One Hundred Demons

One Hundred Demons by Linda Barry

The last 24 hours have been a whirlwind of traveling from Baltimore to Philly to Yardley to my parent's house, then back to Reisterstown today.  The one good part is I got a lot of reading done on day one of the project.  I finished One Hundred Demons in a very short amount of time, then moved on to Cat's Cradle, which I'm about 3/4ths of the way through.  But that's for another time.  For now I want to talk about One Hundred Demons.


The premise of One Hundred Demons is interesting.  Linda Barry is a cartoonist, so the book, which she categorizes as 'autobifictionalography,' is a memoir told through a series of comic strips.  Barry read about a painting excercise called One Hundred Demons, where you literally paint demons.  And see what comes out of you.  Each 'chapter' in the book is dedicated to a different demon, something that shaped her life and made her the person she is today (although she doesn't come right out and tell us that, it's pretty apparent that's what's happening here).  The chapters have titles like 'Head Lice and My Worst Boyfriend,' 'The Aswang,' 'Cicadas,' and 'Hate,' and each deals with a different demon.  The stories are not chronological, which I think lends to the power of the book.

From the chapter 'Lost Worlds'

Even though some stories may seem like they are insignificant, each plays an important roll in developing Barry as a character.  It's telling how she draws herself, and the use of comic strips was actually really interesting as a reader.  In 'Lost Worlds' she looks back at childhood kickball games.  Notice how the dialogue of the characters is not directly related to her narration.  While reading the book, I found myself laughing (awkwardly on a train, oops!) at the memories she drags up.  Some are very funny, some hit close to home, and others are painfully sad.  One chapter talks about the suicide of a friend growing up, one hints at possible sexual abuse as a child, others let us see Barry in a self-conscious way, admitting to horrible things she did growing up.  The thing I loved most about the book was that I started to think about my own One Hundred Demons.  What are the things that are haunting me?  What have I done that's wronged people in my past?  How can we learn to live with these demons?

Where Barry really gets it is in a chapter titled 'Magic Lanterns' which is about those things we cling to as children; security blankets, stuffed animals, a toy.  As a self-proclaimed baby blanket extrodinare, I loved this story.  In it, a child looses his stuffed bunny and Barry sees a man in the airport about to throw it away because 'the lost and found is for important things.'  So she takes it home with her, and asks, in the comic, for someone to claim it if it belongs to them.  The reason I loved this story so much is because she takes the idea of security items and ties it into literature, which is what this project is all about.  She asks why we are so moved by stories, what is it that makes us come back to the same stories, or cry at a sad (or happy!) ending, what makes those stories come alive?

In One Hundred Demons, it's the honesty of each chapter.  I could analyze or critically discuss this book for hours and hours, but that's not why it is still floating around in my head, even though I'm on to book 2.  The book makes you really stop and think, and it forces you to reconsider yourself.  And that, Linda Barry, is why we are so moved by stories.