Plan of Occupancy

An awardwinning cartoonist adapts the well-regarded French novella by Jean Echenoz in this taut and moving study on grief.

A Parisian woman dies in a fire leaving her husband and son behind, bereft.

The fire has destroyed all traces of her. The only reminder the men have is a multi-storey mural, a perfume ad, featuring the woman as a young model. In his grief, the son silently walks by the mural every day. The father is loud and passionate in his grief and this drives them apart.

As time goes by, they watch as a building is built on the vacant lot next door slowly obscuring her image. The men venture to move into the building taking up residence in an apartment directly at face level to the advertisement. And so begins their plan to take down the wall separating them from their beloved. 

The original French novella is famous for its direct prose and even more so for its brevity. While published as a book, it spanned only 12 pages. Master cartoonist Guy Delisle (Pyongyang, Muybridge) seizes the opportunity to pair his spare elegant cartooning with the prose equivalent—the effect of which is powerful and emotionally devastating.

Translated by Mark Polizzotti