Comics and Adaptation by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: University Press of Mississippi
Published: 2018-11-14T16:00:00+00:00

Fig. 22: El hombre descuadernado (Cava and Sanyú, 2009): a series of close-ups of the Horla’s eyes, mouth, and hands.

The double-page spread, where the Horla is shown leaning over the shoulder of Maupassant at his desk holding a quill, brilliantly illustrates both the physical and mental influence of the double on the original. Besides the Horla’s towering presence that domineers the writer, it is difficult not to link the Indian ink Maupassant uses to write his short story with the Horla’s physical appearance, which is portrayed in thick black stripes resembling ink strokes. It is as if the Horla surfaced from the page itself, still dripping with the ink the author used to write this romantic being into existence. We are confronted with the familiar scenario of the mad scientist or divinely inspired writer, overwhelmed by the creature he has created.

In addition to the Horla’s posture and physical appearance, Sanyú’s clever and original framing are especially noteworthy, both in this excerpt and throughout the comic. Emphasizing body parts through extreme close-ups effectively emphasizes the evil and monstrous aspect of this otherworldly being; this malevolent eye can only inspire fear (fig. 22), like the close-up of the hand which simultaneously refers to the hand of the strangler and to the monstrous fantasy of the severed limb that seems to have a will of its own. This streaked, clenched, and flayed hand23 is no longer human; it is at best animal, at worst supernatural or extraterrestrial.

By entitling this chapter “Maupassant and Maupassant,” Cava goes beyond mere adaptation and proposes a psychoanalytic reading of the “Horla.” Like others before him, he suggests that this hallucinatory tale owes as much to the author’s madness as to his imagination. Throughout the remaining fifteen chapters, Cava continues to blend the story of the “Horla” with Maupassant’s life, taking the reader through each phase of the author’s madness up until the final page, which shows a realistic representation of the tomb at the Montparnasse cemetery where the author was laid to rest.

Though more can be said of Cava’s script, it is now necessary to turn to the artwork, which, from beginning to end, is affected by the madness and suffering of the central character. The Argentine artist’s graphic adaptation is twofold, as he simultaneously interprets the Horla and Cava’s script; it is enigmatic and often makes the reader think the drawings could only have been the work of a madman. If indeed it seems crazy, it is only in the sense that Sanyú has devoted an insane amount of time to the work—five years of his life, in fact (admittedly, he was simultaneously working on other projects).

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