Images

Tangles uses
vivid imagery
through text manipulation, facial details, artistic exaggerations, and blank
space.

## Text Manipulation

Over the course of the memoir, Mariam wrote letter to her
family on a consistent basis. As the Alzheimer’s developed, the letters became
less complex and thought out, afterwards the text itself started to break, and
sentences were difficult to read.

The letters provided the audience with tangible evidence
related to the disease progression. The variation in the letters becomes
pronounced as the memoir develops.

On page 16 – Mariam writes a letter to Sarah to help her
cope with the unfamiliar surroundings of Montreal; 40 – Mariam’s writing
reflects that of an elementary student, with words atop other words, and broken
sentences; 48 – the letters became simple notes with difficult to distinguish
meanings; and 69 – notes become a few undistinguishable sentences with hearts
penned in.

## Facial Details

Tangles art work uses a wide variety of facial characteristics
to help guide the audience across the scenes.

Early in the memoir, childhood memories of nightmares had
simple facial illustrations, and made it easy to invest less time in this
section. The development of the Sisters used more pronounced facial features,
making the pages more vivid and capturing reader attention. In large groups of
people, only important characters would have illustrated faces, making it
easier to distinguish between people.

The character models are remarkably consistent throughout
the memoir, making it easy to forget a name but remember a face, and continue
enjoying the memoir.

## Artistic Exaggeration

Several moments in Tangles use wildly exaggerated
interactions to instill a sense of urgency, anger, and general mood related to
a scene.

On page 56, Sarah imagines her mother as a crazy tooth-brush
wielding demon, when in fact she is simply brushing her teeth all night and
keeping the family awake. This scene reveals how Sarah felt about the entire
ordeal.

On page 77, Sarah reacts to a few children making rude
remarks about her mother. The exaggeration depicts a raging monster in place of
Sarah, but also helps the audience connect with her emotions.

## Blank Space

Tangles uses whitespace extensively to help focus the
audience on subtle points. Many of these occur outside the memoir frames.

Pages 42, 45, 47, and 61 are examples of this. The memoir
abruptly stops and inserts a side-bar to the story. Sometimes these moments
include separate stories, other times they are close moments between
characters, but they help separate key moments from the rest of the story.

Tangles also uses blank space to help illustrate
a deeper moment, but the whitespace is not always the same context. For
example, page 33 uses a wide white area to illustrate Rob walking away from the
family at the Airport. In this scene, the whitespace shows the reader how the
family felt at a distance. On page 35 however, the family is in a clinic
staring at the doctor’s door. The only illustration is 3 blacked out characters
and a door. This scene reveals a family intently focused on one thought – the
events through that door. Finally, on page 93, Mariam is standing next to a
tree, and a sentence explains her thoughts. The whole scene is mostly white
space, and helps the audience focus on the internalized thoughts of Mariam in
that moment, and nothing else.

## References

Leavitt, S. (2010).
*Tangles.* Calgary: Freehand Books.

ReadWriteThink.com.
(n.d.). *Graphic Novel/Comics Terms and Concepts*. Retrieved from Read
Write Think:
http://www.readwritethink.org/files/resources/lesson\_images/lesson1102/terms.pdf