On this day, I remember it like it was yesterday. I’m getting closer to being 30 and I feel as though so much has already happened in my short life. I remember I was on my probably 5th time looking through Franz Masereel’s Passionate Journey. I just find it so invigorating. It just serves as such a powerful social commentary and critique of modern industrialized society. I feel as though I can truly feel the way Masereel depicts the struggles, joys, and tribulations of a certain. When I found out about the Armistice I felt all of those feelings that Masereel showed through his book along with those of relief, celebration, disbelief and a profound sense of loss. I was sitting in my rundown room contemplating my life and thinking how did I end up here. . . mostly looking at that yellow jar in the corner of my room. I had just gotten back from another rooftop gathering after another insufferable class. To think– I thought it was just another normal day but then suddenly a four year war comes to an end. My first thought was- what now? How does this affect me? I flip through Passionate Journey to try to find an image that expresses how I felt in that moment. There was sure to be one that fit as the book carries a strong message of social criticism and highlights the destructive nature of war. His stark black-and-white woodcuts, with their bold lines and stark contrasts, evoke a sense of urgency and emotional intensity within me that I’m not able to shake as there is a cloud of uncertainty rolling in.

I took a few details from chapter 2 of Jason Lutes’s comic like Passionate Journey and a few of his friends and his living situation to add. I wanted to focus more on the contents and what Passionate Journey represented, not only to readers, but also what it stands for in the eyes of Richard. I think the material and the artwork within Masereel’s book was a good representation of how many people including Blunck may have felt when they found out about Armistice. I also researched a little on some of the ways the emotions were described during that time and included those.

Donahue, Neil H. A Companion to the Literature of German Expressionism. Camden House, 2005. 

“Armistice.” National WWI Museum and Memorial, www.theworldwar.org/learn/about-wwi/armistice. Accessed 9 June 2023.