Comics, Conspiracy, and the American Way
So much of In the Shadow of No Towers seems to be Spiegelman’s attempt to find connections between 9/11 and the previous turn of the century. The most obvious part of this is his exploration of the early comic supplements of the Hearst and Pulitzer papers. The more subtle connection is with the fear and reactionary politics of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. I missed this the first time I read the book. Guess I shouldn’t have considering that the front page is one of the burning towers set in the middle of the september 11, 1901 The World and the last page is headlines from the years following our 9/11 layered over that same front page.
The connection is truly eerie. The headlines from exactly 100 years before 9/11/2011, were filled with news of McKinley’s assassination. While not as traumatic as the attack on the twin towers, this was a MAJOR event. And the surrounding history adds to the similarities. Anarchists and Muslim fundamentalists are far apart in ideology, but their tactics were quite similar– use terror to gain notoriety and recognition of your cause. McKinley’s assassin was an anarchist, and the movement had become famous over the past couple of decades for spectacular bombings. Socialists were also on the rise, and the labor unrest they were encouraging terrified those in charge. Both groups were lead mainly by new immigrants from Europe– foreigners. As an antidote to the instability that the left was stirring up at the time, the powers that be served up the same imperialism, xenophobia, and reactionary politics that we have become used to over the past 10 years.
(I should point out here that I am pretty weak on this period of American history, so my discussion– informed by Wikipedia and vague memories of a 30 minute lesson in high school– should be taken with several grains of salt. I was listening to one of Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History podcasts a few weeks ago and he makes a similar comparison to Spiegelman. It’s show 40 Radical Thoughts if you are interested. It’s not the main point of the podcast episode, but he provides a good bit of useful information)
Or should we really make much out of the connections that are at first glance so compelling? In his introduction, Spiegelman questions his easy belief in some of the conspiracy theories surrounding 9/11 and some of the connections I’ve been playing with here aren’t all that remarkable. When has the U.S. not been imperialistic? When have we not been afraid of the current foreigner? When have we not had reactionary politics? Certainly, mixed in with all this U.S. right wingery is the opposite. The American Revolution was anti imperial and did inspire revolutions around the world. Even with our discussions of border fences, we are an incredibly diverse nation. The late sixties and early seventies seem pretty cool.
Spiegelman’s use of turn of the century comics seems to me an expression of his love (not sure that he would agree with this word?) and disgust with the U.S. It’s not some in between feeling. He feels both powerfully. Many of the comics that inspire his book are politically backward, but he still loves them. He transforms them and makes them a part of his own understanding of 9/11. The front and back covers reflect this the most. All of these comics characters are the Americans that were in the towers.
