美国国家公共电台 NPR--Kate Beaton's new graphic memoir is about the dark type of job you take for money

Kate Beaton's new graphic¹ memoir² is about the dark type of job you take for money

Transcript³

There are jobs you take because you might find them fulfilling, or they're a stepping stone to a career you see for yourself. And then there are jobs you take for the money. The new book, Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands, is about the latter.

It's from Kate Beaton, author of the popular webcomic Hark! A Vagrant⁴, as well as a number of children's books. But while her comic is known for its funny and exuberant⁵ takes on historical figures, with Ducks, Beaton uses her talents to examine her own life. Specifically the years she spent working at the oil sands of Fort McMurray, in Alberta, Canada.

"I didn't have a good time there," said Beaton. "I lived in the camps, and that was hard. That was very hard. I was a young woman, and by myself. I was harassed⁶ all the time."

The book starts over on the east coast, on Cape⁷ Breton Island in Nova Scotia, where Beaton is from. It's a beautiful place that's long been economically disadvantaged. For a while it was home to various industries – steel, coal, fishing. And then it wasn't. So the island started sending its people out to wherever jobs were.

This idea – that you have to leave home to make a life for yourself – ingrained itself into the culture of Cape Breton. And the book opens with Beaton talking us through how.

Two comic panels show a lighthouse in the first and a small building surrounded by snow. In these panels, Beaton says, "I need to tell you this — there is no knowing Cape Breton without knowing how deeply ingrained two diametrically opposed experiences are: a deep love for home, and the knowledge of how frequently we have to leave it to find work somewhere else."

Courtesy of Drawn⁸ & Quarterly

"This push and pull defines us," a cartoon Beaton says in the opening. "It's all over our music, our literature, and our understanding of our place in the world. To have not is a mental state, as well as an economic one."

Her parents try to convince her to go into teaching or nursing, but she heads west, to the oil sands of Fort McMurray. It's an oil boomtown populated mostly by men who are, similarly, away from their homes and families. It makes it all the easier for them to fall into the traps of boomtowns — drugs, alcohol, loneliness.

The book follows Beaton as she deals with her own sense of isolation⁹, while having to put up with constant sexism and misogyny. Men spread rumors¹⁰ about hooking up with her. They talk about her body at work openly. They walk into her bedroom "by accident."

A page out of Ducks depicting¹¹ machinery¹² against a dark sky.

Courtesy of Drawn & Quarterly

But Beaton depicts¹³ small moments of tenderness too, from people looking out for her in their own ways. And there are the people who populate the city and are simply putting their heads down and providing for their families, just trying to get by.

Chris Turner, author of the book The Patch: The People, Pipelines¹⁴, and Politics of the Oil Sands said the book avoids caricaturizing the town. Where other depictions at the time portrayed¹⁵ Fort McMurray as a lawless Wild West, Beaton's treats the workers with care and grace. That took a lot of courage, Turner said, "given that a lot of these guys, if you wanted to be damning about it, were enabling some of the culture she ran into."

Throughout Ducks, Beaton draws these huge landscapes. There'll be a big beautiful sky juxtaposed with seemingly equally huge and (and just as imposing) machinery on the ground. It's a stark¹⁶ reminder¹⁷ of what the oil industry is doing to the land. Land that was previously¹⁸ occupied by someone else.

There's a scene late in the book when an increasingly tired Beaton watches this interview with Celina Harpe. a Cree elder talking about the impacts the oil companies have had on their community. "Everything's ruined, our lives around our lands are ruined, our water, the air, everything," Harpe says. "At the cost of our lives — as long as they get their money. They don't care how many of us they kill off. That's the way I feel."

The moment coalesces¹⁹ the books themes of complicity and complicity and agency and power. Beaton said when the companies first came in to the area, the First Nations people in the area weren't given much say. And now they are tangled²⁰ up economically in these industries that are polluting their land, and leaving them with higher rates of cancer.

"But what choice did they have but to be involved, or be completely crushed?" said Beaton.

A page from the book where Kate talks to an older male colleague named Doug. "Nobody likes it here. Everyone wishes they were somewhere else," says Kate."I've seen worse. Got a bed here, food. And the money." says Doug."Do you like it here?" says Kate."Doesn't matter" says Doug.Kate asks Doug "What did you do before you came here?" Doug says "Coal, fishing, steel. But that's all gone, isn't it."

Courtesy of Drawn & Quarterly

The book is called Ducks after in incident in 2008 when a couple hundred migrating ducks landed in Canadian oil sludge and died. In the grander scheme of ecological²¹ disasters, it wasn't horrible. But the ducks were photogenic, and it became front page news. People started speaking out against the oil companies. Fines were issued.

When you listen to Beaton talk about her time in the oil sands, it's clear she's weighted down by everything that didn't make front page news, from the First Nations communities wrecked²² by the oil mining, to the decisions her fellow workers are forced to make when working the oil sands is one of the few options for a decent wage.

Beaton said people constantly try and make the oil sands about one thing. To refine it down to one issue. Ducks shows why that's impossible. "Life isn't that way," she said.

1 graphic   

adj.生动的，形象的，绘画的，文字的，图表的

参考例句：

• The book gave a graphic description of the war.这本书生动地描述了战争的情况。
• Distinguish important text items in lists with graphic icons.用图标来区分重要的文本项。

2 memoir   

n.[pl.]回忆录，自传；记事录

参考例句：

• He has just published a memoir in honour of his captain.他刚刚出了一本传记来纪念他的队长。
• In her memoir,the actress wrote about the bittersweet memories of her first love.在那个女演员的自传中，她写到了自己苦乐掺半的初恋。

3 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

4 vagrant   

n.流浪者，游民；adj.流浪的，漂泊不定的

参考例句：

• A vagrant is everywhere at home.流浪者四海为家。
• He lived on the street as a vagrant.他以在大街上乞讨为生。

5 exuberant   

adj.充满活力的；（植物）繁茂的

参考例句：

• Hothouse plants do not possess exuberant vitality.在温室里培养出来的东西，不会有强大的生命力。
• All those mother trees in the garden are exuberant.果园里的那些母树都长得十分茂盛。

6 harassed   

adj. 疲倦的，厌烦的 动词harass的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• He has complained of being harassed by the police. 他投诉受到警方侵扰。
• harassed mothers with their children 带着孩子的疲惫不堪的母亲们

7 cape   

n.海角，岬；披肩，短披风

参考例句：

• I long for a trip to the Cape of Good Hope.我渴望到好望角去旅行。
• She was wearing a cape over her dress.她在外套上披着一件披肩。

8 drawn   

v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的

参考例句：

• All the characters in the story are drawn from life.故事中的所有人物都取材于生活。
• Her gaze was drawn irresistibly to the scene outside.她的目光禁不住被外面的风景所吸引。

9 isolation   

n.隔离，孤立，分解，分离

参考例句：

• The millionaire lived in complete isolation from the outside world.这位富翁过着与世隔绝的生活。
• He retired and lived in relative isolation.他退休后，生活比较孤寂。

10 rumors   

n.传闻( rumor的名词复数 )；[古]名誉；咕哝；[古]喧嚷v.传闻( rumor的第三人称单数 )；[古]名誉；咕哝；[古]喧嚷

参考例句：

• Rumors have it that the school was burned down. 有谣言说学校给烧掉了。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Rumors of a revolt were afloat. 叛变的谣言四起。 来自《简明英汉词典》

11 depicting   

描绘，描画( depict的现在分词 )； 描述

参考例句：

• a painting depicting the Virgin and Child 一幅描绘童贞马利亚和圣子耶稣的画
• The movie depicting the battles and bloodshed is bound to strike home. 这部描写战斗和流血牺牲的影片一定会取得预期效果。

12 machinery   

n.(总称)机械，机器；机构

参考例句：

• Has the machinery been put up ready for the broadcast?广播器材安装完毕了吗？
• Machinery ought to be well maintained all the time.机器应该随时注意维护。

13 depicts   

描绘，描画( depict的第三人称单数 )； 描述

参考例句：

• The book vividly depicts French society of the 1930s. 这本书生动地描绘了20 世纪30 年代的法国社会。
• He depicts the sordid and vulgar sides of life exclusively. 他只描写人生肮脏和庸俗的一面。

14 pipelines   

管道( pipeline的名词复数 )； 输油管道； 在考虑（或规划、准备） 中； 在酿中

参考例句：

• The oil is carried to the oil refinery by pipelines. 石油通过输油管输送到炼油厂。
• The oil carried in pipelines. 石油用管道输送。

15 portrayed   

v.画像( portray的过去式和过去分词 )；描述；描绘；描画

参考例句：

• Throughout the trial, he portrayed himself as the victim. 在审讯过程中，他始终把自己说成是受害者。
• The author portrayed his father as a vicious drunkard. 作者把他父亲描绘成一个可恶的酒鬼。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

16 stark   

adj.荒凉的；严酷的；完全的；adv.完全地

参考例句：

• The young man is faced with a stark choice.这位年轻人面临严峻的抉择。
• He gave a stark denial to the rumor.他对谣言加以完全的否认。

17 reminder   

n.提醒物，纪念品；暗示，提示

参考例句：

• I have had another reminder from the library.我又收到图书馆的催还单。
• It always took a final reminder to get her to pay her share of the rent.总是得发给她一份最后催缴通知，她才付应该交的房租。

18 previously   

adv.以前，先前（地）

参考例句：

• The bicycle tyre blew out at a previously damaged point.自行车胎在以前损坏过的地方又爆开了。
• Let me digress for a moment and explain what had happened previously.让我岔开一会儿，解释原先发生了什么。

19 coalesces   

v.联合，合并( coalesce的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• One air cell coalesces with another. 气房彼此融合。 来自辞典例句

20 tangled   

adj. 纠缠的，紊乱的 动词tangle的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• Your hair's so tangled that I can't comb it. 你的头发太乱了，我梳不动。
• A movement caught his eye in the tangled undergrowth. 乱灌木丛里的晃动引起了他的注意。

21 ecological   

adj.生态的，生态学的

参考例句：

• The region has been declared an ecological disaster zone.这个地区已经宣布为生态灾难区。
• Each animal has its ecological niche.每种动物都有自己的生态位.

22 wrecked   

adj.失事的，遇难的

参考例句：

• the hulk of a wrecked ship 遇难轮船的残骸
• the salvage of the wrecked tanker 对失事油轮的打捞