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Het Amusement
Drie twintigers. De exuberante, paradijselijke grootstad ligt aan hun voeten. Maar Rodolphe zit opgesloten in zijn hoofd, Jona wordt ingehaald door zijn kwalijke reputatie en Victoria wordt beteugeld door een cordon bezorgde vrienden. In deze pulserende mozaïek kruisen ze elkaar, in taxi, restaurant en discotheek, één zwoele zomernacht lang.
336 pages, Hardcover
First published August 29, 2018
69 people are currently reading
1778 people want to read
About the author
Brecht Evens
23 books187 followersBelgian cartoonist Brecht Evens was born in 1986 and studied illustration in Ghent, Belgium. Important mentors were his illustration teacher Goele Dewanckel and cartoonist/comedy coach/zen master Randall Casaer.
His debut comic book, A Delivery from Outer Space, was released in 2005. The slightly melodramatic Vincent was released in 2006, followed in 2007 by a little nocturnal fantasy called Night Animals. The Wrong Place (2009), started out as a graduation project and was a departure from the more typical comic art of his earlier books. It won the Haarlem Comic Festival's Willy Vandersteen Award for best Dutch-language graphic novel, and an award at the Angouleme International Comics Festival. He followed The Wrong Place up with The Making Of (2012) and the many-year-end-best-of-list appearing Panther (2016).
Brecht lives in Paris in a charming and oh so Parisian garret apartment.
His debut comic book, A Delivery from Outer Space, was released in 2005. The slightly melodramatic Vincent was released in 2006, followed in 2007 by a little nocturnal fantasy called Night Animals. The Wrong Place (2009), started out as a graduation project and was a departure from the more typical comic art of his earlier books. It won the Haarlem Comic Festival's Willy Vandersteen Award for best Dutch-language graphic novel, and an award at the Angouleme International Comics Festival. He followed The Wrong Place up with The Making Of (2012) and the many-year-end-best-of-list appearing Panther (2016).
Brecht lives in Paris in a charming and oh so Parisian garret apartment.
Ratings & Reviews
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 245 reviews
August 23, 2021
I think I have rated all of the Brecht Evens books I have read thus far with four stars, mainly because the stories, the narratives, don't quite match the often exhilarating artwork. So I don't know if this is his "best" work that I have read thus far, but I simply have to acknowledge the astonishing visuals in this book, which is otherwise titled/translated as The Entertainment or Amusement (help me out here?) but in English, published by the amazing Drawn & Quarterly, it has the prosaic title The City of Belgium.
Thanks to Moira for posting this in her enthusiastic review, which I borrow:
Brecht Evens posted an impression of his book on YouTube:
https://youtu.be/3uMle0wgGPM
What's it about? Color? A night in the city. Talk. Fluid movement, everywhere. If we all could afford it, this should be a very, very large oversized book format, because I had to peer in closely to read the handwritten lettering of all the talk, and to see the sometimes cramped night life-focused space, to see all that was going on. Oh, this is what it is like in a bar at night on a weekend, where we see tables of talkers, we hear snippets of conversation. Fun!
The focus is on three people who have fun and also get involved in violent criminal activity and mix drugs with their excessive drinking. Then some of it feels surreal, fun, nightmarish, at turns, drug and alcohol-induced. Wonderful watercolor fantasy, moving, moving, a sense of visual noise, amidst bursts of light, crowds of people, a dream?
If you like coherent narrative, if that is your standard for art/literature, you might be frustrated, as I initially was in reading this, but if you let go of the need to hold on to the railing and raise your hands in the air and ride this rollercoaster, you will admire it for the way it conveys one night with lots of noise and talk and fun and excess.
Thanks to Moira for posting this in her enthusiastic review, which I borrow:
Brecht Evens posted an impression of his book on YouTube:
https://youtu.be/3uMle0wgGPM
What's it about? Color? A night in the city. Talk. Fluid movement, everywhere. If we all could afford it, this should be a very, very large oversized book format, because I had to peer in closely to read the handwritten lettering of all the talk, and to see the sometimes cramped night life-focused space, to see all that was going on. Oh, this is what it is like in a bar at night on a weekend, where we see tables of talkers, we hear snippets of conversation. Fun!
The focus is on three people who have fun and also get involved in violent criminal activity and mix drugs with their excessive drinking. Then some of it feels surreal, fun, nightmarish, at turns, drug and alcohol-induced. Wonderful watercolor fantasy, moving, moving, a sense of visual noise, amidst bursts of light, crowds of people, a dream?
If you like coherent narrative, if that is your standard for art/literature, you might be frustrated, as I initially was in reading this, but if you let go of the need to hold on to the railing and raise your hands in the air and ride this rollercoaster, you will admire it for the way it conveys one night with lots of noise and talk and fun and excess.
June 18, 2022
Most beautiful and exciting book of the year so far by far. I bought this in the self-congratulatory spirit of let’s-support-our-local-comix-shop – this is the shop –
and okay it did look quite colourful and jazzy and interesting but I wasn’t expecting the floor to fall away almost immediately in a very Gaspar Noe Enter the Void kind of way
but it did
IS THERE A STORY THOUGH?
Yes. But wait!
THE THREE CATEGORIES OF GREAT GRAPHIC NOVELS
1) The ones where the story is the thing and the art is the quirky or endearing or just serviceable machinery to deliver it. This would be Alison Bechdel
Guy DeLisle
And that fun guy Derf Backderf
2) Ordinary Perfection. This is where the art isn’t original at all, it’s just exquisite. Story and art in complete harmony. This would be
Adrian Tomine
Or Will McPhail
3) The artists who it seems out of nowhere magic an original style that transforms our vision as we read. In some of these cases the story is left far behind or is twisted into unrecognisable forms
Junji Ito
Chris Ware
Anna Mull in Square Eyes
Richard McGuire in Here
Shaun Tan in The Arrival
So The City of Belgium is in this rarefied category.
THE STORY
Is about three characters who don’t know each other. They are out for a night on the tiles in the big bad city. They are young and they have problems. They have dangerous friends (one of whom is frightening – and hilarious). Although the art is OVERWHELMING this is a dialogue-crammed book and the dialogue is funny too – here is Victoria’s friend having difficulty getting Victoria to pick a club they could go to
World Cafe?
Too much drum 'n' bass. Too many hats.
The Roosevelt Room?
That's a cocktail bar.
And you don't like cocktails?
I don't like the cocktail crowd.
The Hotsi-Totsi is open...
Boys with scarves yelling their poetry in your ear.
There’s a strong seen-too-much the world-is-my-oyster-but-it’s-only-a-shell feel to these lives. With Victoria Joni Mitchell’s People’s Parties is the soundtrack
One minute she's so happy
Then she's crying on someone's knee
Saying laughing and crying
You know it's the same release
Or maybe the Stones, 19th Nervous Breakdown
Center of a crowd, talking much too loud, running up and down the stairs
Well, it seems to me that you have seen too much in too few years
And though you've tried you just can't hide your eyes are edged with tears
That’s just her, there are two other lovely appalling characters we are following. Round and round, in and out of taxis, through the thronged streets, elbowing the tiresome revelers to one side, clutching a bottle of Nolet’s Reserve, and fumbling for a bent credit card to try to eke out another twinkling trickle of euphoria before the horror of dawn and the new day arrives like a month in jail, our three lost souls teeter on the edge of bliss, or rage, or disintegration. Just another Saturday night in the great metropolis.
and okay it did look quite colourful and jazzy and interesting but I wasn’t expecting the floor to fall away almost immediately in a very Gaspar Noe Enter the Void kind of way
but it did
IS THERE A STORY THOUGH?
Yes. But wait!
THE THREE CATEGORIES OF GREAT GRAPHIC NOVELS
1) The ones where the story is the thing and the art is the quirky or endearing or just serviceable machinery to deliver it. This would be Alison Bechdel
Guy DeLisle
And that fun guy Derf Backderf
2) Ordinary Perfection. This is where the art isn’t original at all, it’s just exquisite. Story and art in complete harmony. This would be
Adrian Tomine
Or Will McPhail
3) The artists who it seems out of nowhere magic an original style that transforms our vision as we read. In some of these cases the story is left far behind or is twisted into unrecognisable forms
Junji Ito
Chris Ware
Anna Mull in Square Eyes
Richard McGuire in Here
Shaun Tan in The Arrival
So The City of Belgium is in this rarefied category.
THE STORY
Is about three characters who don’t know each other. They are out for a night on the tiles in the big bad city. They are young and they have problems. They have dangerous friends (one of whom is frightening – and hilarious). Although the art is OVERWHELMING this is a dialogue-crammed book and the dialogue is funny too – here is Victoria’s friend having difficulty getting Victoria to pick a club they could go to
World Cafe?
Too much drum 'n' bass. Too many hats.
The Roosevelt Room?
That's a cocktail bar.
And you don't like cocktails?
I don't like the cocktail crowd.
The Hotsi-Totsi is open...
Boys with scarves yelling their poetry in your ear.
There’s a strong seen-too-much the world-is-my-oyster-but-it’s-only-a-shell feel to these lives. With Victoria Joni Mitchell’s People’s Parties is the soundtrack
One minute she's so happy
Then she's crying on someone's knee
Saying laughing and crying
You know it's the same release
Or maybe the Stones, 19th Nervous Breakdown
Center of a crowd, talking much too loud, running up and down the stairs
Well, it seems to me that you have seen too much in too few years
And though you've tried you just can't hide your eyes are edged with tears
That’s just her, there are two other lovely appalling characters we are following. Round and round, in and out of taxis, through the thronged streets, elbowing the tiresome revelers to one side, clutching a bottle of Nolet’s Reserve, and fumbling for a bent credit card to try to eke out another twinkling trickle of euphoria before the horror of dawn and the new day arrives like a month in jail, our three lost souls teeter on the edge of bliss, or rage, or disintegration. Just another Saturday night in the great metropolis.
August 30, 2021
Oh my god, what a stunning, glorious, lurid immersion of a book.
Here is the story of one night in an unnamed European city (according to the author: a bit of Paris, a bit of Berlin, a bit of Brussels). We follow three main characters through their various evenings and on through til sunrise — drunken debauchery, drug-fueled excess, eating and dancing and reveling and despairing through the most vivid depictions of urban nightlife I have ever seen on any page.
Everyone's story begins at the same restaurant, for which Evens apparently made a detailed floor plan, down to each person sitting at each table and what they're talking about, even though most of them we will never see or hear. Our ensemble focuses on three strangers: Jona, a designer and lifelong Belgian who is moving to Berlin in the morning to join his beautiful bride; Rodolphe, a charismatic partier who seems to have lost his, uh, groove; and Vic, a lovely and troubled young woman out with her overprotective sister, her ex, and his new girlfriend. Each character reveals themselves slowly, as the night seethes around them, providing endless opportunities for adventures and mistakes, howling joy and overwhelming despair. Though none of the three ever quite meet, each can often be glimpsed in the background of someone else's story, the way city nightlife so often feels: no matter how expansive, it's always the same faces at the same bars and the same parties, making these dense urban centers seem like the smallest towns in the world.
There is just so much that happens in these hundreds of pages — Jona accidentally running into a passel of all the friends who said they were too busy to see him on his last night in town, Rodolphe carting an economy-sized package of toilet paper throughout the city, Vic receiving perfectly timed hypnosis from a gorgeous masked stripper, Rodolphe regaining his magic on the dancefloor and transforming into a manic satyr, Jona receiving a tableside handjob, Vic disappearing under a table, Rodolphe delivering a fiery speech on the prow of a boat as his hair literally catches fire, Jona being accosted and fed drugs by clearly the worst friend he has, Vic's sister calling the cops on her, Jona's terrible friend kicking a dog and being forcibly removed from multiple establishments, Rodolphe taking an ill-advised predawn plunge into the ocean, and on and on and on and on.
Each mini cast of characters careens through the city for hours and hours, through raves and dive bars and dance clubs and gritty streets. At various points, everyone takes a turn in the backseat of a Scheherazade-like gender-nonconforming cabbie, who spins them each their own yarn about the plastic skeleton hanging from the rearview mirror as they are spun through the electrifying city in pursuit of more and more adventures. When the sun comes up, no one is where they expected to be. The book ends in an all-encompassing fog, both literally and figuratively.
And I haven't even come to the art itself, which is perhaps the most incredible art I've ever seen in a graphic novel. Page after page seething, brimming, bursting with light and color and gyration, as dizzying to look at as if you were careening, yourself, drunk and young and wild, through an explosively vibrant city all night long. Plus each character's speech is rendered in its own color, and the text moves just as vigorously and sinuously as the images do, yanking your eyes hither and thither across the spreads, breathless to follow every twist and turn.
This is just such a stunning thrill through and through. I can't even fathom how long it must have taken to make a book like this, an overwhelmingly lush maximalist masterpiece, a delight in really every way for an urban devotée like me.
Here is the story of one night in an unnamed European city (according to the author: a bit of Paris, a bit of Berlin, a bit of Brussels). We follow three main characters through their various evenings and on through til sunrise — drunken debauchery, drug-fueled excess, eating and dancing and reveling and despairing through the most vivid depictions of urban nightlife I have ever seen on any page.
Everyone's story begins at the same restaurant, for which Evens apparently made a detailed floor plan, down to each person sitting at each table and what they're talking about, even though most of them we will never see or hear. Our ensemble focuses on three strangers: Jona, a designer and lifelong Belgian who is moving to Berlin in the morning to join his beautiful bride; Rodolphe, a charismatic partier who seems to have lost his, uh, groove; and Vic, a lovely and troubled young woman out with her overprotective sister, her ex, and his new girlfriend. Each character reveals themselves slowly, as the night seethes around them, providing endless opportunities for adventures and mistakes, howling joy and overwhelming despair. Though none of the three ever quite meet, each can often be glimpsed in the background of someone else's story, the way city nightlife so often feels: no matter how expansive, it's always the same faces at the same bars and the same parties, making these dense urban centers seem like the smallest towns in the world.
There is just so much that happens in these hundreds of pages — Jona accidentally running into a passel of all the friends who said they were too busy to see him on his last night in town, Rodolphe carting an economy-sized package of toilet paper throughout the city, Vic receiving perfectly timed hypnosis from a gorgeous masked stripper, Rodolphe regaining his magic on the dancefloor and transforming into a manic satyr, Jona receiving a tableside handjob, Vic disappearing under a table, Rodolphe delivering a fiery speech on the prow of a boat as his hair literally catches fire, Jona being accosted and fed drugs by clearly the worst friend he has, Vic's sister calling the cops on her, Jona's terrible friend kicking a dog and being forcibly removed from multiple establishments, Rodolphe taking an ill-advised predawn plunge into the ocean, and on and on and on and on.
Each mini cast of characters careens through the city for hours and hours, through raves and dive bars and dance clubs and gritty streets. At various points, everyone takes a turn in the backseat of a Scheherazade-like gender-nonconforming cabbie, who spins them each their own yarn about the plastic skeleton hanging from the rearview mirror as they are spun through the electrifying city in pursuit of more and more adventures. When the sun comes up, no one is where they expected to be. The book ends in an all-encompassing fog, both literally and figuratively.
And I haven't even come to the art itself, which is perhaps the most incredible art I've ever seen in a graphic novel. Page after page seething, brimming, bursting with light and color and gyration, as dizzying to look at as if you were careening, yourself, drunk and young and wild, through an explosively vibrant city all night long. Plus each character's speech is rendered in its own color, and the text moves just as vigorously and sinuously as the images do, yanking your eyes hither and thither across the spreads, breathless to follow every twist and turn.
This is just such a stunning thrill through and through. I can't even fathom how long it must have taken to make a book like this, an overwhelmingly lush maximalist masterpiece, a delight in really every way for an urban devotée like me.
June 21, 2022
L’un des plus beaux romans graphiques qu’il m’ait été donné de lire. C’est riche, c’est déjanté, c’est magnifiquement coloré. Que l’histoire se déroule en une seule nuit ajoute encore au charme. Je quitte ces pages avec l’impression d’avoir veillé en ville pour faire la fête, pré-pandémie. Ça faisait un bail.
Je prends note de garder un œil sur ce que fait Brecht Evens, que je ne connaissais pas vraiment jusqu'à aujourd'hui, autrement que d'avoir longtemps eu l'intention de lire Les Rigoles, justement.
Je prends note de garder un œil sur ce que fait Brecht Evens, que je ne connaissais pas vraiment jusqu'à aujourd'hui, autrement que d'avoir longtemps eu l'intention de lire Les Rigoles, justement.
August 26, 2024
Vienas gražiausių gyvenime skaitytų komiksų – spalvos, scenos, figūrų plastiškumas... Kiekvieną puslapį būtų galima kabinti ant sienos arba studijuoti, kaip čia padaryta ir kodėl. Iš kelių lengvai persidengiančių personažų perspektyvų atskleidžiamas vakarėlinimo spindesys ir skurdas.
Man atrodo, vizualinė medija šiaip yra įtaigesnė, taigi autoriai turi įdėti papildomų pastangų, kad minties perdavimas nevirstų pamokslavimu. Tai šioje knygoje labai nudžiugino nepamokslaujantis jos pobūdis (na, gal tik pats galas nuėjo ton pusėn), manau, prie to prisidėjo ir puikiai parašyti dialogai.
Nu žodžiu, labai patiko, labai rekomenduoju!
Man atrodo, vizualinė medija šiaip yra įtaigesnė, taigi autoriai turi įdėti papildomų pastangų, kad minties perdavimas nevirstų pamokslavimu. Tai šioje knygoje labai nudžiugino nepamokslaujantis jos pobūdis (na, gal tik pats galas nuėjo ton pusėn), manau, prie to prisidėjo ir puikiai parašyti dialogai.
Nu žodžiu, labai patiko, labai rekomenduoju!
June 18, 2021
Wow. Just...wow. This absolutely blew me away in ways I couldn't even begin to describe, but I'll do my best. An absolute masterpiece in visual storytelling, the kind of undeniably accomplished, fully realized creation you find yourself staring at and wondering "how the fuck did a mere human being create this?!", Brecht Evens' The City of Belgium grabbed me by the collar with no warning and held me hostage in it's feverishly beautiful, terrifyingly wonderful world of nightmarish excess for four days. Yes, it took me four days to read this graphic novel, simply because I felt so overloaded by sensation in a way I have rarely felt reading, listening to, or watching anything before, that I felt it necessary to stretch this experience out for as long as I could.
And how appropriate an anecdote that makes for a story taking place over the course of one drug/sex/alcohol fueled, ego driven night taken to dangerous levels of debauchery with hefty doses of severe mental health issues and deeply questionable morality. The kind of night you that leaves you endlessly chasing any and all forms of sensation, anything to keep you away from your self and your problems for just a few hours longer. But what happens when the sun rises and the world resumes itself and you find yourself covered in puke and blood, and starved of all meaning? Do you look for your shoes and admit you need to try to do better tomorrow? Or do you follow the feverish colours of the city and dance nakedly towards it's enticing mania for just one more night...
And how appropriate an anecdote that makes for a story taking place over the course of one drug/sex/alcohol fueled, ego driven night taken to dangerous levels of debauchery with hefty doses of severe mental health issues and deeply questionable morality. The kind of night you that leaves you endlessly chasing any and all forms of sensation, anything to keep you away from your self and your problems for just a few hours longer. But what happens when the sun rises and the world resumes itself and you find yourself covered in puke and blood, and starved of all meaning? Do you look for your shoes and admit you need to try to do better tomorrow? Or do you follow the feverish colours of the city and dance nakedly towards it's enticing mania for just one more night...
October 17, 2018
Oogverblindend, verbluffend, geraakt, geëmotioneerd, mij herkend. Dat vat het wel zo'n beetje samen voor dit boek.
Het Amusement, één stad - één nacht en drie mensen, verdwaald in hun eigen leven. Het hele boek is één groot kleurrijk psychedelisch stuk kunst, ik heb me vergaapt aan de beelden, de details, het is Brecht Evens in zijn overtreffende trap!
Op YouTube plaatste Brecht Evens een impressie van zijn boek:
https://youtu.be/3uMle0wgGPM
Het Amusement, één stad - één nacht en drie mensen, verdwaald in hun eigen leven. Het hele boek is één groot kleurrijk psychedelisch stuk kunst, ik heb me vergaapt aan de beelden, de details, het is Brecht Evens in zijn overtreffende trap!
Op YouTube plaatste Brecht Evens een impressie van zijn boek:
https://youtu.be/3uMle0wgGPM
December 11, 2021
Another superb graphic novel from Brecht Evens. He has a great ear for naturalistic dialogue and combines it with a pallet of various styles of art to great effect
November 3, 2022
Grandioso, de una belleza lunática apabullante.
February 25, 2023
I dabble in graphic novels occasionally, but I'd dabble a lot more if they were all as good as "The City of Belgium."
I recently read Belgian cartoonist Brecht Evens' The Wrong Place which didn't have a story to match the impressive visuals. That's not the case here. "The City of Belgium" is visually stunning, and the story does those visuals justice.
This is a graphic novel but you can hear it as well — and it's loud. Bright colors, flashing lights, larger-than-life characters — but it's a noisy book about the importance of taking time to pause and reflect on what a privilege it is to be alive, and a reminder to tune out the noise and focus on what really matters.
If you're graphic novel curious at all, I'd recommend this as a great introduction to the format. But just be warned that, unfortunately, they're not all this good.
I recently read Belgian cartoonist Brecht Evens' The Wrong Place which didn't have a story to match the impressive visuals. That's not the case here. "The City of Belgium" is visually stunning, and the story does those visuals justice.
This is a graphic novel but you can hear it as well — and it's loud. Bright colors, flashing lights, larger-than-life characters — but it's a noisy book about the importance of taking time to pause and reflect on what a privilege it is to be alive, and a reminder to tune out the noise and focus on what really matters.
If you're graphic novel curious at all, I'd recommend this as a great introduction to the format. But just be warned that, unfortunately, they're not all this good.
December 2, 2018
Een razende cocktail van beelden en stemmen die de lezer naar adem doet happen als was het een natte dweil in en over het gezicht. Centraal staan flinterdunne façades die onder invloed van drank en drugs afbladderen tot de monumentale ruïnes die erachter schuil gaan bloot komen te liggen als zenuwbanen in een oude, diepe wonde. Zelden een werk gelezen waarin vorm en inhoud elkaar zo versterken. Deze zal nog even nazinderen.
September 18, 2021
The art is beautiful and very intricate, the artist has a way to convey motion that’s pretty original. The layout is also multilayered and not always linear
However as much as I like his art this book was dense and overwhelming, I would have liked more spacing and less heaviness in the details. It also didn’t help that I didn’t like any of the characters in this book
However as much as I like his art this book was dense and overwhelming, I would have liked more spacing and less heaviness in the details. It also didn’t help that I didn’t like any of the characters in this book
November 6, 2024
What the "Nighttown" section of Ulysses is to modernist literature, what The Night Is Short, Walk on Girl and After Hours are to cinema, this rich and vibrant masterpiece is to comics.
December 22, 2022
The art is fantastic, but the story and characters...not my favorite. I was going to quit reading it and left it sitting for about a week, the idea of continuing to read it did not appeal to me at all, but I decided to pick it up and finish it before returning it to the library.
The art is really wonderful and unique - if I were basing my review on art alone I would give it 5 stars. I didn't feel that there was a strong plot or any real story line to this, it just kind of...goes. And the story, whatever story there is, just ends abruptly. The characters are not likable at all, none of them - which made this more difficult to push through.
The art is really wonderful and unique - if I were basing my review on art alone I would give it 5 stars. I didn't feel that there was a strong plot or any real story line to this, it just kind of...goes. And the story, whatever story there is, just ends abruptly. The characters are not likable at all, none of them - which made this more difficult to push through.
October 28, 2018
Un roman graphique somptueux ! Chaque page est une merveilleuse surprise où l'on peut se perdre pendant de longues minutes. Les dessins et les couleurs nous emmènent dans une nouvelle dimension propre à Brecht Evens. Le scénario est inventif, original et cohérent tout en incohérence. Un roman graphique à lire et relire afin de saisir les milliers de petits détails qu'il regorge.
August 18, 2023
I hand-lettered the English edition of this weighty tome! I can definitely recommend this book unreservedly… A moving and surprising look at party people, panic attacks, and the power of storytelling.
May 18, 2024
Wowowowowowoowowowowowow.
Un de mes livres préférés.
Baron Samedi était tellement bien écrit et décrit. Jonah et sa relation avec Buzz wow. La fin incroyable!
Un de mes livres préférés.
Baron Samedi était tellement bien écrit et décrit. Jonah et sa relation avec Buzz wow. La fin incroyable!
August 19, 2024
Niesamowicie narysowany komiks. Kiedy myślisz, że już wiesz, co cię czeka nagle okazuje się, że autora stać na więcej.
February 5, 2021
"Jest zabawa" to Brecht Evens w najpełniejszej, najbardziej intrygującej i najciekawszej odsłonie. Już "Pantera" była czymś niezwykłym, niejednoznacznym i szalenie niepokojącym, ale dopiero bogactwo najnowszego komiksu pokazuje jaki potencjał skrywa ta twórczość. Zaczyna się niewinnie, banalne rozmowy, stopniowe poznawanie bohaterów, luźne barowe gadki. Z czasem w kwestii dialogów wiele się nie zmieni, choć robi się coraz bardziej emocjonalnie, a w końcówce wręcz filozoficznie. "Jest zabawa" to z jednej strony afirmacja nocnego życia, zatłoczonych barów, klubów, wielkomiejskiej wrzawy i zabawy, a z drugiej świadectwo kryzysu. Żaden z bohaterów nie jest do końca sobą, każdy kogoś udaje i każdy jest na swój sposób żałosny. Plątając się między dążeniem do przyjemności, chęcią odcięcia się od przeszłości i szukaniem swojego miejsca w całym tym bałaganie, bohaterowie są całkowicie pogubieni. Pretensjonalna końcówka to celowa gra z czytelnikiem, wieńcząca groteskową i wielowymiarową całość. Komiksowi towarzyszy niezwykła oprawa graficzna. To co dzieje się w sferze wizualnej to prawdziwy majstersztyk. Wydaje się, że w operowaniu kolorami, tworzeniu niecodziennych perspektyw czy wielowątkowych kadrów Evens doszedł do perfekcji i trudno będzie to przeskoczyć nawet jemu samemu. Charakterystyczny styl przy jednoczesnej różnorodności tych grafik to niewątpliwie znak firmowy autora, a sam komiks to według mnie najlepsza rzecz wydana w Polsce w 2020.
May 24, 2022
Le doy dos estrellas porque el libro es una pasada visualmente. Sin embargo, no es lo que esperaba. Creo que el título está mal traducido: “Amusement” no es exactamente “jolgorio”, puede serlo, pero no en este caso. Es un comic sobre las sombras y las catacumbas de la noche, con mucho color pero no ilustra exactamente algo que me apetezca mirar. Creo que “jolgorio” tiene otra connotación y “amusement” sí que encaja con el juego ácido de palabras.
December 22, 2025
Party Hoppin' with Brecht Evens is so much fun! And Beautiful!
I did a short appreciation video : https://youtu.be/iz22VN3g5Fg
March 15, 2020
Heerlijke wervelwind van kleur, een roes van begin tot eind. Aanrader, je komt ogen tekort!
April 26, 2020
Mind-bending multicoloured trip
August 8, 2021
A sad and beautiful story that reminded me of Céline and modernist literature more than about any comic book I’ve read. With mesmerizing imagery.
September 1, 2024
Opasły, psychodeliczny tom malowany farbami wodnymi, którego lektura jest równie wyczerpująca jak przetrwanie całej długiej imprezowej nocy na mieście, pełnej wszystkich możliwych substancji i uciech. Książka przytłacza zmysły, trudno przyswoić tę całą kakofonię barw, kształtów i słów. Stylistyka jest niepowtarzalna, mnogość pomysłów i szczegółów oszałamia, a niektóre strony (chciałoby się powiedzieć: niektóre obrazy) zachwycają. Fabuła o przeplatających się losach trójki bohaterów zagubionych pośród tej całej upojności jakby zostaje w tyle za formą, tylko że ta forma jak najbardziej jest treścią. Jak na komiks to jest lektura długa, albo wręcz bardzo długa, tym bardziej, że czasami naprawdę trzeba odłożyć książkę wskutek przebodźcowania. Tym bardziej, że dialogi - pisane różnymi krojami i kolorami, czasem bełkotliwe, czasem zabawne, a przy tym świetnie, kozacko przetłumaczone przez Olgę Niziołek - także bywają wyzwaniem. Jednocześnie wchłaniająca i trudna w odbiorze, dość wyjątkowa rzecz.
August 6, 2021
The story is basically intertwined adventures of a bunch of people navigating the night and getting up to all sorts of trouble with a very friendly taxi driver but ultimately you'll be drawn in by the stunning art. Lots to pour over and enjoy and let yourself be taken away by the colours.
June 26, 2021
Als je ooit een boek zou moeten lezen alleen al voor de graphics dan is het deze jongens xx
Read
November 28, 2021Genuinely stunning!
December 23, 2025
Comic increíble. Visualmente, Brecht Evens trata el color como nadie.
Hay páginas que son obras de arte en sí mismas, con ecos del cubismo y del surrealismo.
Y narrativamente, es super interesante cómo trenza tred historias de personajes al borde del colapso psíquico en una sola noche. Un comic único
Hay páginas que son obras de arte en sí mismas, con ecos del cubismo y del surrealismo.
Y narrativamente, es super interesante cómo trenza tred historias de personajes al borde del colapso psíquico en una sola noche. Un comic único
August 6, 2024
No one does pages like Evens.
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