One in four books sold in France is a comic book, according to the market research company GfK, and a growing number of those are nonfiction works by journalists and historians.
Last year, they have included titles such as “M.B.S.: Saudi Arabia’s Enfant Terrible,” a biography of Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman by Antoine Vitkine and Christophe Girard; “What Are the Russians Thinking?” based on the cartoonist Nicolas Wild’s conversations about the war in Ukraine during a 2022 trip to Russia; and “Who Profits From Exile?,” by Taina Tervonen and Jeff Pourquié, which looks at the economics of European immigration.
The trend will be in the limelight at the Angoulême International Comics Festival, which is one of the world’s leading comic book gatherings, which starts Thursday in southwestern France and runs through Jan. 28.
Matthieu Vincenot, the manager of Bulles en Tête, a Paris comic bookstore, has watched its nonfiction section grow since the shop opened two years ago. He said:
“We decided to dedicate this section to nonfiction comic books because they’re very popular. The readership is very varied. We get people who are big readers of the news, and others who aren’t so much, and therefore learn about current affairs through comic books because they’re easier to read.”
Though they are booming in France right now, Vincenot pointed out that nonfiction comics are not new and, in fact, originated in the United States. Also known as “comics journalism,” the genre was pioneered by Joe Sacco, a Maltese-American journalist and cartoonist whose book “Palestine” was first published by Fantagraphics in 1993. Based on a 1991 visit by Sacco to Gaza, the book was recently rushed back into print when demand surged after the Hamas attacks of Oct. 7, 2023, and Israel’s ongoing retaliation.
Navkiran Dhaliwal is a seasoned content writer with 10+ years of experience. When she's not writing, she can be found cooking up a storm or spending time with her dog, Rain.