A Comedic Style Ahead of Its Time
Written by Laurence Sterne, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman was a book published in five separate volumes between the years 1759-1767. For each volume, Sterne left his readers with consistent cliffhangers which was a common practice done by authors of consecutively published writings. However, Tristram Shandy was hardly a common novel of the time period. When authors were creating adventurous stories with a predictable narrative, Sterne destroyed the story’s original chronology by rearranging the order of different fragments of his tale. Also, he includes contrasting materials such as essays, sermons, and legal documents to disrupt the basic framework of the plot. The title itself is unaccustomed to Sterne's contemporary readers; instead of the "life and adventures" of a pronounced hero, Sterne assures us his "life and opinions." Furthermore, attaching “Gentleman” to the end of his title might deceive some readers today into believing Tristram as a polite and kind man, but in the middle of the eighteenth century the term meant a man who received his income from his land and could not claim another higher title.
Practically simultaneous, the television and the comic book developed and coevolved in the twentieth century. Debora L. Spar argues that “technological change follows a cycle of innovation and experimentation, commercialization and diffusion, creative anarchy and institutionalization”. As the television was beginning to dominate the world of entertainment, innovators in writing and art experimented by including massive illustrations in their works. This sophisticated interplay between text and image was the result of historical pressure placed on artists and writers of the time period. The implications of this media transfer can be seen by analyzing the product that makes a comic book and the audience it attracts. Comic books got children, especially boys, much more interested and involved in stories that they might not have without creative media like comic books. Furthermore, this new media of comic books has developed the genre of superheroes that has been successful in creating movies that has enticed the audiences for over half a century.
Fortunately, there has already been a comic strip made by Martin Rowson about The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy. As shown in the image, the comic book would surely be a comedic depiction of the tale of Tristram Shandy. I believe that the illustrations would make the comedic novel more liberal in its expressions and allow it to express the extent of the sarcastic tales more resolutely. As seen in other examples of graphic novels, comedy seems to play off the illustrations better than other genres. Currently, comic strips are a popular visit in many newspapers and online websites for political references to add a bit of comedic relief to the often serious tone of politics.
Regarding The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, transferring the series of volumes into a comic book format would create quite the entertaining product. Although, the illustrations without any descriptive text would constrict the creative environment for the readers, the graphic scenes would give the author more control of the entire product. The random tangents that Sterne takes would be more easily described with the were in a comic strip. Sterne, by breaking the sequence of the story he tells and interjecting them with chains of supplementary ideas, memories, and anecdotes, allows Tristram to emerge out of surprising juxtapositions between seemingly unrelated events. The coordination of ideas is a major theme of the work, however, and not just a structural principle.
Sterne’s volumes of a common man and his many opinions reminds me of a new genre to hit television, American adult animated sitcoms such as Family Guy. Similarly, the shows are blatantly opinionated with many adult and sexual themes guided by an ingenuous, non-heroic character. The plot often digresses while much of its humor is exhibited in the form of “cutaway gags” that often satirize American culture. Judging by how popular this style of comedy is today, Sterne’s unconventional methods were ahead of his time and undoubtedly lead to his success and popularity.