Fun Home brims with fantastical threads, seemingly improbable elements that are the product of Bechdel's self-described “failure of imagination.” She says she can only work from notes and clear memories and doesn't understand how people write fiction. “If I'd made this up it would be really bad writing,” she points out.
Although Bechdel speaks as if documenting her life is not a particularly creative endeavor, the book displays deep insight—into herself, her father, and the complicated and contentious relationship they shared. According to her this perceptiveness comes partly from a lot of therapy but mostly from simply having been “a hyper-sensitive kid.” She adds that she knew her father extremely well and maintained an unusually strong bond with him.
In Fun Home Bechdel examines the hard time she has accessing her anger at her father. She notes that she is able to forgive him for his flaws partly because “the bar is lower for fathers than for mothers.” But she also says that through working on the book she gained respect for her mother, "really understanding some of what she was dealing with.” “My perspective has changed since being a kid in that household,” Bechdel says, noting that she came to be more sympathetic toward both of her parents in the process of producing Fun Home.
According to Bechdel, much like her father she often attempts to access emotion vicariously, by eliciting a response from someone else that she wishes she were capable of herself. When asked whether she relies on her audience to function in a similar way—although with greater remoteness and delay—she says: “I suppose so. I'm unable to fully access my feelings, but maybe someone listening will be able to do that and reflect it back to me.”
Bechdel says she exhibits “weird confidence” talking about herself and her work but is petrified talking about anything else. She can't imagine speaking at a town meeting, for instance: “I'm amazed that people will just stand up and ask a question. How do you do that?” Yet she is comfortable talking to groups about her comic strip and has no qualms about the intensely revealing nature of memoir. “It's odd. I'm a shy and retiring person, but something compels me to bear my soul like this,” she says.
Bechdel didn't tell her mother and brothers about her book until a year into working on it because she didn't want to be inhibited by how they might respond to her “family tragicomic.” But she made sure to show it to them at various stages and even promised to make changes at their request. “But whenever they asked me to remove something I'd argue with them about why it was important to have it in there,” she says, laughing. “Ultimately I prevailed.”
Bechdel describes her mother as very private but says that she's been very supportive despite her discomfort with having the family history on public display. She says one of her brothers expressed concern about the negative portrayal of their father while the other is simply annoyed that she uses so many big words. Apparently he finds it off-putting, and they even have a bet going related to that. Unfortunately, disclosing its details would skew the results.
Bechdel has been illustrating since childhood. Recently she found something she'd written at age 11 about wanting to do comics when she grew up. But she didn't pursue her forgotten dream until after college, in 1983, when a friend encouraged her after receiving a letter from Bechdel that contained illustrations. It wasn't until 1990 that she quit her day job and she admits that she still has anxiety about whether her career is sustainable. “It always seemed like a really impractical career goal,” she says, adding that she finds the perilous existence nerve-racking at times. “I still worry that I might have to get a job.”
For now at least, Bechdel will continue with her comic strip. And in June she begins her book tour—with stops in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Portland, Seattle, Tucson, New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Northampton, and D.C.—during which the author will be reading along with projected sections of Fun Home.
See more Dykes to Watch Out For at DykesToWatchOutFor.com;
get Fun Home at Amazon.com
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