ARTIFICIAL

Kurzweil continues to expand the possibilities of the graphic memoir with an exploration of her patrilineal ancestors.

Braiding together the stories of her paternal grandfather, an Austrian conductor and pianist who narrowly escaped Nazi-controlled Vienna, and her father, an early innovator in artificial intelligence research, New Yorker cartoonist Kurzweil, author of Flying Couch, navigates the complexities of recollecting and framing pieces of her family history. Pages expand with maximalist detail that reflects a true-to-life experience of digging into the past, where insights are dispersed between various family memories and physical artifacts often nestled in dusty storage facilities. Stunningly re-created archival materials, from newspaper clippings to handwritten letters, lend visceral impact to each discovery. The story of the Kurzweil family’s innate connection to the vanguard of technology also breaches questions of collective memory and the ways in which technology might become a new conduit for the voices of the past. When do our loved ones really pass into the beyond? Is it when they die or when those who remain no longer remember them? How much can we learn from what remains of our ancestors? An AI chatbot trained on the correspondences of her late grandfather becomes a sometimes-inadequate interlocutor for Kurzweil as she reflects on her own influences and navigates her family’s desire to maintain a connection with the past. Nonetheless, these interactions bear fruit as new questions arise. Couched in the casual conversations among family and the genuine desire to connect and preserve specific memories, these inquiries avoid becoming overburdened by stodgy philosophical ramblings or overly enamored techno-proselytizing. The deeply personal and sometimes frenetic energy of the book delivers an intimate and cohesive vision of the past as well as life lived in the influence of parents and ancestors.

Intimate reflections and powerful visual elements combine in an exemplary work of graphic nonfiction.