indicate the need to?connect?the ascetic and hedonistic sides of any human being. However, the phrase is nowadays mostly used to indicate the need for different social groups to?connect?with each other - though, in the case of the RSL, for individuals to discover the joys of literature if?only?they would?connect?with it.

The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) was founded in 1820 by King George IV to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent".

#storytelling #literature #graphicnovel