Automne

by Jon McNaught

C'est un mardi gris d'octobre semblable à tant d'autres dans la petite ville de Dockwood. Les habitants vaquent à leurs occupations quotidiennes: à la maison de retraite d'Elmview, un garçon de cuisine prépare le repas des pensionnaires; le long de la rue Nettlefield, un livreur de journaux finit sa ronde; et dans les arbres les hirondelles se rassemblent à grand bruit avant de s'envoler vers l'Afrique.
Œuvre contemplative et douce-amère, Automne suit les trajectoires de ces habitants, que Jon McNaught se plaît à faire se croiser, avec, pour toile de fond, les vestiges de l'arrière-saison.

Genres: Graphic Novels, Comics, Graphic Novels Comics, Bande Dessinée, Fiction, Poetry, Sequential Art

64 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2012

About the author

Jon McNaught was born in 1985. He lives in London where he draws comics, and works as an illustrator, printmaker and lecturer.

​His Clients include; Penguin Books, Faber, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The New Yorker, Walker Books, Picador, and the BBC.

He is also a regular cover artist for the London Review of Books.

​He is the Author of Kingdom, Birchfield Close, Pebble Island and Dockwood (Winner of the Angouleme ‘Prix Révélation’ award in 2012).

Reviews

[Jan Philipzig]

This book looks great, almost like a cross between Seth and Chris Ware. I have to admit, though, that its poetry may be a bit too subtle for my dulled pop cultural tastes - it did not exactly rock my world. I mean, where are the car chases and the explosions?!? Jeez...

[Dave Schaafsma]

Several reviews say it: poetry. Comics as poetry. Two stories, one of a porter in a nursing home, the other a paper boy, in a small British town, in autumn. Autumnal colors, contemplative tone. The effect is to slow you down as poetry can do, to make you take a look at small ordinary things... William Carlos Williams:

so much depends
upon
a red wheel
barrow

glazed with rain
water

beside the white
chickens.

Exactly. It is crucial we notice the simple beauty around us. Period.

McNaught invites us to the amazing ordinary world, one others in their own way have urged us to contemplate: Chris Ware, Seth, Jeffrey Brown, Anders Nilsen... but this is artwork, with very few words, almost wordless, as poetry. Awesome.

[Dina]

Es muy muy sencillo y creo q detrás tiene un mensaje muy fuerte sobre la soledad. Solo tiene tres estrellas porque lo encuentro demasiado desgarrador y triste.

[Jeffrey]

John McNaught's comics are the closest thing to poetry in comics yet... this latest book has a bit more narrative than the previous work of his I've read, but it's still a visually meditative and peaceful capture of a hundred moments from the everyday. Reading it is really is like taking the time to stare at leaves in autumn. Typical excellent production and design from publisher Nobrow as well.

[Kinga]

This is beautiful: the images are slightly faded and give a perfect feeling of an English autumn and the grayness of that season. The boredom and quiet life is beautifully depicted, showing us that there is pleasure in the everyday.

[Stephan Brusche]

It’s beautiful, in a peaceful and bittersweet way.

[Kim Lockhart]

This is one of those reading experiences where the meaning has to be excavated. It's subtle. The author uses the everyday to convey some rather profound insights about life.

Essentially, we are the only animals who don't know how to live. We fill our days with repetitive tasks, and we don't take note of the actual seasons of life unfolding before us.

The author emphasizes how advertising and product branding crowd our attention, and prevent us from noticing the beauty and the pure poetry of the world. We even reduce other people's lives to tasks: the work we do for them or the work they do for us. It prevents us from having deeper connections. It keeps us from truly seeing each other, and therefore makes it easier to disregard the people we don't know, to deny them even a scintilla of emotional investment. Because of this, two consequences are equally important:

1) We can become completely inured to death, as evidenced by our consumption of violent media. This creates a feedback loop of companies giving the people what they want, instead of what they need.

2) Little acts of kindness can mean the world to weary souls.

This is all conveyed in a set of small simple scenes which are almost excruciatingly ordinary. The author does none of the work of interpretation. The reader decides what it all means.

[Lucas Sierra]

En rápidas viñetas se detallan dos historias que recorren el pueblo de Dockwood. La vida cotidiana aparece en primer plano a través de una sucesión de cuadros que nos permiten contemplar la tranquilidad y el tiempo. En el fondo creo que se trata de una obra sobre el paso de las horas, una obra donde las historias sencillas pueden desenvolverse con fluidez y belleza y en la que el cadáver de una ardilla atropellada tiene tanta belleza como el atardecer. Los protagonistas de ambas historias viven la rutina laboral, y es desde allí, desde el foco más prosaico que podría ocurrírsenos, que el autor muestra la realidad poética del mundo. Una obra hermosísima.

[Felipe Assis]

A poesia permeia essa hq de forma tão particular... Você começa a ler e de repente seus batimentos ficam mais calmos, o autor te deixa num estado contemplativo, te faz perceber a beleza de coisas banais que passavam despercebido, enfim uma experiência muito original e diferente... Espero que existam mais coisas desse autor.

[Kirsty]

Absolutely beautiful. McNaught's use of colour is stunning, and I can't wait to read more of his work. I only wish Dockwood had been longer! Video review is forthcoming.

[Iida M-I]

Harkittu tyyli ja rauhallinen tunnelma, mutta silmät karkailivat toisille riveille. Olisi pitänyt keskittyä vähän paremmin, mutta se oli vaikeaa.

[Kirsty]

Poetry in visual form.

[Petitpois]

Es una obra pequeñita, menuda, como muchas de sus viñetas, pero su aparente falta de ambición es falsa, pues su relato es pura vida. Me gusta la cotidianidad de las dos historias, y la propuesta de simple contemplación. La frase de Chris Ware de la contraportada es perfecta"...es un homenaje a la belleza que supone el simple hecho de estar vivo".

[Anna]

Me'l van regalar per què m'agrada el que fa el Sr. Chris Ware i ara em veuré obligada a donar la raó a l'autor del regal.

Poc text, moltes vinyetes, simetria, dibuix minimalista, però ple de detalls alhora. I les petites històries quotidianes que no ho sembla, però expliquen tant....

Una perleta.

[Liliana]

Es maravilloso en su aparente sencillez contemplativa de lo cotidiano, con ese tono entre melancólico, agridulce y delicado.

[Lorena Salcedo]

La simpleza de las ilustraciones que van desde el tamaño y los colores hasta el ritmo, hace que te puedas centrar en los detalles, convirtiéndolo en una novela gráfica contemplativa y nostálgica. A pesar de la sencillez toca temas como la muerte, la cotidianidad, la soledad y la solidaridad en un pueblito del sureste de Inglaterra.

[Wendle]

The art is wonderful. With a limited colour palette of blue, red, pink, black, and white, the panels are simple, but hold so much depth, change, and mood. And mood is really what this book is all about. There is some dialogue in the stories, but most panels have no text. Instead they show people walking, chopping, folding, reading. Instead they show animals flying, climbing, eating, perching. These panels, strung together, show small moments that would otherwise have gone unnoticed. They have a peaceful feeling about them. Serene and simple, they made me take the time to slow down and really appreciate them–really experience them. I found this book just really, really calming.

This graphic novel is just lovely. That’s the word. It wrapped my mind up the same way a blanket would wrap my body. Safe, and warm, and comfortable.

A slightly longer review can be read at my book blog: Marvel at Words.

[Stephen]

Excellent, beautiful comic from McNaught, with lovely production from No Brow Press. More meditative (lots of aspect-to-aspect transitions) than plot-driven, McNaught explores life in UK small-towns. The boundaries that the characters inhabit seem limited, but McNaught finds a lyricism in the banal - it's at the same time touching and disturbing.

There's definitely a touch of the Chris Wares in the mechanics of the piece - the rhythms, dimensions, the muted palette - but McNaught brings his own, more organic feel. There's something of an Arts And Crafts sensibility in some of the designs. All in all, an understated gem of a comic.

[Sam Quixote]

Beautifully poetic graphic novel set in a small town and focusing on the lives of a kitchen porter in an old folks' home and a young boy's evening after the school day is done. Full review here!

[George Marshall]

Beautiful, gorgeous autumnal pallete, lovely printing. And, as a British comics fan, how wonderful at last to have something so elegant set in my country. With this and Nao of Brown coming out this year, with Nobrow and selfmade hero over here at last Britain is doing some good work again.

[Jesús]

Dockwood is a tone piece. It builds mood by way of montage, frequently juxtaposing panels of the autumnal changes in the natural world (leaves falling, birds and squirrels busily preparing for winter, etc.) with the routine lives of lonely people in a small, suburban town (a cook in a retirement home and an adolescent boy delivering newspapers).

Many of the page layouts consist of sequences of very small, square panels that periodically build to climaxes of much larger panels and splash pages. Those climactic panels usually combine the two juxtaposed worlds (nature and dull suburban life) and capture very brief moments when the book's characters pause to take in a wistful, natural scene. But there is always also something that reminds them (and the reader) that there is still psychological baggage weighing them down (visually reflected by the trash-like objects always intruding on the natural scenery).

Dockwood is short, but effective. There's no real plot, but the emotional weight more than makes up for it.

[Marthese Formosa]

A graphic novel that caught my eye at the library. Dockwood tells two stories set in the same place, both dealing with autumn. Rather that tells, it shows actually.

The first story deals with a worker at an elderly home and the second with a student that delivers newspapers after school. Both show how autumn just came about and depict a lot of animal and trees.

There is very little conversation but there's a lot of small things that show that despite being autumn this is an ordinary day. There's adverts, radio songs, appliances and video games and art - all small things that the protagonists see a lot of in their lives. The art is this amazing mix of oranges and blue and blacks and white and the panels are usually small squares with some full-pagers.

A quick read, perfect for when you are doing other things since there isn't much to read, just notice.

[Tom O'Brien]

I would echo the key words of several other reviews on here; poetic, contemplative, wistful and beautiful. There is a real skill in (gently) forcing the reader to slow down and notice the details in everyday life. I particularly liked how McNaught evoked sounds indirectly, by giving quiet spaces for us to hear leaves rustling, planes fly overhead, a bus pull away. Elegant.

[Patrick Fabri]

Je viens de relire ce livre, paru en 2012. Peu de textes, des illustrations souvent sous forme de très petites vignettes, peu de couleurs. Et c'est, un peu comme pour certains haïkus, un enchantement!
On y entend le son que fait une feuille en tombant, on y suit des animaux des villes, on y voit la vie qui s écoule doucement.
A lire et à relire

[Social_Sloth]

Truly unique and the artwork is absolutely stunning. It gives you a calm feeling just by reading it. The two stories that we get to follow are very casual, normal, but still made spectacular by, one the art, but also the way the story is structured.

[kathryn]

Contemplative yes, bittersweet less so.

[Toni]

Comic as poetry ✨✨✨

[LC]

Beautiful images and an easy to follow visual narrative with minimal words. Lovely nostalgic vibe.

[Parker J]

3.5/5

[Hysope]

Les couleurs sont superbes.