An Evening With Joe Sacco
An intimate look at Sacco’s craft—and the complexity beneath it
This week, I attended a discussion at the Frontline Club in West London with Maltese-born American cartoonist Joe Sacco, a pioneer of comics journalism. His appearance follows a strong year for US comic artists in London—after Alison Bechdel in June and Craig Thompson in September.
Sacco has just released a new book, Once Upon a Riot, about sectarian violence in Uttar Pradesh. Though he is best known for his work on the Israeli–Palestinian conflict (Palestine, Footnotes in Gaza) and the Bosnian War (Safe Area Goražde, The Fixer), his reporting—delivered through comics—carries the rigour of a traditional foreign correspondent. The conversation, led by The Times’ veteran war reporter Anthony Lloyd, felt very much like a peer-to-peer exchange between a prose journalist and a comics journalist.
My interest in Sacco is rooted squarely in the comics medium. I was curious to hear him, though I don’t share his political views on Palestine—unlike, I suspect, much of the audience—so I arrived with some trepidation. But the talk was fascinating, and, as I describe later, we had a brief but warm exchange at the end of the evening.
The Self-Critical Lens of Comics Journalism
Sacco is famous for drawing himself—literally—into his work. Lloyd asked why. Sacco’s answer was simple: to puncture the myth of the “all-seeing, all-knowing” foreign correspondent.
“When you’re there and you realise how you’re assimilating material—and how other journalists are doing it—you see it’s not like that. There are misunderstandings. There’s guesswork.”
By depicting himself, he makes explicit that the reader is seeing events through his imperfect, outsider’s perspective.
He also explained that his process is closer to print journalism than traditional cartooning. He rarely sketches in the field unless it is unsafe to take a photograph. Instead, he relies on notes, recordings, interviews, and reference photos; the drawings come later in the studio. Throughout, he said, he is drawn to those pushed to the margins of conflict.
Influences
Sacco acknowledged the influence of Robert Crumb and the American underground comix movement, while distancing himself from its misogynistic and sometimes racist content. What he took from it was artistic freedom: the sense that comics could tackle serious, adult subjects. A single image, he observed, can provoke, unsettle, or move—often all at once.
Palestine and the Early Reporting Years
Sacco’s major wartime reporting began in the 1990s with the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Arriving with almost no contacts, he developed a method based on chance: taking local taxis into contested towns, being dropped in public squares, and waiting until someone approached to ask what he was doing there. When he explained that he wanted to see how people were living under occupation, he was often invited home. The hospitality and trust he encountered shaped his early work.
His arrival in Sarajevo for The Fixer was different. He simply walked into the Holiday Inn—the city’s journalist hub—and met Neven, who became his fixer, guide, and occasional sparring partner.
In Chechnya, he deliberately shifted his approach, interviewing only women. Men, he said, tended to offer sweeping political narratives; the women spoke with a candid immediacy that brought him closest to the emotional truth of the place.
Art Spiegelman
Sacco spoke warmly of his friendship with Art Spiegelman, whom he visits whenever he is in New York. Their recent collaboration, Never Again and Again and Again, emerged over wine during a private conversation about the Middle East. Spiegelman had not drawn comics for decades; Sacco suggested they create something together, and to his surprise, Spiegelman agreed. Sacco returned to New York several times and they worked “elbow to elbow”—arguing, scripting, redrafting. The comic first appeared in The New York Review of Books (the article appeared in the Guardian see link).
Sacco also discussed The War on Gaza, his own polemic, written in anger after a friend in Gaza pleaded: “Please raise up your voice.” Sacco is an unambiguous and tireless advocate for the Palestinian cause.
Once Upon a Riot
Sacco’s latest book examines the 2013 sectarian riots in Uttar Pradesh. Rather than simply documenting the violence, he explores fractured truths, misinformation, political opportunism, and the competing narratives people construct to justify their actions. Arriving more than a year after the events, he approached the material like an archaeologist—excavating memories and contradictions to build a fuller picture.
Ethics and Pushback
Sacco rarely challenges people without power, though he noted that when he hears something repeatedly, he begins to push back. He described two moments in Palestine when he felt compelled to respond: confronting interviewees over antisemitic remarks and, separately, over celebrations of a bus bombing. These, he said, were instances where remaining silent wasn’t an option.
A Lighter Future?
He also mentioned a long-standing dream project: The Gentleman’s Guide to the Rolling Stones. It remains on the back burner until his current work is done.
Closing Reflections
Lloyd concluded the evening by suggesting that the world would be poorer without voices like Sacco’s. He went further, saying that Sacco’s work offers genuine solace: a rare devotion to those usually overlooked—the “little people,” not in a condescending sense, but those who bear the brunt of conflict. He spoke of the comfort he finds in Sacco’s commitment to giving them space, dignity, and grace on the page—something many in the audience, he believed, would recognise.
My Exchange with Joe Sacco
At the book signing afterwards, I told Sacco how much I was enjoying his India book, but also that, as a Jewish reader with deep personal ties to Israel, his books on Palestine felt too close to home to read. He didn’t dismiss me. He paused, looked at me, and asked after the safety of my family and friends in Israel. He mentioned a colleague whose relatives had been at the 7 October rave massacre.
It was a gesture I wasn’t expecting but gratefully received—a small moment of personal warmth. Sacco may be a committed advocate for the Palestinian cause, but his compassion, and his eye for injustice, seem to extend far beyond any single conflict.
Article by Jonathan Sandler, Author of THE ENGLISH GI: WORLD WAR II GRAPHIC MEMOIR OF A YORKSHIRE SCHOOLBOY’S ADVENTURES IN THE UNITED STATES AND EUROPE published in April 2022.
Sounds like an amazing event. Thanks for sharing it in such detail!
very cool