Graphic Novel About a "Birthright" Trip to Israel by a Questioning Young New York Women has Real Value

“Graphic novels” are not everyone’s cup of tea, and the humourist in me
longs to suggest that this fairly recent term is actually Yiddish for “comic book.” Novels have been an important part of world literature for several centuries now, and with the stunning exception of artist Art Spiegelman’s Pulitzer-Prize-winning MAUS series (in which Nazis are cats, Jews are mice, and the sheer power and passion of the story allows readers to accept the seemingly-petty premise), they are not high on my reading list. Baby boomers like myself grew up with the Classic Comics series, which were never original, but merely Great Novels and Plays Through History turned deliberately into comic books, read mainly by lazy or illiterate teenagers who couldn’t find the time or energy to sit down with giant tomes of world literature and actually read pages filled with all these endless words.

Then, in late 2010, a young Brooklyn cartoonist, Sarah Glidden, made
her “graphic novel debut” (as her publicity sheet notes proudly) with
How to Understand ISRAEL in 60 Days or Less, a charming, often
challenging, occasionally touching hard-cover with the not-too-cheap
price of $28.99. It hardly changed my attitude toward graphic novels,
nor about the State of Israel, but it is very well done, and has far greater
depth and insight than I had expected.

In seven chapters of, yes, simply-drawn cartoons, this clearly
autobiographical story of a young American’s journey to the Jewish state
reeks of honest reflection and solid thoughts: the 20ish author/artist
hugs her “goy boyfriend” [his words] goodbye as he begs her not to
“come home a raging Zionist.” At the airport, a more assimilated young
Jewish woman is “red-flagged” because she fails to know her Hebrew name,
which is a nice touch—and this promising first “novel” is filled with these.

Examples of the fine depth of this book abound, such as a girlfriend who
is “unsure about safety in Israel”; the wariness of the Birthright
participants as they watch Israeli soldiers who join their tour “as peers,
fearing weak propaganda”; the author shows determination to
understand “the situation” [between Jews and Arabs], which is wise;
and we get such edgy exchanges as such as when the author protests
that the security wall is evil, her left-wing guide protests, “It’s not a prison;
it’s the wall,” while admitting that “it’s a complicated issue, but since
it was built, terrorist attacks in Tel Aviv have dropped from two a week
to four a year”—a fact which I have rarely seen anywhere else.
And as someone who can be critical of many Israeli choices
(and American ones, and Canadian ones), I was impressed that
the same Birthright leader admits to the author, “Much of the wall
was built on private [Arab] land, causing many problems.”

What makes this graphic novel of far greater value than I expected
is the way Ms. Glidden thoughtfully sprinkles mini-histories throughout:
the rebirth of the Hebrew language under Ben Yehuda; the way
the UN forcibly stopped Israel from marching on to Damascus
during the Six Day War; moving descriptions of the growth of Zionism
in the 19th Century with the Dreyfus Trial and the Kishinev Pogrom
as backdrops; a beautiful poem by the great Israeli writer Rachel
about the glory of the Kinneret; one assimilated youth on the trip
admitting, “You ask what I don’t get about Judaism? EVERYTHING!”
We see guides challenged over “the bulldozing of people’s houses,”
we see Purim celebrated, and the State of Israel founded in 1948—
and even the assassination of Prime Minister Rabin. And during
the obligatory visit to Yad Vashem, the author cries out that she
“hates God” over the horrific, outrageous murders of World War II.

Can graphic novels be great literature? Maybe MAUS; possibly
A HISTORY OF VIOLENCE, turned into a wonderful Cronenberg film.
HOW TO UNDERSTAND ISRAEL is far from perfect, but then neither
is the State of Israel and the neighbours so eager to wipe it off the map.
I think this intriguing little—dare I say comic?—book would be an
ideal gift for anyone you know who plans to make his or her first trip
to Israel, regardless of their age, but most especially for teens and
university students. I was impressed with what Ms. Glidden tried
to do with this, and would love to see it in a lower-priced paperback.