You might know that I’m a fan of the graphic novelist Brecht Evens. The City of Belgium (2021) is his fourth or fifth book and I’ve read and enjoyed all the others to differing extents – from deeply loving to being deeply disturbed, but still recognising his brilliance. The City of Belgium was translated by Evens himself – it was originally published as Les Rigoles, which Google translate tells me means ‘the channels’, but is a venue in Paris. I thought it was originally written in Flemish, so this all gets a bit confusing. Suffice to say, I was delighted to get a review copy of this from the publisher, and I think The City of Belgium is a brilliant title.
The book follows three people on a night – three separate nights out for Jona, Rodolphe, and Victoria, and the various people they meet, interact with, love and loathe. We interweave between them all, with a colour-coding indicating which world we’re in.
Being Evens, these are not quiet, happy nights. His work often includes menace, unhappiness, warped eroticism, and the surreal. But it also includes moments of joy, unexpected connections, and hope. The balance of these elements is what makes an Evens’ book a favourite or not, in my eyes. The Panther went a bit too far into warped territory for me; The Making Of hit the sweet spot.
I think The City of Belgium is perhaps a little to the right of the sweet spot – perhaps not quite enough hope to balance out the despair. We see violence, loneliness, arguments. But then there are pages like this one, showing the humour that Evens threads through any situation.
The story is one thing, but what always draws me back to Evens again and again is his stunning use of colour and form, and his astonishing imagination. Some pages are spare, like the one above – or even more so, even disappearing in a mist. Others are a riot of colour and action, beautifully balanced and judged perfectly. The cover is one example, but sometimes a whole world is going on. You can see more examples in this excellent article, which includes interviews with Evens. The stereotype of graphic novels is still that they look like superhero cartoons – and, while there is a world beyond that, I’ve browsed through a graphic novel shop for hours without finding anyone who uses colour so gently and sensuously as Evens’ watercolours. The meeting of subject matter and technique is particularly striking.
You’ll leave an Evens graphic novel feeling both unsettled and satisfied. Perhaps that isn’t always the combination you’re looking for from a book – but it is a profound mix, and sometimes feels exactly right.