As a comic strip, Sylvia is clearly a hybrid form and represents a mix-ing of genres—the characteristic of structural heterogeneity as real-ized in Menippean satire. While in text-based literature this pastiche of structural elements might include snippets of poetry or verse alongside prose, in comics this fusion is inherent in the juxtaposition of text and image, for the commingling of word and picture is one of the hallmarks of comics.2 Furthermore, the context of the syndicated comic strip, as it appears within the daily newspaper, surrounded by a curious mélange of fact-based journalism and hyperbolic adver-tisements as well as other comic strips of wildly varying styles and subjects, only emphasizes the curious amalgamation of forms. And while satire in general and Menippean satire in particular is primar-ily attached to the novel, the serial nature of the comic strip, entering
2. Obviously silent or wordless comics do exist, but I refer to the majority of comics art, which features both text and image.
into the lives and homes of readers on a daily basis, is arguably a superior representation of the form, for it is peripatetic and disjointed by the interruption of each daily installment, each strip realized in short, sharp bursts of connection. Yet a comic strip is also recursive and quotidian, greeting the audience on a daily basis with a comfort-ing reunion with familiar characters. The regular newspaper reader can recognize the style of individual strips and distinct characters quickly; with time and habitual study, the reader will instinctively know where to look on the page each day to find his or her favorite strips. And even on the micro level, the shape that Sylvia the strip demonstrates is a variety of panel formats on a daily basis, sometimes with one, two, or three or more panels, eschewing a standardized four-panel layout.
Sylvia further exhibits stylistic heterogeneity in the language of the narrative text, with a peculiar mix of dialects, including the alien tongue of Gerniff, as well as the stilted jargon frequently emanating from televisions and radios, juxtaposed with the casual vernacular of Sylvia and friends. The audience must negotiate a sophisticated multi-dialectalism to make meaning from the various linguistic reg-isters in order to comprehend each strip. Artistically, although the very first strips differ slightly in style, after 1980 Hollander’s aesthetic does not vary much over many years or between days; as Hollander reported, Sylvia’s profile changes very little, as if copied from panel to panel and from day to day, with only minor embellishments mark-ing the passmark-ing of the time. Her characters remain static, both in style and, for that matter, within the panels; they rarely move, but rather remain suspended in bathtubs or in armchairs. Sylvia exhibits very little character movement; this is not a strip of pratfalls and slapstick physical humor. Yet this rough, repetitive, and constant artistic style contrasts with an extremely literate and literary text-based narrative as her characters discuss philosophy, history, and current events with evident erudition, further emphasizing the curious amalgamation of high and low cultures in style and structure.
While the art remains static, thematically Sylvia roams widely, and in doing so tackles a wide range of subjects, veering from intel-lectual to unrefined in the space of a panel. While gender stereotypes are a frequent subject (particularly in the Spokeswoman entries), she doesn’t hesitate to discuss douches and macro-economics and the danger of chipped cups along with healthcare reform and LGBTQ+
rights. These drastic contrasts stress the absurdity of the political
sit-uations, bringing the news to another level and, in fact, into bath-rooms and bars, just as Sylvia’s television becomes the voice of the media piped into the domestic, enclosed spaces of the strip. Sylvia, by and large, takes places in these intimate domestic spaces: the kitch-ens, bathrooms, and living rooms of women. And though the char-acters occasionally meet at the neighborhood bar (which acts as an agora in which Sylvia can interact with outsiders and antagonists), the strip’s most frequent setting depicts Sylvia in a domestic space, such as soaking in a tub in the bathroom or resting in a lounge chair in the living room, surrounded by the clutter of familial life—potted plants, mugs, and food—while a television or radio blares out snip-pets from the news. Inevitably, Sylvia makes a biting, witty comeback in response to the outside influence, rendering the world outside and the news of the day absurd and illogical, while she appears all-wise and all-knowing. And once again, although this setup is a recurring one, the topics addressed fluctuate widely, and Sylvia covers a great deal of territory.
In addressing these various themes, Sylvia presents additional traits of Menippean satire, such as numerous digressions as well as displays of encyclopedism. Certainly, a long-running syndicated comic strip would have to vary its content over many days and years, but Sylvia is particularly itinerant. While providing a mirror of the news cycle, mocking key political figures and movements, the strip wanders frequently, spending a day lamenting an onslaught of killer bees or showcasing the superiority of cats before lambasting a political figure. There is no continuing plotline or growth nor is there any character development to speak of. A reader does not need to be familiar with the history or the strip in order to appreciate it. Rather, the reader would be best served by a knowledge of current events and political theory. Although the strip displays a meandering focus at best, highlighting its nomadic perspective, it does remain rooted within the home. This is not a strip about work or careers or adven-tures in foreign lands. That is not to say that the strip is not highly intelligent, for the daily strips repeatedly invoke encyclopedism, showcasing a didactic knowledge in the form of informational snip-pets as well as comical checklists and quizzes that draw attention to the absurdity of the news and to the idea that complex social ills can be captured in bulleted lists and taglines (see figure 4.3).
Hollander uses lists and fill-in-the blanks to display information and to emphasize the dialogic nature of the strip, which encourages
<INSERT FIGURE 4.3>
the audience to participate in the making of meaning. Hollander also playfully employs catachresis, intentionally misusing words and phrases for comedic effect, as in figure 4.4.
This circuitous style features a rotating cast of characters with Sylvia positioned steadfastly in the center, and the alternating nar-rators, who directly address the reader, share an eccentric and some-times extreme point of view, another mark of Menippean satire. As Musgrave contends, “eccentricity, foolishness, extreme behavior, or abnormal mental states are frequent in the narrator and/or charac-ters” (23), or, as Miranda Gill explicates, a Menippean figure “hov-ers between genius and madness, wisdom and foolishness” (32).
Sylvia, flouting convention and spouting hyperbole, can certainly be said to exemplify an eccentric character, yet when her statements are juxtaposed with the absurdity of the news of the day, her position is less clear—is she melodramatic or reasonable? This uncertainty
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FIGURE 4.3. Nicole Hollander. “Are You an Optimist?” Originally published May 27, 2004.
Reprinted in The Sylvia Chronicles, p. 94.
FIGURE 4.4. Nicole Hollander. “The Sylvia School.” Comic Strip originally published February 18, 1983. Republished in The Sylvia Chronicles, p. 24.
carries over into the recurring characters, including “The Woman Who Lies in Her Journal,” “The Woman Who Does Everything Better Than You,” “The Fashion Cop,” and the “Super Cop,” who all sound ridiculous via introduction, but frequently dispense sound advice, thus embodying the common trope of the “wise fool” frequently found in satire.
Not only does Sylvia revel in the unusual point of view, it also proudly displays a grotesqueness of iconography in theme and art, sometimes overtly, such as when the Devil takes center stage, and sometimes more subtly, as represented by the large nose and rum-pled figure of Sylvia, or, at times, in the concentration on bodily func-tions as points of discussion. The strip did not hesitate to mention hemorrhoids, douches, and sigmoidoscopies, a fact which bemused the creator and dismayed some audiences. In The Sylvia Chronicles, Hollander reprinted a cartoon that suggested that a “good stock port-folio” would make a woman “feel more confident” than a douche (as advocated by a commercial blaring from the television), and which some readers found offensive, in addition to a letter to the editor that originally appeared in the newspaper, Prince George’s Journal (see fig-ure 4.5). The letter decried the strip as “offensive and quite unnec-essary,” wondering “what has happened to honest modesty?” (The Sylvia Chronicles 37).
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FIGURE 4.5. Nicole Hollander. “Sylvia Gets Offensive.” Comic Strip originally published September 11, 1984. Republished in The Sylvia Chronicles, p. 37.
For her part, Hollander felt the ugliness of the exchange resided in the idea “that there might be something offensive about women’s bodies, something that can be made right with a scented over-the-counter product” (Sylvia Chronicles 36). While one might argue what, exactly, was grotesque in that particular strip—the mention of a product designed to clean a female’s genital area or the idea that such an invention was actually necessary, Hollander was certainly inten-tional in her position, and as Harry Thurston Peck has argued, “if the Menippean satire was anything at all, it was scrappy, eccentric, and purposely grotesque” (90). Of course, the aforementioned Devil represents the most obvious example of the grotesque, operating as the epitome of divinity debased, yet in Sylvia the Devil pops in from time to time with the nonchalance of an annoying neighbor, making questionable bargains for souls but once again seeming to be more of a wise fool trope than a dangerous threat—the more dangerous char-acters appearing to be the politicians and/or the government. Sylvia’s Devil points out the monstrousness of human behavior, acting as a foil for the truly evil—the humans themselves.
While these attributes attest that Sylvia bears many qualities of Menippean satire, it is important to remember that it is not a “pre-cise form” (Musgrave 23), and scholars still debate its definition.
Still, most critics agree on the primary feature being a “disjunctional nature” along with, according to David Musgrave, “a medley . . . concerned with the absurd, irrational and the contradictory” (23).
Through the embrace of the absurd, a lampooning of the contradic-tory, the delightful pastiche of themes, and the incorporation of the grotesque, Sylvia surprises and persuades readers through highly sophisticated rhetorical techniques, urging the audience to view the news of the day through another, more focused lens. Yet, to what end does Sylvia employ the practices of Menippean satire? The next sec-tion takes an in-depth look at several representative strips to examine Sylvia’s powerful, feminist argument and her skillful use of rhetoric.