If you’re looking for a piece of media that truly aces the Bechdel Test, the comic Dykes to Watch Out For is perfect. Written and illustrated by Alison Bechdel, DTWOF was one of the longest running queer comics from 1983-2008. It is the original home of the Bechdel Test and one of the first mainstream representations of the lesbian community. Starting as one-off strips, the comic was later picked up by popular queer and alternative newspapers at the time. This allowed for weekly instalments of the comic, opening it up to the wider queer community. Alison Bechdel is an American cartoonist, writing and drawing about her experiences as a queer person. She is best known for the comics DTWOF but more recently gained popularity for Fun Home, the musical adaptation of her graphic memoir under the same name.
Bechdel’s comics are known for their political edge, refusing to shy away from controversial topics. Following witty and emotional story lines of a tight-nit friend group in New York, it proudly depicted an accurate, though heightened, picture of contemporary Lesbian experiences. Though the art in graphic novels can often be overlooked, compared to fine art, Bechdel’s style is an essential part of the comic. The black and white drawings highlight her complex line work, and subtle expressions. The apparent simplicity and easy, effortless flow of each panel into a cohesive whole betrays the effort it must have took to produce something of its calibre. The scenes overflow with movement and texture, making them come alive to the reader and creating stories that are easy to engage with. The illustrations sticking to a black and white format makes the characters universal, appealing to a wider audience, while not shying away from depicting real queer women. She celebrates butch and androgynous lesbians in a way that can still be considered revolutionary. Popular media continues to shy away from presenting more masculine women, commonly showing a ’palatable’ version of lesbians. Bechdel’s comics show characters with buzzcuts and “men’s” clothing, unapologetically being themselves and not afraid to take up space.
DTWOF came out in a time before iconic series such as the L Word or movies like But, I’m a Cheerleader. It is hard for us to appreciate how important and impactful this comic must have been in the 80’s. Interviews in the New York Times detail stories of older lesbians who found the comic in their 20’s, patiently waiting each week to see the new addition. They explained how it felt like an adult representation of what being queer is like, something to see beyond their own community of other 20-year-old lesbians. Other stories detailed experiences of 50 year old lesbians who had found the comic later in life. They explained how if they had seen works like this in their 20’s, which normalised and celebrated being a lesbian, it would have changed the trajectory of their lives. The strip named ‘Get over it and go pee’ that came out in 1995, shows the main character Mo apprehensive to use the bathroom with her friend who is transgender. Mo’s friend Lois calls her out on this simply stating to ‘Get over it and go pee, or we’ll leave without you’. Bechdel effortlessly includes and supports transgender people in her comics, showing how we have been having the same, simply solved debates for years.
The diverse cast in these comics shows how art can help us make sense of our identities. While some may see DTWOF as a simple comic, it truly opened a window into the lesbian community and continues to do so. Seeing ourselves and experiences in art allows us to move and grow, and more deeply understand the experiences of others. From Sappho’s poetry to Keith Haring’s paintings, art has been essential to the queer community, allowing our voices and symbols to enter the mainstream and reach a wider audience. Seeing our experiences reflected back at us allows us to put them into words and further accept, and love, who we are. If we continue to fail the queer community by trying to appeal to heteronormative standards, even the loudest voices will continue to be silenced.
Reading the strips of DTWOF from almost 40 years ago, it is funny to see how many of the tropes of the lesbian community hold strong. From dating friends to people caring maybe too much about politics and poetry, Alison Bechdel does an effortless job at showing the humour of these well-known archetypes, while not limiting the lesbian experience to a series of normative stereotypes. I believe one of the reasons this comic continues to be so relevant and important to lesbians today is her presentation of complex, queer characters that refuse to conform to a heteronormative society. But, most importantly, it features two women talking about something other than a man.
WORDS: Isabelle Doyle
