“Poppies of Iraq”

There are a lot of lessons to be learned from the way our media and culture has dealt with, and continues to deal with the ongoing conflict with Middle Eastern extremist groups. Perhaps the most basic one being not to paint the Muslim community with a broad brush. And yet, it is almost absurdly difficult to find nuanced portrayals of Arab life or what this war-torn region looked like outside the decades of conflict. Graphic novels have proven to be one medium, particularly for female voices, that offers some kind of snapshot of times and places.

Cover by Veroinca
Fish

Written by Brigitte Findakly
Illustrated by Lewis Trondheim
Colored by Brigitte Findakly

Poppies of Iraq is Brigitte Findakly’s nuanced tender chronicle of her relationship with her homeland Iraq, co-written and drawn by her husband, the acclaimed cartoonist Lewis Trondheim. In spare and elegant detail, they share memories of her middle class childhood touching on cultural practices, the education system, Saddam Hussein’s state control, and her family’s history as Orthodox Christians in the arab world. Poppies of Iraq is intimate and wide-ranging; the story of how one can become separated from one’s homeland and still feel intimately connected yet ultimately estranged.

“Poppies of Iraq” falls into this genre, but approaches the subject matter in a very different way. Described as poetic, sparse and wide-ranging, the narrative follows the experience of colorist Brigitte Findakly as a Christian and a child of mixed parentage living in Mosul. Rather than tackling any of that complicated origin directly, the book feels more like wispy cobwebs of memories, that start to paint a picture only after enough of them have been laid out.

For a large chunk of the slim volume, each page contains its own thread of thought. The narrative is slowly woven from snippets of Findakly’s childhood, pieces of Iraqi tradition and the occasional page of family photographs. It is only once we’re past the half-way point that things start to take on a more chronological sequence.

Following these threads of life and history is a little challenging on first read, but even on that first pass, there are some beautiful and haunting moments. The juxtaposition of Findakly’s family history of masonry, and the destruction of the Mosque of Nabi at the hands of Daesh is particularly poignant. These scenes touch on some of the less human atrocities of warfare in a way that the news media seem unable to do. Not to diminish the human cost, but rather to emphasize the slow erosion of the things that civilize us: our histories. Our cultures.

But the story isn’t all war and destruction. There is a heavy sense of nostalgia that pervades the book. Findakly’s loving descriptions of her mother, a French woman who never felt at home in France, and never quite acclimatized to Iraq, provides much of the book’s subtle humor. Her experiences highlight some of the differences between the Middle East and the West, but they also point out the many similarities. Through this lens of Arab and European cultures, Findakly begins to expose the descent of Mosul from cosmopolitan city, to Wahhabi police state.

Findakly’s husband, acclaimed French artist Lewis Trondheim, underscores the motion of the narrative with his understated cartooning. The simple, borderless six-panel pages fall somewhere between memories and snapshots. The feel of the art is light, and is at its strongest when enhancing the funny moments. There are places where the visuals reach for heavier emotions, but the simplistic figures frequently get in the way of real emoting.

This lack of visual substance is balanced by Trondheim’s more detailed and photorealistic background work, and by the occasional page of family photos. These black and white images contextualize the cartoon figures. While they are all highly posed shots, the comic’s panels seem to almost set them in motion.

Perhaps the most striking image of the book is actually on the cover. It is a scene of the younger Brigitte, sitting atop a pillar of grey stone on a field of grass, strewn with some more stone rubble. It captures the soul of the narrative in an instant. All the more so once you are familiar with the visual vocabulary of the story.

There is a sequence of full-page images in the final pages of the book, all titled ‘The good memories.’ Each one captures a scene of everyday life in Mosul from Findakly’s childhood. They are set against the conclusion of the main narrative of the story: a series of visits Brigitte makes to Mosul and Amman, Jordan between 1977 and 2006. Each visit highlights the increasing xenophobia and conservatism of Iraq. Against the contrast of Findakly’s fond memories, this slow decline into fear and isolation is all the more heartbreaking.

The book closes with a simple timeline: the history of the Mosul region from ancient Sumer to the sacking of the city by Daesh.

In many ways, “Poppies of Iraq” is too simple for the narrative it is trying to weave. It is also incredibly poignant because of that simplicity. It never tries to force an opinion on you. It is simply a collection of observations and recollections, contextualized by history. It is delightful and moving, and most of all, quite charming.