Epileptic

Epileptic, the graphic novel by David B., is reviewed in the New York Times:

People are devouring the graphic novel across the whole range of human I.Q.'s. It's not uncommon now for readers of literature to admire Chris Ware or Julie Doucet or Joe Sacco or Joe Matt with a partisan vigor formerly reserved for renegades like Kurt Vonnegut and Richard Brautigan. Among the reasons for this popularity is that comics are currently better at the sociology of the intimate gesture than literary fiction is.

and

The graphic novel may originally have been aimed at ''a less-educated and/or intellectually blunted segment of the consumer pool,'' as Chris Ware observed, but ''Epileptic'' proves that this relatively new form can be as graceful as its august literary forebear. Recent novels by Jonathan Lethem and Michael Chabon have indicated how formative comics can be for writers who rely only on words. Now comic artists are expressing their facility with the strategies and ambitions of the word-smitten crowd. This cross-pollination is to be celebrated.

More at Time Magazine, which reviewed Epileptic Part 1 in 2002:

All great works of art must at least pass this test: does it use the unique properties of its medium to further the meaning of the work? Beyond that, does it offer us a new experience? Does that experience have depth, rewarding revisitation? Lastly, does it posses that aesthetic quality, that no matter the substance, can be called beauty? "Epileptic," (L'Association; 176pp.; $24.95), the graphical autobiography by David B. (né Pierre-François Beauchard), passes all of these tests, making it one of the "must-haves" for 2002.

Some pages from Epileptic:
I no longer believe in anything.
I decided to change my first name.