Comics Tourism: Destination Brussels

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If you are at all serious about the comics medium and you have not visited and/or thought about visiting Brussels, you should really start to reconsider your thinking. It’s one thing to read that Belgians regard Bande dessinée (BD) as an important artform and it’s another thing entirely to actually experience a mature, mainstream comics culture firsthand in a European setting that’s more alike than alien to an American visitor.

It doesn’t matter if you don’t speak French and it’s probable that you don’t speak Flemish, either. But because the country is bilingual, most signage is printed in English (and often in German as well) on the theory that it’s just as easy to print things in three or four languages as it is to print in two. English is prevalent because of the sheer variety of international visitors – Brussels is the capital of the EU, the headquarters of NATO and is a major international banking, business and convention center. Still, learning another language because you want to has the net effect of making you look less jingoistic and xenophobic than your peers and it opens up an entire world of comics you probably know less about than you think.

Brussels bills itself as the capital of the ninth art, but it was also the epicenter of the Art Nouveau movement. Several prominent Art Nouveau architects designed buildings in and around the city center that still stand. One of the more famous architects was Victor Horta, who designed a wholesale fabric store that now houses the Belgian Comic Strip Center. Lovingly restored in the 80s and beautifully maintained, the building is a work of art in and of itself.
 

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The museum features a permanent exhibition about Herge and Tintin, along with exhibits on other prominent Belgian creators, most notably Peyo and EP Jacobs. The top floor is dedicated space for rotating exhibitions – it’s currently dedicated to a retrospective of Willy Vandersteen and a celebration of the 75th anniversary of Spirou. The reading room contains over 3,000 albums and is open to anyone who has purchased admission to the museum. The museum bookstore is fantastic and has token English, German and Spanish sections. If you only have time to visit one thing in Brussels, this should be it.
 

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Scattered throughout the city center are a variety of BD-related murals that have been commissioned by the local government, private businesses and associations. These murals are indicated on maps that are handed out by the Brussels tourism board and they are considered to be a major tourist attraction. The city center looks huge on the map, but the blocks are not very big and are very walkable; wandering around looking for murals is a great way to see a large part of it.

Many of the major characters created by Belgian artists are featured in these murals, but Tintin shows up more often than most. Herge is the favorite son of Brussels and is easily one of the city’s biggest claims to fame. There is an entire Herge museum found just outside Brussels, not far from Herge’s house. If you are a Tintin fan, it is very easy to gorge yourself on the character – the Tintin Boutique is just around the corner from the Grand Place de Bruxelles and features every Tintin related piece of merchandise you could ever want, including (but not limited to) towels, dress shirts, figurines, framed prints, stuffed animals, keychains and playsets.
 

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My favorite part of the BD culture in Brussels is the sheer number and variety of stores. From the random boutique book store in the St Hubert Gallery that had Jordan Crane, Alec Longstreth and a translation of Duncan the Wonder Dog to the big stores on the main drag, BD seems to be everywhere. The local FNAC store (sort of like Best Buy, with much less emphasis on household appliances) had more space dedicated to BD than it did to either DVDs or CDs.

The real destination stores, however, are Brüsel and Multi BD. They are obviously aimed at different demographics and approach the sale of BD in completely different ways. Brüsel has a gallery in the basement and top floor and seems to have a much more curatorial approach to what they sell – they don’t try to have everything in stock, just those things that they think are worthwhile to carry. They also have comics in English, Spanish and German as well as the obligatory Flemish.
 

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Multi BD is a lot more comprehensive and is your go-to destination if you are looking for book three of that fantasy series from Dargaud that you cannot seem to find anywhere else. Interestingly, Multi BD seems to have a better selection of alternative/small press comics in both English and French than Brüsel does – and places this material right in the front of the shop as the first thing that a customer encounters when they walk in the door.

Neither of these is in the kind of space where you’d find the local Games Workshop franchise – both occupy two fairly large storefront spaces on a major thoroughfare and are within easy walking distance of each other. And neither seems to be hurting for business. More importantly, their primary demographic is not children, but adults of all genders with money. The market is centered around 48 page hardbound albums (although there is a greater flexibility in formats than there used to be) which tend to run about 12 Euros apiece and go up in price relative to the page count.
 

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Another shopping destination is the Comics Village on the Grand Sablon, which features a store downstairs and a pretty good restaurant upstairs. If you go here, make sure you buy your books after you eat, to take advantage of the discount. The book selection here overlaps what you can find at Brüsel or Multi BD, but is much less robust and aimed at a much more general audience, as you would expect from a venue that markets itself as a theme restaurant and sidewalk café that happens to have a store. They also have copies of Tintin lying around in the restaurant so that kids have something to read while they are eating lunch.

What I found most interesting about all of these stores is that it’s easier to find manga than it is to find American superhero comics and there is usually a better selection of the former. Manga often gets its own prominent corner while American superheroes generally get an out-of-the way shelf. Other English-language comics are found in translation more prominently – Strangers in Paradise, Prophet, Whiteout and Making Comics – to name only a few titles. It is almost as if these stores considered superheroes to be just another genre instead of the foundation of the market and stocked them accordingly. Also of note: American floppies are almost completely absent, probably because graphic novels fit the local buying patterns better.

The other place to look for BD in Brussels is among the used bookstores along the Rue du Midi – only a few blocks from Multi BD and Brüsel. Most second hand bookstores have a large selection of used BD albums which are worth flipping through, if only to see the sheer volume and variety of material that you have never heard of (often for good reason). Along the same street is Le Dépôt, a used bookstore that is entirely dedicated to BD. Here, more than anywhere else, I got a real sense of the depth of the French BD market and how much of it was completely unknown to me. As with the best stores of this kind, it is entirely possible to spend hours lost in the stacks, constantly surprised by things you had no idea could be considered commercial.

Once you have exhausted all of the obvious options, one of the more off the beaten path attractions is a house that was also designed by Victor Horta called Maison Autrique. This townhouse is now a museum that has hosted a variety of small, comics-related exhibits. The whole endeavor of restoration and curatorship of the townhouse is obviously a labor of love and among those lovers are local creators François Schuiten and Benoît Peeters. Albums from their Obscure Cities BD series is available in the museum’s blink-and-you’’ll-miss-it bookstore and there is a major callout to one of the characters in that series hiding in the attic of the house. Schuiten’s artwork is heavily influenced by Art Nouveau and he has also authored a book with Lonely Planet that suggests possible walking tours of the city’s architecture. It is possible to get a greater appreciation of their work just by wandering around the more beautiful buildings of the city – including this one.
 

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François Schuiten, from the Belgian Comic Strip Center

 
More than anything else, what Brussels offers a world-class city that features comics as a foundation of their tourism and local identity year-round and not just for a week a year. What other city does that? Besides, they sell fresh waffles in the streets and have good beer. And make sure you try the mussels.

Philosophical Cities (Part 2 of 3)

[The first part of this article (Les Cités Obscures: The Great Walls of Samaris) can be found here. Fever in Urbicand was first translated into English in the pages of Cheval Noir and later reprinted in album format by NBM in 1990.]

“In my youth, fooled by the illusory theories of the Xhystos and Tharo architects, I momentarily succumbed to the turbid charms of the arabesque. However, I soon regained my sense and discovered the profound nature of our art. I realized that in every circumstance, simplicity is preferable to affectation, steadfast attention to a single effect is better than a thousand strokes of inspiration, and at every moment the conception of the whole must prevail over obsession with detail.”

Eugen Robick, Fever in Urbicand

Benoît Peeters and François Schuiten’s second album in the Cités series seems, in part, a reverberation from the events in The Great Walls of Samaris. It may in fact suggest a path humanity should be taking.

Within the pages of Fever in Urbicand, an apathetic citizen by the name of Eugen Robick (whom Franz finds occupying his girlfriend’s apartment at the end of The Great Walls of Samaris) becomes an instrument of reconciliation and hope.

Robick is Urbicand’s chief urbatect and thus a synthesis of the artistic and scientific genius. The story begins when he is presented with a virtually indestructible and seemingly useless metal lattice cube, an object which he immediately loses interest in. The cube is first discovered at the Von Hardenberg construction site, a veiled reference to the author and philosopher, Novalis.

There are a number of interesting links between Novalis and Les Cités Obscures. Novalis’ oeuvre includes idealistic philosophical allegories like Pollen and Faith and Life. In Novalis’ Heinrich von Ofterdingen, the hero searches for a symbolic blue flower which is the color of the Drosera in The Great Walls of Samaris. In yet another tribute to Novalis, Peeters has named Robick’s girlfriend, Sophie, in memory of Novalis’ own fiancée, Sophie von Kuhn.

It seems safe, therefore, to assume that Robick’s apathy is intended as a metaphor for intellectual disdain for small yet potentially significant forces – an attitude which is shared by the government and academicians of Urbicand.

Robick is preoccupied with the important task of building bridges joining the Northern and Southern banks of the city. Passports are required for crossing these bridges and it is quite apparent that the river dividing the city is a symbolic frontier line separating essentially similar peoples. Like the intellectuals of Castalia in Hermann Hesse’s The Glass Bead Game, however, Robick shuns anything overtly political. Absorbed with artistic endeavor, he fails to understand what soon becomes so fascinating to the citizens of his city. His initial concerns are merely directed at the symmetry, stability and aesthetic perfection of his creations. Like Plinio in Hesse’s novel, he has become “unpleasantly strange to others” and incapable of understanding them. The authors, thus, do not merely decry elitism but also the failure of intellectual and artistic communities to provide leadership and direction for society.

The reader is treated to the sights of Urbicand through Robick’s long walks and explorations. The city exhibits a reserved expression of Art Deco (and Art Nouveau) ideas, a typical example of which would be the “sober, geometric” Stoclet Palace in Schuiten’s native Brussels, with its carefully trimmed trees and prominent tower. All these and more recur with some regularity along the streets of Urbicand. There are statues which recall the work of Joseph Maria Olbrich and interiors which touch on the simplicity and reserve of Charles Rennie Mackintosh. The rectilinear and symmetrical forms so loved by Art Deco artists are prominently displayed in a proliferation of female and animal sculptures, furniture and wall paper designs. At one point in the album, Schuiten depicts an immense avenue flanked by a stern, bare building with the word “mortalis” inscribes on its façade. This huge mausoleum is further romanticized and made symbolic by cypress trees planted at the termination of the avenue.

Schuiten redefines his spatial expression for this story. In one instance, a long narrow corridor with high walls creates a variation on Gothic space with a magnificent office at its termination substituting for an altar.

As Peter Collins describes:

“…in the nave of a Gothic cathedral the high walls closely confining the observer on two side restrict his possible movements, suggesting advance along the free space of the nave towards the altar; or their compression forces him to look upward to the vaults and the light far ahead, there to feel a sense of physical release, though he is earthbound.”

In another instance, pedestrians on open walkways are engulfed and dwarfed by the massive buildings which surround them. The emphasis on stone masonry, towering doorways and massive staircases lend an air of monumentality and majesty to Urbicand which begins to resemble a sort of temple glorifying the State.

Within a day of its discovery, the cube begins to grow at an amazing pace, forming a network as it does so. Quiet, unbreakable and indifferent to external matter, the network passes through Urbicand like a giant metaphor for Mikhail Bakunin’s anarchistic pan-destructionist theories save for their excessively violent elements. The network is thus an indefinable, immortal force replacing the terrorism that has littered history; leading all classes in a “spontaneous revolution” against the government.

Amidst the turmoil, the visionary qualities in Robick creep into play as he readily accepts the need for savage elements to highlight the “unity of the whole”. He lectures a skeptical academy on the workings of the network and, later, maps the extent of the network to best benefit from its presence. Gravitating towards the other extreme is his friend, Thomas, the consummate bureaucrat. He is the only person to recognize the magical properties of the cube from the outset and remains firmly against the network and its adherents for the better part of the book. The third major character, Sophie, is a free spirited and open minded procuress. She remains a tribute to Sophie von Kuhn in name only. As fickle in her commitments as she is in love, she sets herself up firstly as Robick’s public relations officer but later defects to Thomas’ cause.

To the populace, the network is both captivating and terrifying. Robick who is merely the victim of tumultuous events, is hailed as the ideological leader of the movement and as a result cast into prison. Military intervention and government propaganda is stepped up even as the North and South banks of the city become freely accessible to the people. A ponderous attempt to destroy the network using an antiquated cannon (a somewhat telling symbol) results in disastrous losses for the aggressors. What follows is a sudden and final breakdown of the judicial system as the geometric growth of the network makes all forms of incarceration untenable.

The sudden stabilization of the network results in unprecedented freedom for the citizens of Urbicand as the various classes of society are finally physically (if not spiritually) united. When Robick, awash with misconceptions, is pressed into visiting the North Bank by Sophie, he discovers what we have suspected all along.

The North Bank can best be described as a tenement area with dilapidated buildings and poorly clothed inhabitants ennobled by their friendliness, tolerance and eagerness to learn of the South Bankers. The affluent, sophisticated South Bank residents are portrayed in a similarly idealistic vein, coming across as understanding, sociable and unprejudiced.

Indeed, the efficiency of the network in dismantling the trappings of government is matched only by the miraculous spirit of cooperation and innovation exhibited by the population: exchanging houses becomes common between people staying on opposite sides of the network; municipal government officials begin to take indefinite leaves of absence abandoning the civil service; walkways and railing are quickly set up along the metal beams of the networks; toll booths are set up to demarcate and signify property lines; crops are grown using the network as scaffoldings; and when ice makes the network inaccessible to pedestrians, tram cars and elevators are set up to ease travel during these periods.

Pierre-Joseph Proudhon probably envisioned a society along similar lines when he developed his own form of anarchism, Mutualism. In Proudhonian Mutualism, policies are shaped purely by the will of the people and the possession of land an essential ingredient in the liberation of the working class. Business is undertaken for mutual interest and unbound by laws; disputes are settled by arbitration. At this point, it seems appropriate to note that Robick does bear some resemblance to the bearded Proudhon.

Proudhon is hailed as the first man to declare himself an anarchist. He was harassed by the authorities and even underwent imprisonment. He was involved in the Revolution of 1848 “which he regarded as devoid of any sound theoretical basis”. He was “a solitary thinker who refused to admit that he had created a system and abhorred the idea of founding a party” (George Woodcock).

Sophie illustrates another aspect of anarchy – the expression of bodily freedom as demonstrated through publicly sanctioned encounter houses (essentially pavilions for the purposes of sexual orgies) at the intersections of the network.

Robick, who views the “pleasant state of chaos” as inefficient and unconstructive, begins devising new buildings to “bring disturbing elements into balance with useful ones”. Among his designs is one which draws upon the image of Olbrich’s Sezession House in Vienna right down to the “golden cabbage” dome.

This “parody of classicism and imitative historicism” is a symbolic call to break with the past. It is not an insignificant or fanciful choice for the original building heralded a new era of experimentation and change. While Art Nouveau today may be closely linked with decorative designs of Xhystosian architecture, it allowed for a diversity of modern styles and ideas. The Sezession House is the symbol of a new art belonging to a new unfettered attitude towards life. Its lack of luxury conforms to the anarchistic ideal.

On a trip to the outskirts of the city, Robick discovers that the network has attained the shape of a pyramid slightly tilted on its side due to Thomas’ angular displacement of the cube on Robick’s table at the beginning of the story. This reiterates the idea that bureaucratic involvement of any kind is singularly detrimental to anarchistic revolution. The fact that the cube only starts to grow on Robick’s table suggests that it is the place of the intellectual to nurture such movements. It is fitting that the most enduring and perfect structures ever created by man should come to represent the spirit of freedom. It is perhaps subtle irony that what once represented the Egyptian “autocratic ideal” of central government and the powers of the pharaoh is here used to express solidarity and individual action.

Peeters’ and Schuiten’s idealism is tempered with a tinge of realism for even pleasant dreams must come to an end (and all too often with a shock). The new order is shattered when the network resumes its growth, destroying everything built upon it. The powers that be swiftly reassert themselves and Thomas, who has unwaveringly opposed the network, is chosen by the people to re-establish order in the face of chaos. Memories are, however, slow to fade. Some citizens cling tenaciously to the miracle of the network. Climbers attempt to scale the fast disappearing structure while others fervently hope and pray like zealots for its return.

In the closing pages of the book, Thomas, hoping to counteract the despondency of his people, seeks Robick’s help to build an artificial network. Robick refuses but supplies his maps to Thomas to aid the undertaking. When work finally begins, Robick can only describe the resulting structure as a “grotesque caricature”.

Robick has an alternative solution, one which constitutes the message of this tale: the recreation of the cube. The album closes with Robick beginning the difficult process of invention by making a crude stone replica of the original lattice cube. In the absence of radical social reformation, a slower, more taxing process of trial and error is adopted. It is quite possible that the utopia created by the network may never be attained through this laborious process of evolution. On other hand, as Herbert Read states in the The Cult of Sincerity:

“My understanding of the history of culture has convinced me that the ideal society is a point on a receding horizon. We move steadily towards it but can never reach it. Nevertheless we must engage with passion in the immediate strife…”

The anarchistic ideal thus becomes a standard by which to judge our society, an ever present reminder to guard against over-organization and regimentation.

A full color newspaper insert in an issue of À Suivre published some years after the release of Fever in Urbicand shows Robick hard at work in his factory and with some measure of success in his endeavors. A touch of optimism on the part of the authors perhaps…(cont’d)

Sequential Surrender Monkey (Part 1 of 5)

(or the HU Bande Dessinée Roundtable Part 1)
(or Noah wrote it and Kinukitty meowed in approval, so don’t ask me what the title means.)

This is the first entry in the Hooded Utilitarian BD Roundtable. Vom Marlowe, Derik Badman, Kinukitty and Noah will be along later in the week with their own articles on various European comics.

I wrote the following article in the early 90s. It has never been published and the yellowing manuscript has been sitting in a dark closet for the last two decades.

The first third of the article is presented below (with some editing). The latter parts of the article concern two other books in the series namely, Fever in Ubricand and The Tower. Both of these are far superior to The Great Wall of Samaris and show off Benoît Peeters’ and François Schuiten’s abilities to a much greater extent. Anyone who has the slightest interest in European comics owes it to themselves to check them out if they haven’t already.

Second hand copies of The Great Walls of Samaris go for about $40 to $100 at on-line second hand book retailers. NBM has been publishing the albums in the series at a slow pace. I suspect that they aren’t big sellers for them as they’ve never been reprinted. Still, they are to be congratulated for printing and translating them at all. The latest books in the series to be translated are Brusel and The Invisible Frontier Volumes 1 and 2 both of which are still in print.

François Schuiten received the Grand Prix de la ville d’Angoulême in 2002.

Philosophical Cities (Part 1): The Great Walls of Samaris

The English speaking world was introduced to the comics of the Belgian artist, François Schuiten, nearly 30 years ago. His first album, Aux médianes de Cymbiola (Heavy Metal 1981-82; created with Claude Renard) was done as a sort of graduation piece from Saint-Luc. His short stories have been published in the pages of Pilote and Metal Hurlant, among them the acclaimed Carapaces. It is, however, upon his more recent work on Les Cités Obscures (co-authored with writer Benoît Peeters) that his fame rests.

Parables are designed to simplify, persuade and to communicate spiritual truths. To a certain extent, the stories in Les Cités Obscures seek to do just that. These albums represent intriguing introductions to a world of ideas and are sparkling illustrations of basic philosophical tenets. The architectural motifs which can be found throughout the series are not merely functional but highly expressive of the societies which produced them. The architectural content of the buildings illuminate the personalities of the people who inhabit them and provide valuable clues as to the meaning of these tales.

Les Murailles De Samaris
(The Great Walls of Samaris, English edition published by NBM in 1987) is the first album in the series and like the other albums, it is steeped in allegory.

It concerns the latest exploratory mission from the city of Xhystos to the enigmatic city of Samaris. Xhystos is an Art Nouveau fantasy with twisting, organic architectural forms and heavy ornamentation: a lounge seems to suggest a tribute to Victor Horta’s Hotel van Eetvelde; buildings are framed by metal girders and stanchions bent into shapes reminiscent of Hector Guimard’s Metro entrances.

Indeed Schuiten’s sensibilities permeate the entire album with Art Nouveau furniture, floor patterns and book covers. The city, however, is monstrously huge and impersonal; overcrowded but underpopulated. “Stifling” is the way one citizen descirbes it. The flamboyance and complexity of the buildings embody the values of its inhabitants who, while aesthetically astute, appear superficial and careless.

At the story’s start, the protagonist, Franz, is invited to undertake a mission to Samaris to dispel the fears and questions which are circulating among the citizens of Xhystos about the city. He accepts but his reasons for doing so are a mystery even to himself. His overwhelming fascination with Samaris belies a surface attraction for wealth and position. Though rejected by friends because of the dangerous nature of his mission, his mind is filled only with the promise of the unknown.

Franz reaches the strange and bewitching city after a journey across vast wastelands via train, altiplane and boat. His observations concerning the city and its inhabitants provide a wealth of useful information for readers interested in unraveling the conundrum the authors have set before them. For one, Samaris sports elements of the Romanesque, Classicism, Neo-Classicism and Art Nouveau. As Franz describes:

“Many different architectural styles seemed to merge together, as if the city had conserved traces of all the civilizations she had sheltered.”

Samaris is shrouded in mystery: a constant humming pervades the entire city; walls lie behind open windows; secret alleys open up in unexpected places and familiar buildings with similar details appear along unexplored paths. Her inhabitants wander aimlessly through the streets following routines which are never departed from. By his own account, Franz’s faculties are similarly dulled as soon as he enters the city. A woman named, Carla, who he meets everyday at the same time and the same place bears a striking resemblance to Anna’s sister, Clara, who has been presumed lost on a previous mission to Samaris. Yet Franz fails to recognize her and has absolutely no idea why they meet at all. Their conversations are at once banal, strained and repetitive.

This last point proves useful in deciphering the theme of Peeters’ and Schuiten’s tale for it seems to be a direct reference to what Martin Heidegger called “idle talk”. Arne D. Naess describes it as a situation in which:

“… talker and listener do not stand in any genuine personal relation or in any intimate relation to what is talked about…”

Gradually, Franz comes to “look and act” like all the other “lethargic wanderers” of Samaris. He pursues his mission with all the zeal of a sloth and becomes increasingly disenchanted with his discoveries. This reflects what Heidegger called “curiosity” which is described by Naess as:

“… a form of distraction, a need for the “new”, a need for something “different”, without real interest or capability of wonder.”

Realizing this and rousing himself by an act of will, Franz decides to leave the city with Carla. The violent scene that ensues when she refuses to comply reinvigorates him and leads to a renewed determination to find out the inner workings of Samaris.

What he discovers is at once shocking and horrifying – a rude awakening from a lifetime’s slumber and a revelation which brings new meaning to all his future dealings. For behind Samaris is a vast labyrinthine complex where the streets circulate according to his needs and where buildings are mere facades. Her inhabitants are two dimensional cut-outs committed to sustaining an illusion solely for him. The city represents a world of lies and alienation; a deterministic society as depicted by a clockwork town.

With this penultimate revelation, an echo of Søren Kierkegaard’s “three spheres of existence” or “stages in life’s way” may be perceived. The first is an aesthetic stage (Xhystos’s Art Nouveau) where one lives “for the moment” and develops one’s skills. It is a life symbolized by the casual love affair which ends in despair (a situation which Franz has found himself in). The next stage is characterized by an ethical life where one shows commitment and duty (the routine existence and comparatively sober architecture of Samaris) which results in the recognition of one’s shortcomings. The final religious stage is left undepicted but not without reason.

At the centre of Samaris, Franz discovers an ancient tome filled with images of the “sprawling” Drosera, a carnivorous plant upon which Samaris has been based. Here is a metaphor within a metaphor, the interpretation of which becomes clear only with the demystification of the rest of the author’s imagery.

Franz escapes from Samaris but returns only to social and political rejection in the city of Xhystos. The pattern of existence within that city no longer holds its charms for him. His friends and lover have never existed and in a final revelation he discovers that the citizens of Xhystos are little better than those of Samaris, puppets controlled from without by some impersonal force. The story ends with Franz stumbling back to Samaris, “the city [he] should never have left to begin with”.

The Great Walls of Samaris paints a picture of utter hopelessness and an eternity of searching. There are no answers given to Franz’ dilemma. Certainly, Samaris does not hold the key for Franz would only be returning to superficial friends and trivial, monotonous pastimes. Samaris represents a kind of existence described by Heidegger as inauthentic and anonymous (ethical stage). It is a world where people try to hide the “nothingness” of existence or the non-reality of its possibilities behind the mask of daily concerns (Nicola Abbagnano). Heidegger saw an escape from this in a recognition and embracement of death, and through this the acceptance of “the possibility of the impossibility of existence” thus leading to the appropriation of the authentic existence (religious stage).

This authentic existence, however, remains undefined by Peeters and Schuiten. In fact, the authors have rejected all firm ideas as to what exactly constitutes this state. Hence the complete absence of all religious edifices and acceptable alternatives in Samaris. Kierkegaard found his answer in Christianity and the acceptance of salvation through faith and not by works. A humanistic existentialist might devote himself to revolution and social change but Franz, like so many others, must continue his search.

When Franz fully comprehends the nullity of his existence in Samaris, his response is one of “dread” (“the sentiment of the possible”), a situation which leads to the apprehension of a “common destiny to which all men are subject”. His return to Samaris at the end of the story demonstrates the methodological importance and consequences of an awareness of death and its associated feeling of dread. From Abbagnano’s concise commentary on these two factors:

“…they offer to him, therefore, the possibility of remaining faithful to his destiny and of freely accepting the necessity that all men share in common. In this fidelity consists the historicity of existence, which is the repetition of tradition, the return to the possibilities from which existence had earlier been constituted, the wanting for the future what has been in the past.”

This statement becomes meaningful if one recalls the diverse architectural styles in Samaris and the quotations from the ancient tome Franz discovers at the centre of the city. In Peeters’ own words, Samaris is “free from impurities”, “will have always been and will always be” and will “seize the images” of those she has captured. She is “never changing yet always different” and her roots will always grow “further and further”.

Thus Franz’s returns to Samaris constitutes a faithfulness to the common destiny shared by all men since Samaris, as judged by her architectural content and characteristics, encapsulates the history of man. This last point in itself represents an interesting idea for it suggests that mankind’s existence has hitherto been singularly inauthentic.

Allegory is not an unfamiliar tool in the realms of existentialist thought. Kierkegaard created a series of books under various pseudonyms (embodiments of the aesthete, the ethical person and the religious person) to fully express his ideas on the three stages of life. Writers such as Albert Camus have chartered similar territory in The Rebel and The Outsider, dwelling mainly on the ultimate futility of one’s efforts, “the absurdity of existence” and the meaningless of life.

This would appear to be the message of The Great Walls of Samaris if one fails to consider the themes of the authors’ later albums…(cont’d)

Update by Noah: You can see the entire roundtable so far here.