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36 pages 1 hour read

Dan Santat

A First Time for Everything

Dan SantatNonfiction | Graphic Memoir | Middle Grade | Published in 2023

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Symbols & Motifs

Illustration

Because Dan’s memoir is a graphic novel, its illustrations are central to telling the story, conveying themes, and revealing character development. Dan’s illustration style is emotive, both in how he draws characters’ faces with such detailed expressions and in the shading techniques and color choices he uses. He sticks to the warm side of the color spectrum, except when the scene takes place at night or is a flashback. When Dan is embarrassed about eating all the breadsticks, he emphasizes this through the red on his cheeks and how his mouth curls into a squiggly half grin, showing his embarrassment with only a couple of subtle changes in his appearance. Dan doesn’t rely heavily on comic-style techniques like emanata (symbols or motion lines emanating from characters’ heads or objects for emphasis), reserving these techniques for notable events, like when Amy rides a toboggan in Lucerne. Dan’s style is also less cartoony and leans more toward realism, as is appropriate for a memoir. Since the panels are almost always image dominant, Dan’s illustrations take precedence as the foremost form of communication in his memoir. He has always had a passion for drawing, but it was because of Amy that he finally felt confident enough to share his drawings with the world. Through sharing his talent, Dan takes a big step toward letting go of his inhibitions, which links illustration to the theme of Overcoming Fear to Live in the Moment.

Europe

As the setting for most of the memoir’s events, Europe is the source of the major change that occurs within Dan as he ends middle school and looks ahead to the next phase of his life, initially with fear and later with excitement and anticipation. Dan’s time in Europe thematically supports The Impact of First-Time Experiences since almost everything that happens to Dan is something he has never done before. He sees places he had only read about and meets people from all over the world. His attitude changes from one of dread to one of gratitude and the joy of being alive. His school group travels to four different European countries, each of which presents new beauty and lessons to learn. Dan’s detailed illustrations uniquely honor these places. He has experiences that he would never have had in his own country, and being so far away from home forces him to find his confidence and solve his problems. Dan looks back on his school trip to Europe as one of the fondest memories of his childhood.

“Spring Morning” by A. A. Milne

Best known for his Winnie-the-Pooh series of books, A. A. Milne personally wanted to be known for his poetry, which he considered his best work. Milne’s poem “Spring Morning” explores how life is unpredictable and tends to throw a person in many directions, urging readers to embrace the unknown and the often random nature of life’s path and not worry about where one might end up. Dan chose to include this poem as a motif in his memoir because A First Time for Everything centers around a time in Dan’s life when his attitude toward the unknown began to change. The poem links thematically to his journey because it alludes to Overcoming Fear to Live in the Moment. This message is relatable because people often experience insecurities and fears during adolescence. Dan fears being on his own, getting rejected by girls, and showing other people his drawings, but on the trip, all of this begins to change. With encouragement from friends and teachers, and through his persistence, Dan transforms into a confident person who is eager to speak his mind and see the world and who does not fear what unexpected change may be around the next corner.

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By Dan Santat