Jimmy Corrigan and Smallness

I find myself enjoying the story of Jimmy's grandfather more than Jimmy's. He experiences the creation of the White City for the Chicago's World Fair. The idea of scale becomes integral during these scenes, as this massive structure is built, and James begins to experience it. His first encounter with the building comes when his friend, Miss McGinty, uses her unclear power to take him to the top of the building. The page is largely shades of blue with thick lines of black in it. James and his friend begin to climb the stairs to reach the top of the structure and James' emotions are always mentioned twice. The written script narrative begins to echo the bubbles that indicate James' thoughts. The bubble says "We'll just go up for a second" while the black box with white script says "They'll just go up for a second." This happens again in the next panel, where the black box says "They'll just go up for a second and then he'll make her leave," and the bubble says "I'll make her leave/I'll make her." Through this text, his unease is felt. The repetition forces a sense of empathy, this is his first time experiencing this, and previously he had been caught by a man who intended to stop James.

The thick, black lines, also aid the feeling of unease. In the first panel, the sheer scale of the structure is apparent by the disappearance of James and Miss McGinty into the background as they take the elevator. They are essentially unseen, the building dominates the panel and the color gives it darkness, though the reader is aware that it is day outside. In the last panel, these lines force perspective, they shoot back into the reader as James ascends the stairs, and you have to look forward towards the outside.

I want to discuss the page immediately following it, as well. It begins with a large "BUT." Then we see James on the roof, with the water behind him and his town before him. The sheer scale of this relates it back to panels preceding it. It's all beautifully rendered, Chris Ware has an eye for detail. The scale of it makes James seem small in both scenes. Ware tends to draw his characters as small people in these vast backgrounds, and the characters lose some detail when they become small, but the detail transfers to the background. This is like the simplicity, or even boringness of the story, juxtaposed with the complexity of reading it.

Smallness permeates the novel, I don't think I can definitively say what it means or what it does. To me, the small characters in their large settings shows, not necessarily a spiritual smallness, but the idea that we are not quite as big as we might think we are. This could explain the depressing Superman references, a large character forced to be small or less super. These vast landscapes with small characters are indicative of often diminutive characters. James is not a confident boy, he doesn't want to go to the roof, and when he does, he becomes small, which seems to be a more accurate representation of him.