Seconds is a graphic novel by Bryan Lee O’Malley that follows the story of a twenty nine year old chef named Katie. After realizing that her life was not going as she had planned, she is presented with the opportunity to travel in time with the use of a magic mushroom, to change her past. Each time she changes the past, she is presented with much greater consequences in the present. An example of this can be seen with Katie’s relationship with Max (which is explored more deeply in Blog 2 ).
Katie’s need for love in her life relates to a cultural code. Being almost thirty, Katie feels that she needs love in her life in order to feel as if she has accomplished something since she does not feel proud of her other accomplishments, such as starting her first restaurant. On page sixty nine, Katie lies to her father by telling him that she and Max were still together, when at that point of the book, she was not. Katie is constantly stuck in the past, (in this case figuratively and literally) trying to rekindle a relationship that is just not working.
In addition to the various uses of the cultural code, there are many uses of the symbolic code as well. Since Seconds is a graphic novel, there is plenty of room for visual symbols throughout the book. There are constant mentions of these magic mushrooms that Katie eats in order to travel back in time and change her past. She is given the mushroom by a “house spirit” that lives in Seconds and then take twelve additional mushrooms. The mushrooms symbolizes Katie’s insecurity with the decisions that she has made.
Every time that Katie eats one of these mushrooms it is because she is unable to deal with the choices that she has made. She has a problem with commitment and facing the problems of the present. There is a poster of mushrooms on page sixteen of the book where Katie is describing her ideal version of her new restaurant. This proves that it the idea of how she is alway trying to achieve perfection in the future, but is not too interested in dealing with the present.
There are frequent images of trees which are seen various times throughout the book. There is a tree in front of the character Hazel’s house, Seconds, Katie’s new restaurant that she wishes to open in the future, and many other places. These trees are similar to the Tree of Life or Yggdrasil in Norse Mythology and acts a bridge between worlds. There is alway a tree present, when Katie eats a mushroom and travels in time and one when she wakes up in a new timeline. There is a point in the book when travels through this tree (pictured above).
“At the junctures of its branches she saw points of light. Seconds was nestled in the branches, tiny an perfect. Then it was gone. She spotted it again, somewhere else this time. Lis was trying to show her something. This meant something.” (184)
Katie is constantly seen trying to navigate the branches of this tree in the book which might indicate how she is constantly trying to make sense of her world. She manages to jump from branch to branch without seeing the impact and the consequences of her actions are.
( left) Source (right)source
The trees are also almost always shown without leaves throughout the book. The lack of leaves might indicate that Katie is at a crossroad in her life, like how trees are in the winter.
At the end of the book, we see the tree next to Seconds have leaves once again, which not only indicates that time has passed, but also Katie has changed as a person. She is older and wiser then she was before. The change of seasons also indicated that Katie is ready to start on a new way of thinking and experiencing life.
Overall, this is a story of self discovery for Katie which can be seen throughout the many different mediums in this book.
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I think an important code that you missed was the code of Hazel. Hazel fits into both the symbolic and the cultural codes and is the last piece in the puzzle that you have laid out for us here. First, a weird little thing is that hazel is a shrub or a tree, so it fits into the symbolism with the mushrooms and the trees, and you explained the symbolic code. I think that Hazel is the bridge between the symbolic code because she can represent both. And on a deeper level, I think it’s important to notice that Hazel is the only constant in Katie’s life. She’s the only thing that doesn’t change whenever Katie goes and changes the past/present. Also, Hazel is the constant to which Katie compares herself. Katie has this deep-rooted feeling of inadequacy (which you touched on concerning Max) and having Hazel around validates that for her. Hazel is this constant reminder that Katie is nearly 30 years old and is single and has not yet done what she’s wanted to do.
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Symbolism might be my favorite thing to find in a book and pointing out the Tree of Idrasil was perfect. That symbol of the tree is found in so many stories and movies and it is fascinating. It’s meaning goes from branches leading to new worlds or even the role of God in ancient text because it is everywhere. The beauty of the graphic novel genre is that pictures can show a story while the text reads another. The tree, among other specific images become a Waldo in the book that you can look for. The constant imagery of the tree found throughout is a constant reminder of something big going on in the story. You might not have noticed it, but your brain did.
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This blog post is rich in content that helps to unpack the book in terms of its intertextual codes. While both the symbolic code of the tree and the cultural code of Katie’s age play an undeniably large role in the development of the story, I think it would be helpful to include the symbolic code of Katie’s title as “chef”. This is a role that Katie prides herself in taking up, though very little of the book concerns itself with her actual cooking. As we discussed in class, a chef is far different from a standard line cook. A cook is expected to follow directions strictly, adhering only to the wishes of a chef. A chef, on the other hand, is concerned with creating dishes. This attitude is mirrored in Katie, who throughout this book is concerned with creating her own future from the ingredients at her disposal. Evaluating this dynamic should help to shed light not only on Katie’s disposition, but also on the larger intertextual codes at play within this graphic novel.
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