Review by Frank Plowright
Alison Bechdel has produced two volumes of memoirs, one looking at each of her parents, and in The Secret to Superhuman Strength she turns the spotlight on herself as she ages. The title is sourced from a lurid ad on the back of a comic, and is perhaps a sarcastic misnomer for what certainly centres on physical pursuits, but largely accompanied by the philosophical and spiritual.
Bechdel recounts how from a very early age she was attracted to the concept of physical improvements, and how exercise has remained a consistent core ever since. She uses various forms to tie together the decades she’s lived accompanied by the idea of exercise somehow being able to prompt a transcendence dispensing with the inner conflicts of her life. How much any reader will take from The Secret to Superhuman Strength depends on how willing they are to follow the long trail Bechdel takes.
It’s a discursive journey encompassing long dead, but influential people who transcended times in which they’d have been viewed as outsiders, interestingly placing them in context. She notes she might have been more engaged by The Rime of the Ancient Mariner in school had she known about Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s eccentricities and how out of step he was with his era. Margaret Fuller is the inspiration referred to most frequently. Unlike the people she notes as influential, we follow Bechdel in times of greater possibilities, and she’s always able to find her niche, persistence a prevailing trait, yet undermined by insecurities. A pattern of private failure accompanying professional success begins early, and a therapist later notes her only ever viewing some matters as states of perfection or worthlessness, which is sad.
Tidiness has always characterised Bechdel’s art, and here there’s a greater precision. The panels aren’t as full as previously, and there are experiments, such as black and white spreads closing each chapter. Having previously worked in monochrome, having Holly Rae Taylor’s watercolour additionally removes this from earlier projects. In places it adds little, and in others it’s essential for definition, an example being a busy full page illustration of events at an early 1980s women only event. Pages dealing with nature are greatly enhanced by the colour.
The Secret to Superhuman Strength is a novel autobiography for encompassing a quest, for constant self-analysis, and for drawing comparisons with the lives of others. That these are people well known in various fields could suggest egotism, but until the 2010s, beyond family, it was only the celebrated whose lives were public currency. Anyone considering their enthusiasms can captivate for a while, but the events that made Bechdel’s life different have been aired in other projects, and while some observations are notable, it leaves this too short on incident to be compelling. It’s only when Bechdel’s life steps into the extraordinary that she begins to captivate fully, and by then the final stretch is approaching.
A superior creator remains a superior creator, so you can dip into The Secret to Superhuman Strength at any point and discover a moment of fascination, but it’s not sustained.
