It's truly a beautiful book. Possibly the graphic novel I would now first recommend to literature fans who are curious about the field.

You seem to be making an arbitrary comparison between print and graphic novels. Graphic novels read faster, and may appear to have less substance, if you "skim" all the visual design. You seem willing to give Mazzuchelli credit for the literary weight carried in his illustrations, but not Craig Thompson. Claiming that Blankets is not a novel because it "reads too quickly" begs the question; who is setting the pace? Are you saying that the illustrations were not compelling enough to make you linger? Or that you chose not to bother? Do you simply prefer more dense illustrators that force you to read at a novel-esque pace? Would you let me get away with saying that the Sound and the Fury is too short to be a novel because I just skimmed it for the dialogue?

I suggest you pick up "Stuck Rubber Baby," "From Inside," and "Black Hole," if you haven't already. The latter two have as much narrative depth as any novel, if you're willing to linger on each page. The former is a better example of the kind of dense illustration you seem to prefer, and came out many years ago.

Good Lord, what an embarrassing piece of writing, Paul.

You should go to a bookstore and pick up a copy of Bottomless Belly Button by Dash Shaw along with about ten other books I could recommend that would put your ridiculous claim to rest.

You are right about one thing though. Asterios Polyp is a great graphic novel. And by that measure, deserves far more informed criticism than this.

Why do critics continue to use prose novels as the measuring stick to which COMICS are measured?

They are two completely different mediums, with their own virtues, tropes, and narrative tricks. Why not just judge comics based on their worth as COMICS?

If any film critic repeatedly said "this film lacks the staging and the expression of a play," or "this film is so close to being a play, how wonderful!" they'd be fired for showing that they don't know what they are talking about.

Learn what you are supposed to be talking about before your next review, ok?

Every time Newsarama links to one of my comic reviews, I get a bunch of angry comments from people who don't seem to read what they've linked to.

AlexaD and others on this thread: I wasn't saying that other comics (like Bottomless Belly Button, which I reviewed positively in The Stranger when it was released) aren't great. I was saying calling them "novels" is a misnomer. To use your example, AlexaD, I'm saying that it would be like calling movies "picto-plays" or television shows "mini-movies." The terminology needs to change.

It fascinates me how comics fans never fail to get upset if a critic tries to write a review for a broader audience that perhaps doesn't read comics all the time.

Mr. Constant, I wasn't angry when I posted last summer, but I'm irritated now.

You made a bold, sweeping claim in order to praise on Mazzucheli. Three people, including myself, presented challenges to your sweeping claim, including counterexamples. Two of them used pejorative language, and so you dismiss us all as angry comics fans that didn't read your article.

Well, that's disappointing. I'd still be glad to read a response that indicates that you actually read what I wrote.

It seems to me, on further reflection, that Graphic Novel is perfectly apt as a descriptor for a hefty story that can be read over the course of one or two evenings. Is Beloved more of a novel than Old Man and the Sea, because Morrison's writing requires more attention to decipher? I would think that's one (but not the only) legitimate measure of literary value... but not a defining feature of "novelness."

To me, the term graphic novel suggests a work that should be read in about the time it would take to read a novel, that is to say, a short book. Now, there's obviously a problem when so many single issue collections go under the same title, instead of "trade paperback," and I don't know a good term at the moment for extended works like Cerebus or Sandman that stretch across several volumes. But Graphic Novel serves well for all the examples I named above, plus Watchmen, Sin City, A History of Violence...

It seems to me that you could hold up Asterios Polyp for high praise, even put it on a pedestal, without knocking many other worthy works right off the stage.