Another Way To Watch

Shaun Tan is a famous Australian picturebooks artist.His work is famous for the innovation of narrative form and the complexity of the theme,which poses a challenge to the convention of children's picturebooks.This article focuses on the narrative language,and believes that picture plays an important role.This is not only because it exerts its own expertise,but also because it becomes an element that connects all levels of his creation.As a kind of narrative language,picture can be analyzed from technique,meaning,discourse,etc.just like text.First,examine the characteristics of the graphic language formed by Tan within his own scope.It reveals Tan's special use of pictures in terms of consciousness of creation and expression of his works.Tan believes that picture and word carry two different ways of thinking and represent different perspectives on reality.Through collage,surreal images,and extreme proportions,his pictures can convey their own perspective.Then,graphic language is put back to the specific works for discussion,revealing their necessity for Tan's creation,which means appropriateness between pictures and the objects of the works.Taking The Red Tree,Cicada,and The Arrival as examples,analyzes how the graphic narratives represent the role that cannot describe the state of self in words.Among them,the text restrains the narrative function,while the picture creates ambiguity with surreal metaphors,and puts the reader in a subject state similar to the protagonist.Finally,the works are further placed in the historical and cultural environment in which they are located,and they are found to be related to the Australian children's literature and adult literature traditions in terms of image,theme,background,etc.It is pointed out that Tan's originality comes from the graphic narrative,whose complex and changeable perspectives may contain a more mature post-colonial vision.Thus,the unity of Tan's creation can be manifested,and they provide enlightenment of "watching" on different levels.