The first of David Heatley’s stories I read was part of an anthology published about four or five years ago. I can’t remember if it was one of those Best American Comics books or the hardbound issue of McSweeney’s filled with indie comics. One thing I do remember is what the story was about. In a few sloppy panels, Heatley told about living with his father after college, sitting on the toilet and wondering what it looks like when he wipes his ass after pooping. Not all of us wonder what this looks like, but I’m sure more of us wonder than would admit it, and Heatley’s honesty immediately struck me as both hilarious and heartbreaking.
In his 2008 full-length graphic memoir My Brain is Hanging Upside Down, Heatley brings this intimate and odd tone to broader subjects. Whether he’s showing us a record of every woman and man he’s had even the most fleeting of sexual encounters with, or if he’s reviewing every one of his favorite hip-hop records, Heatley’s innocence and appreciation for life is always evident. He is our generation’s Harvey Pekar, somewhat more socially well-adjusted, but a singularity just the same. His stories are all realistic and never flinch from sharing the emotional content of everyday life, with all its painfully happy and awkward moments.
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| Portrait of My Dad |
My Brain is Hanging Upside Down is divided into five sections, each very focused on its topic, and all with some overlapping threads of family, sex and music. The first section, Sex History, depicts all of Heatley’s sexual experiences with blinding honesty. His simple, almost childish art makes the graphic sexuality innocent and endearing. Heatley’s panels are like manic sketches of the most intense moments of his life.
Each of the five sections begins with a number of dream stories relating to each topic. The second and fifth sections, Black History and Family History respectively, stick to the format of Sex History, with literal laundry lists of experiences and personalities. Only in sections three and four, Portrait of My Mom and Portrait of My Dad does Heatley allow himself to become expansive and relate separate stories to one another in a less linear manner.
In most of the other sections, Heatley comes off like a typical 80s kid. He’s enamored of hip-hop culture, yet never fully comfortable with it. His sexual freedoms and experimentation seem quaint and almost old-fashioned. Was he ever worried about getting AIDs when he was screwing all these girls and guys at college? He doesn’t tell us. But in the two Portraits we see Heatley’s strange and contradictory parents in a way that helps us understand his paranoia and obsessions in a whole new way. His mother is the reformed hippie who doesn’t know when to stop trying to relate to her kids on their level and just try to be their mother. His father is a bitter hermit who builds train sets in his basement and smiles bitterly at a world that left him behind.
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| Heatley's New Yorker Cover |
So, I’m a fan of all types of comics. I dig Alan Moore and Frank Miller as much as Harvey Pekar and R. Crumb. However, if indie comics aren’t your thing, Heatley is going to seem juvenile and artless. His drawings are all flat, with very little detail. They look like they were scrawled off on notebook paper by a stoned high school kid during study hall. If you’re not into Chris Ware or Kim Deitch, if you prefer Will Eisner’s superhero stuff to his brilliant The Contract with God trilogy, you’re probably not going to be into Heatley. He’s not interested in the fantasy and exploitation of most mainstream comics and though his memoir is certainly for Adults Only, it will not satisfy your little boy prurient interests. Still, it’s fun and funny enough in its weird, jaded way.
The other half of The Bent Spine, Mark Rooster, has been writing surreal autobiographical comics as long as I can remember. His style and sense of humor reminds me of Heatley. If you like My Brain is Hanging Upside Down, be sure to check out Mark’s site, www.markrooster.com.
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