Alan Navarra's DUMOT

Shepherds, farmers, fishermen, and other members of the self-employed profession have the best reason to be happy. They don't need to deal with an Evil Boss. They don't need to hold that anger or contain that aggression against this evil puppeteer and manipulative hog who remains a constant source of pain in the urban, corporate world.

This book by Alan Navarra is about anger and hate. I bought this one on the eve of TRESE 4's launching as a companion read to that good comic book. Another reason is the title---it caught my attention because I know what the word means due to my West Visayan roots.

Though the main character's (Michael Perez) vindictiveness against his superior is a natural reaction, me as a reader feel no sympathy nor allegiance to this corporate worker who shares the same "hole" with the boss. Considering that Michael can easily puke at the mere sight of his superior (nandidiri), I think that it's stupid to bang your boss's wife. Wala syang pinagkaiba sa boss nya.

No matter how funny and clever the writer's choice of cuss/curse words and phrases and no matter how experimental and postmodern the writer's technique here, he who paints his character as an eternal victim that whined every second and badmouths everything, unknowingly paints Michael Perez as the character who failed to differentiate the pussy from the weiner and also metaphorically becoming both. It's like an attempt to spit on God's face and realizing that your spit fell back flatly in your own face, special thanks to gravity.

By the way, I think the "crab mentality mindset" is a redundant term. Redundant as a "crisis situation scenario" or "difficult dilemma." But I'm not an English teacher nor a communications expert, I'm just a common, pedestrian reader who just inserted his 200 pesos worth of money to the writer's pocket. Once again, just a reader.

Luckily, this Visayan reader appreciates a good art when he sees one. Alan Navarra's style (ala Robert Crumb) of organic art  transmuting into different forms and symbols of Michael's own version of the alphabet as they complement acronyms of the shitty business and corporate terms became a redeeming point. Design saved the day for Navarra, prompting me to give his book a passing mark. This one is a very angry design book and it's better to view it more as a design book than as a book of complaints but at least, the aggression here is entertaining.

I'm sure Alan Navarra knows another Hiligaynon term like YAWA and if he attempts to write a book about it, I will surely look forward to read it.

ART SAVES THE AUTHOR

Genre: Postmodernist Literature, Visual Book, Mature Reading
Rating: 3 enchantments of YAWA out of 5