After a recent reading of one of my nonfiction graphic narratives, a French woman came up to me and called me a vulgarizer of history. In response to my jaw drop, she explained that she was offering me a compliment, not an insult. “You see,” she said, “in French, to vulgarize is a good thing.” I couldn’t believe my ears, so I checked out the Cambridge French-English Dictionary on my phone and lo and behold, up came the following: Vulgariser: verb [transitive] ; rendre compréhensible par tous, to bring within everyone’s reach. For example: vulgariser la science , to bring science within everyone’s reach. Instead of accusing me of making things common or ugly, she was telling me I was making the complicated easy to understand. Accessible, even enjoyable. After years of struggling to define what I do, I knew at last. Je suis un vulgarisateur de l’histoire . I make the complex easy to engage with and understand. I use the form of graphic nonfiction narrative o...
