Safe Area Gorazde

Joe Sacco

Titles which don't seem to fit the medium are always irresistible. When you hear that someone has written a comic strip (though I think the term "graphic novel" is preferred) version of the events in Gorazde in the 1990s it's bound to make you want to investigate, at the very least. And the title strikes such a strange note. Sacco chooses - instead of countless alternatives - a truly technical title. It's now long forgotten but there was intense debate at the time the protection (such as it was) for the muslim population of Srebrenica, Zepa and Gorazde was being arranged by the UN. It was argued that the original choice of "safe haven" placed too onerous an obligation on the UN. So "safe area" was favoured for its legal vagueness.

Of course the description Safe Area Gorazde was a Balkan oxymoron. Sacco's visits to the town in 1995 and 1996 took place at a time Serbs were besieging towns like Gorazde. Sacco was able, as a foreign national, to come and go via the so called "blue road" opened up by the UN convoys. The route was blocked to local muslims. Inside overcrowded Gorazde there was no power or running water. The defences could fail at any time and - though it never happened - the Serbs could have overrun the place and slaughtered the inhabitants.

The advantage of handling this kind of material in a graphic novel is the contrast between the pop style format and the heavy duty content. There's another advantage too. I've visited fucked up countries and there's a problem you have to deal with. You're better dressed, better fed and you're on better wheels than the local population. The language you speak and the passport you carry are prized. Back home you're a nobody but here you're extraordinary. So I like the way Sacco draws himself into almost every frame in the book, not as the hero of the blue road in the cool jeans but as the idiot cartoonist in the crap specs.

I don't buy new books any more. Not now there's ebay. But when Safe Area Gorazde comes up for sale on ebay (rarely) it does good business and what's the point of books on ebay unless you're getting them for next to nothing? Thankfully there's still gift certificates, amazon and Jim Hake.