Fun Home #2

Bechdel uses many pictures to depict the minimal text in her story, Fun Home.  I think that the most blatant purpose of her pictures is to show the facial expressions of the characters.  I think that without the pictures, the story would not have the same feel, and the reader would not get the same understanding of the family as they do with the pictures.  Smiles are few and far between in the pictures, and most of the time it shows nothing but solemn and stern faces.  Also, I think that the details of the faces often show that the characters are thinking to themselves.  Bechdel does this to give the reader the feeling that the family is distant, and rarely express their emotions with each other.  Sometimes, she incorporates the characters thoughts in the pictures to show just what they were thinking.  I think that Bechdel uses shading mainly to show character's emotions in the background.  She uses darker colored clothing and shading on the characters who may not be the emphasis of the picture, but whose emotions are important to the reader's understanding of the story.  I also think that there are a number of things pointed out by the lighting of the story, such as objects or events that reinforce what the text is saying.  The tidiness of the house is often exhibited, as is the perceieved, "traditionalistic" functioning of the family.  I think Bechdel also uses silhouettes to describe peoples' emotions without even showing their faces.  Bechdel does a tremendous job with complimenting her text with sketches that truly capture the emotions and thoughts of the characters in the story.