Worm: Cuba US Odyssey
cartoonist: Rodriguez Edel
Publisher: Metropolitan Books/Henry Holt and Company
Publication date: November 2023
There is a classic American story about immigration, who leaves his home to the United States for better opportunities, security or freedom. We’ve all heard of it before. It’s as classic as a backyard barbecue burger, and unfortunately as common as the rhetoric used to demonize these same immigrants. Worm: Cuba US Odyssey go through Rodriguez Edel Adding its unique sound to this diversity, beauty, is essentially American storytelling.
Edel Rodriguez is a designer, artist and activist whose work can be found on Time magazine covers as well as on a large number of book covers. When Rodriguez took art as a form of protest, his work was somewhat famous during Trump’s first tenure. One of his most famous works depicts Trump holding the decapitation of Mrs. Liberty and is often found in protests. and wormRodriguez turns this art to tell the story of his childhood and family’s ultimate escape from Cuba, although his career as a visual artist and activist can be felt throughout the book.
The story tells the simple and clear structure of a graphic memoir. We focused on Rodriguez’s childhood and then moved forward with age and eventually left Cuba. The beginning of the book changes the organization. It began with the historical record of the Cuban Revolution. This choice relates many of the tone of the book and the historical moments in which he lives. Often, these moments seem to be overshadowed by editors, fearing that the “general audience” does not understand the historical context of the situation. exist wormThe case, it is more of a setting for Rodriguez’s position on his country of birth. Realistic accounting for the way many people on this island look.
As we have passed through this book, this statement has never been explicitly anti-Kuba, because many American propaganda do not support the communist regime. The book usually opposes a government that treats its most vulnerable people with ridicule, fear and distrust. The story of Rodriguez’s father searching for a camera to make a living, going to a doctor’s journey to get rid of parasites, constantly scrambling for food or medicine, the book makes the book dramatic, crazy energy. The story is spreading moments of family joy, clearly Cuba, but no one can identify it immediately.
As the book progressed, his family decided to leave the country as Castro opened Mariel’s port, and the energy of the book continued to ripple. Rodriguez’s cousin sourcing and the journey to the boat waiting in Florida feels similar to the story of escaping from a war-filled area. Rodriguez accomplishes this skillfully, as the story clearly shows the link between violence that evades actual war and violence that suppresses government. Weight feels right, balanced and fair. At this point in the story, leaving Cuba is the only choice we understand and the only choice left for the Rodriguez family.
Thick black or white gutters throughout the book are also fun. These books are usually filled with writing texts that look similar to comic news or early comics that use gutter space for narratives. Rodriguez’s news background is related to most of the work of the story, which makes sense. This is also a huge connection between the story told and the art. The only difficulty is in the design and narrative of the word balloon. There are several times when it is unclear which conversation is going on for the first time, or the conversation happening is responding to what we read afterwards. These moments are rare, but they are evident in the otherwise tense comics, especially one that pays so close attention to art.
As professional visual artists expect, the art throughout the book is amazing. The drawings sometimes take a propaganda style, but these images are turned to criticizing rather than supporting oppressive regimes. At other times, this work represents the emotions of the characters, their fears or worries, and the events that occur. When it’s a difficult part of the journey, the shadows get darker and when there’s doubt or hiding, things get overshadowed.
Since communism is such a unique focus in the book, it is no surprise that bright reds, as well as camouflage greens, are used throughout the process. Surprisingly, how Rodriguez uses color to connect with Cuban identity in a beautiful way. In most cases, it is easy to see the connection between the color red and everything that happens in the text, such as military members coming to arrest someone from El Gabriel and they are red, while Rodriguez and Rodriguez and his mother do not . The connection between the Communist Party and the military is obvious. However, other times, this color connection is not very clear. Rodriguez’s mother wore a red turban and skirt, and the rest of her clothes were not colored or green stood out. Here, it feels more like the color is a shield than an identity, which is used to stop family suspicion. The entire scene is as red as a sunrise, and when landing in the United States and other times, such as a bicycle, an apple or a flag, painted with the only bright colors used in the book.
This is the most powerful and lasting visual effect Rodriguez uses in the book. It permeates most pages, making pages without red stand out more explicitly. Given the context and internal images of the page, colors treat meaning and presentations as something seductive to memory hazards. This color is gorgeous in use as it constantly plays out the readers’ expectations and understanding of the space. It also shows that things are not as simple as we sometimes want to make. Immigration is difficult, staying away from home is heartbreaking, and standing in the government trying to oppress you is even more complicated.
The last thing I would mention about the use of red is a specific scene later in the book, when adult Rodriguez competed with the undercover police in New York. The use of red here is shocking to do with his childhood experience in Cuba. Instead of making a clear connection between the oppression experienced in New York and the memory in Cuba, he allows art to do it. It’s subtle but clear and gorgeous.
The ending of this book is worthy of shouting, as there is a clear shift in the narrative arc from the story of Rodriguez’s immigration to the United States, as many immigrant memoirs doom, we see Rodriguez Everything that time in the United States does. He has become an artist and visual designer, but the book’s conclusion decides to focus primarily on conversations about the art and resistance he made during Trump’s first president. This move reflects the beginning of the book, which brings us a historical context, and it reflects the historical moments Rodriguez lived in when he created the book. This choice focuses on the way he resists oppression and hatred, which is linked to the way Cuba changes before his birth. Then, the final chapter lets Rodriguez’s father explain the real reason they had to leave Cuba and the resistance his father had shown in Cuba to his present moment, combined in a powerful and prescient way Together.
This ending gives readers the choice of how to drive the trend of fascism, hatred, division and violence. Edel Rodriguez Worm: Cuba US Odysseyprompting us to see the parasites that have entered our blood, slowly meandering and making our legs take over everything. He told us that it was too late to pull it out and we attacked it at its source. This is a story of an American’s life as he tries to understand where he comes from, his family and the responsibilities left behind today. It’s about trying to put family together and losing everything to survive. Now, it has to do with all of us when we look at the failures that have promised to ensure we are safe in the space. It’s about resistance. This is an American story, and some people want to pretend they won’t quit. But Edel Rodriguez’s story is all about us, and he tells it fearlessly. We should listen.
judgment: Buy and resist
Worm: Cuba US Odyssey is now available
Read more Beat comments!
