Broken Frontier

Repression and creativity seem destined to walk on opposite sites of the line of history but appearances deceive. Restrainment most often contrives creative escapes from the bonds that try to bind. 

Greece in the late thirties was bend under the dictatorial rule of Metaxas, a fascist military leader. Outlawing the musical genre Rébétiko symbolised the repression of history, the Greek defeat at Smyrna at the hands of the Turks. The subsequent stream of Turkish Orthodox Christian refugees fled to Greece, taking residence in the ghettoes of Athens, Thessaloniki and Piraeus. Rébétiko was the music that rose from the ashes of defeat, a musical style developed for and by the poor and downtrodden, the thieves and homeless looking for a better way of life. An exiled people, lending their voice to their instruments.

Athens, october 1936 : Stravos, Markos, Dog and  Batis lead an aimless life, drifting from women to drugs to stealing; all rebetes, the only constant and central axis of their lives is the Rébétiko. With their bouzouki held high and their souls held low, writer and artist David Prudhomme succeeds in recounting 24 hours in the life of these friends, laying bare their souls and the animus of a nation of lost people.

David Prudhomme, a graduate from the cartoon academy of Angoulême, exhibits graphical skills with a seldom seen flair. He lays a heavy focus on facial work with scratchy lines, taking care to edge the history of a people on the run on the faces of the characters that inhabit the story whether they are on the fore- or background. His body gesturing swerves over the pages and becomes particularly impressive when the rebetes are drunken or stoned - or both - and when the Greeks start dancing to the Rébétiko. Immediately the colors turn dark, drowning the characters in ink and line-work, history falling down. It is a stark contrast from the outside scenes where the overpowering sun overtakes all colouring on the pages, its rays burning away all intent of pigmentation, the atmosphere feverish and boiling. The original French title, Rébétiko. La mauvaise herbe,  can be translated as Rébétiko. The bad weed; a reference to both marijuana - ingested in copious amounts in this book - and weed, a plant that stubbornly refuses to lay down no matter how much you want to eradicate it. 

Rébétiko is the type of story where meaning lies between the cracks, between the panels; where the journey tells us more than the ending. The story itself is supported by a basic night out on the town structure but the deeper meanings lay in the fragmented conversations, the in-jokes, the spare historical background. David Prudhomme does provide an introduction and afterword which is helpful for those who want to know more of the rebetes. 

It is a powerful work but not easily digested. Rébétiko showcases the strenghts of comic book storytelling by fusing history, friendship, politics and philosophy into a deceptively superficial story of a boys nights out but while the easily digested foreground tells the tale of a bunch of rascals on the run, David Prudhomme injects into the background the overwhelming sense of history bearing down on individual man coupled with warmth, humanity and a sense of longing inherent in human nature. Highly recommended!

Rébétiko by David Prudhomme is published in Dutch by Oog & Blik / De Bezige Bij. The OGN is 104 pages long and retails for € 24.90.