Jun 6, 2012

Weigh In Wednesday #4: Graphic Novel Vs. Traditional Novel!

Weigh In Wednesday is a new weekly meme hosted by Lauren @ Epilogue!

If you'd like to participate, visit this post HERE!


This week's theme: Graphic Novel Vs. Traditional Novel!

Wow, I can't believe it's been almost a month since I've participated in this meme, anyway, I'm back ;) 

I kinda don't know what to pick - although I don't read graphic novels as much as I'd like to, I actually love them & of course I love the traditional novels, I read them all the time ;)  
So, because I read them more, I'll say traditional novels, although I love the graphic novels.   
Why I love graphic novels? 
I've read some graphic novel adaptations of novels I've read & loved, (the last one being Neil Gaiman's Stardust) and I've loved the graphic novels also. I actually find it interesting how the artist or/& the author imagined the characters & the world & how different & what's different from my imagination, but that doesn't destroy my imagined characters &/or world ;) I just like to see different perspective. Someone can describe how he or she imagined a character or a world from a traditional novel, but it's quite different & accurate to see it illustrated. 
For example, (although not quite a graphic novel, but the animation had that graphic novel feel) take it The Tale of the Three Brothers from the Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows - I loved the story & yeah I imagined it different, but it was quite amazing & brilliant adaptation in the movie & that still didn't change the way I saw it while I was reading it again, I still imagine it the way I did before, but the animation is different & quite amazing & I still fell in love with it. I think movies & tv series influence a lot more when it comes to changing the way you see a character or imagine a world, at least if you watched them first instead of reading the book, although I'm quite good at watching them as different things, and they rarely influence me ;) 
Back to the topic, I've also read some original graphic novels & I've loved most of them, some were so funny :) but in the end it's the same as for traditional novels, if I loved the story & the dialogues & of course the illustrations, I love the graphic novel, too. And sometimes they can be so amazing & beautiful. One of the most beautiful illustrated graphic novels I've seen is the adaptation of Peter S. Beagle's The Last Unicorn, I'll say it again, so beautiful. 
Graphic novels I've wanted to read for years are Neil Gaiman's Sandman series, which isn't available as traditional novel(s), and everyone says they're amazing (ok, almost everything from Neil Gaiman is amazing, or at least brilliant - yeah, he's my #1 fav author & I think he's brilliant) so of course those are some I'd love to get & read, but I have no idea when I'l do that, 'cause yeah, they (as usually most of the graphic novels) cost a lot more then regular novels. 
Anyway, I love both, and although I talked & talked about my love for the graphic novels, I'll choose traditional novels, because I read them a lot more, and in the end there's nothing like a good book, at least when it comes to the same story being a traditional novel, graphic novel & movie/tv series - yeah, there are lots of them these days :) but you can still love them all, for me that's the case with Neil Gaiman's Stardust - I've read the novel at least 5 or 6 times, I've also watched (and loved) the movie lots of times (although I read the novel first, and the movie is different, but still didn't destroy the way I imagined the novel) & I loved the graphic novel when I read it a while ago :) 
Ok, this unexpectedly came to be one quite long post, but what about you? I know (or at least guess) that everyone prefers traditional novels, but have you tried graphic novels & what did you thought about them, and if you might have a recommendation, let me know in the comments :)  

3 comments:

  1. Yay! Glad you're back :)

    After reading your reasons for liking graphic novels I have decided to try something new. I already know I don't enjoy just picking up and reading a graphic novel but I think I will try "reading" one that I have already read the original book first. That way I don't have to be confused about following the plotline!

    Thanks :)

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  2. I love both graphic novels and traditional novels and find it hard to have to pick just one of them. But then again I'm from the Netherlands and there's a much bigger tradition in Europe when it comes to graphic novels than there is in America.

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  3. @Lauren: I hope you'll enjoy it, whatever you try it :)

    @Sullivan McPig: Yeah, me, too :) And you know what, I didn't thought about the graphic novels being more popular in Europe, at least because of the biggerer tradition, but that's actually true, I'm also from Europe & I know that :) Just didn't remember ;)

    Thank you both :)

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