“Rolling Blackouts”

Sarah Glidden takes us through Turkey, Iraq, and Syria, exploring the nuances and humanity of a region that is often discussed in generalisations and assumptions as well as the challenges of journalism.

Cover by Sarah Glidden

Written and illustrated by Sarah Glidden

Cartoonist Sarah Glidden accompanies her two friends—reporters and founders of a journalism non-profit—as they research potential stories on the effects of the Iraq War on the Middle East and, specifically, the war’s refugees. Joining the trio is a childhood friend and former Marine whose past service in Iraq adds an unexpected and sometimes unwelcome viewpoint, both to the people they come across and perhaps even themselves.

As the crew works their way through Turkey, Iraq, and Syria, Glidden observes the reporters as they ask civilians, refugees, and officials, “Who are you?” Everyone has a story to tell: the Iranian blogger, the United Nations refugee administrator, a taxi driver, the Iraqi refugee deported from the US, the Iraqis seeking refuge in Syria, and even the American Marine.

Glidden (How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less) records all that she encounters with a sympathetic and searching eye. Painted in her trademark soft, muted watercolors and written with a self-effacing humor, Rolling Blackouts cements Glidden’s place as one of today’s most original nonfiction voices.

In late 2010 Sarah Glidden joined her friends, reporters and co-founders of the Seattle Globalist, a journalist non-profit, on a trip through three Middle Eastern countries to research some of the effects of the Iraq War. They visited Iraqi Kurdistan — the area of Iraq that probably benefitted most from the war as the Kurds were heavily discriminated against under Saddam Hussein — before travelling to meet people who were displaced by the war and fled to neighbouring Syria. The group was also joined by a former marine who was periodically interviewed about how he felt returning to Iraq.

Despite being about events six years ago, “Rolling Blackouts” feels extremely timely. This book gives context to the current turmoil in the region from a moment of peace, between the Iraq War and the Syrian civil war and the rise of ISIS. Glidden takes a warm, personal approach to the portrayal of all the people she encounters: no one is a caricature, no one is a stereotype. These people are people, they have depth and nuance and contradictions. They all have complex relationships to the Iraq War and American imperialism but none of them are our enemies, not the former marine, not the journalists, not the Muslims, not the refugees.

I think a lot of the relatability of the characters comes from Glidden’s lovely style. Her simple, clear lines give each figure a universality, while her soft watercolours bring a comfortable warmth to them. The focus is on the subjects, not on flashy art or formalist experiments. You can see this in how Glidden mostly sticks to the nine-panel grid, by keeping to a consistent and typically bland layout, the focus remains on the content.

That’s not to say there aren’t interesting things that “Rolling Blackouts” does with the form, just that the simple appearance helps to focus the book on the big subjects being discussed. In an interview with The Observer Glidden describes how her work “tries to make a connection between the reader and the person being interviewed by showing things like their body language, where they live and what they wear. It’s about these slower moments, in which you reveal who they are as people. Text can provide more information, but perhaps it puts more distance in there, too, and we’re bombarded by horrific photographs to the point where we’re desensitised. Drawings have a more human touch.”

It is only through comics that Glidden can truly show her experience. It allows her to capture the moments in between. Photographs are staged, interviews are prepared for, documentaries are edited. In comics, the cartoonist can choose to subtly include these ‘slower moments’ that highlight a person’s truth. The reader can choose to notice these subtleties but it isn’t essential to be constantly vigilant for them, largely they come across subliminally and the more overt elements of these stories are fascinating on their own. However, paying close attention to Glidden’s illustrations gives this special extra depth. The question of reliability arises here: is Glidden inserting her biases in this subtle way?

A couple moments within “Rolling Blackouts” directly address this, Glidden questions what her role is on this journalistic expedition. This insecurity is quite present in the book, there are reminders that this mediated – we see the cameras and the recording equipment and the editorial. One formal thing that Glidden does do that particularly stood out, was how she shows translation. Glidden overlays the subject’s Arabic speech bubble with the translator’s English speech bubble. Rather than having an asterisk to a caption box that says ‘this was translated from Arabic,’ Glidden makes the translation an active part of the book. This emphasises another key aspect of “Rolling Blackouts” – as much as it’s about the lives of people in this region, it’s also about the process of journalism.

The only people present throughout the entire book are Glidden and her two journalist friends. These are Glidden’s true subjects, while the stories of the local people are recreations of their interviews. The first page ends with the question “What is journalism?” This question resonates throughout the book as we see this small team of reporters seeking out stories, setting up interviews, and warding off Syrian government minders. An investigation of how journalism works is kind of the thesis statement of the book, its goal. However, for a large chunk in the middle I forgot about that; the stories of the people they meet on their journey overpower the metanarrative about journalism. I don’t necessarily think that’s a bad thing. While it is interesting to see the journalistic process, the stories of Kurdish, Iraqi, and Syrian people are more desperately needed. The book itself, in observing the journalistic process, becomes its own piece of journalism. At one point Glidden asks her friends for a definition of journalism, the answer given is “anything that is informative, verifiable, accountable, and independent.”

Glidden manages to do all of those things in “Rolling Blackouts” while also discussing how those things are achieved. It’s informative in that it explores many facets of its subject matters; it’s verifiable and accountable, we can see the process of verifying stories and both Glidden and the journalists she follows discuss accountability throughout the book; it’s independent in that Glidden comes to most of these situations from the outside, she’s not backed by any kind of interest groups and though her biases do influence the presentation and approach, they are acknowledged and discussed.

“Rolling Blackouts” presents a nuanced, informative and personal view on a situation and region where we often get none of those. It is a key and detailed piece of comics journalism that deserves to be remembered in the same breath as Joe Sacco’s “Palestine” books.