by S.E. Fleenor
Sunflowers by Keezy Young is an autobiographical comic exploring the creator’s experiences living with bipolar I disorder. The gorgeously drawn, deeply evocative short comic drips with nostalgia, dips into horror, and seeks to provide not only insight to those of us without bipolar, but dignity to those of us who do. It is a moving and weighty project–a gift from the creator to readers.
Keezy Young discusses Sunflowers with BoC in this interview. Sunflowers is out now and available for purchase from Silver Sprocket. It is also available to read online for free via the publisher’s website, though we highly recommend the print version–the cover catches light beautifully making the title and sunflowers jump off the page.
The tagline for Sunflowers is “Most people think mania is fun”—an enticing call to readers suggesting your book will frame out “but it’s not.” However, you start the book by saying mania can be fun “sometimes” and exploring examples. It’s an interesting way to set up our expectations and then immediately subvert them. As the narrative progresses the fun unravels and becomes more and more frantic. Why did you want to start the book with the sometimes-fun parts and how does that prime readers for the rest of the narrative?
I think it’s important to acknowledge where the misconception comes from! It’s easy to see someone who’s just mildly hypomanic, or hear someone talking about their own experiences with elation and euphoria and creativity, and think “well, that sounds wonderful, I don’t see what the problem is.” And, to be fair, a lot of us with bipolar fall into that trap as well—“if I could just cling onto that fun part, just to get myself out of depression, or to get through this period of work crunch, everything would be okay.” It’s just that that isn’t the full story.
And I don’t want people to feel ashamed that they don’t know the full story! Why would they? A lot of us don’t like talking about the rest, because it’s not fun, it’s not funny. It’s embarrassing, and traumatic. At best it makes you a real downer at parties, and at worst, it can get you fired or kicked out of an apartment, or even get your kids taken away.
So I don’t blame people for not understanding that they may only be seeing a glimpse of what mania is–I just want them to open up their concept of it and accept that all of that fun and euphoria can turn very, very dark, very, very quickly. (Hypo)mania–even the fun kind–isn’t the consolation prize we get for having to suffer depression, it’s a sign that things are already very wrong, and need to be addressed as soon as possible.
The art in Sunflowers is retro and psychedelic, dripping in emotive oranges and blues that instill a sense of nostalgia, but nostalgia at a distance–both because it is your nostalgia and not ours and because it’s a heightened state of nostalgia, longing for a state of being that never really existed. How does intertwining more realistic art with abstract art help you create this heightened nostalgia?
Like I mention on one of the pages, memory problems are a real issue with bipolar. It’s difficult to think back on your time spent in an episode, partly due to the shame, and partly due to the disconnect between what you were thinking and doing and who you feel you truly are, and partly just because you literally don’t remember a lot of it. Your focus was sort of hijacked. I remember things like staring at a sunflower or the night sky or a crack in the sidewalk and losing myself in that, being just enthralled by what it all meant, by the things I was seeing and hearing in those patterns that may or may not have any meaning to me now. I don’t remember where I was when that happened, or what else was going on, because that’s all eclipsed by this abstract wonder, or fear, or divine knowledge.
And you’re right to say it’s a longing for a state of being that never really existed, because I know that in reality, I was probably just standing on the street and staring at stuff, completely out of it (or, more embarrassingly, laughing or dancing or talking to inanimate objects). I wasn’t privy to visions of a higher calling, I was just unwell. But that doesn’t mean I don’t still remember the feelings I felt at the time, and in some cases wish I could feel them again. Even fear, when it’s felt that intensely, can be longed for, just because it was so powerful and meaningful.
While your book is definitely not 100% horror, there are horrifying elements. I’m thinking particularly of your page dedicated to psychosis and the “weird stuff” you experience in that state (page 6), but there are other pages filled with text or completely devoid of text that also evoke horror for me. Mental illness is a mainstay in horror–handled more and less effectively depending on the title in question. I’d love to learn more about these elements in your book and if you see them as connected to horror or if there was something else you were going for.
I adore horror! I always have haha. I also totally recognize that horror as a genre has a very fraught relationship to mental illness. It tends to play with our fears of both the mentally ill people around us, and of mental illness within us, but almost always at the cost of the dignity, humanity, and lived experience of actual people with severe mental illness, as well as our ability to navigate the world safely and openly and without stigma. When we’re consistently painted as monsters, that’s how people begin to see us.
At the same time, it’s really, really hard to separate horror from the experience of severe mental illness. For me, at least, my psychosis tends to be paranoid, bizarre, and upsetting. My depression is a horror in its own right. And even during the most euphoric mania, the loss of control you undergo is really terrifying. So while I would love to combat the stigma of severe mental illness when it comes to horror (which is something I’m hopefully doing in my new graphic novel, Hello Sunshine!), I don’t think it’s possible to completely divorce it from horror, either. It is scary, both to experience and to witness! And personally, one of my goals is to explore my experience through horror in ways that humanize people with severe mental illness, instead of dehumanize us.
Sunflowers really is an experience of a comic. The pacing, art, and lettering all make your readers feel the states–hypomania, mania, psychosis, depression, euthymia– you’re going through in the book. How did you decide to balance these elements and what was most important to you to make the comic an experiential read?
I think a lot of people try to learn about bipolar disorder by listening to the words of our caregivers, our doctors, and our neighbors, instead of listening to us. And you can learn a lot that way, but there are also a lot of important things you’ll miss. What bipolar looks like isn’t necessarily the same as what it feels like–for example, when I’m depressed I develop a blank affect, but internally, I’m feeling every negative emotion you can possibly imagine. When I’m manic, glaring at cars and yelling at street lights might make me seem like just a belligerent asshole, but what I’m really feeling is scared, and I’m trying to be brave in the face of what I’m perceiving as threats. And I really wanted to give people a glimpse into the what bipolar feels like, because it’s hard to be so badly misunderstood by so many people.
At the same time, I recognize that no comic is going to actually give people the experience of having bipolar disorder. It really is just a fraction of a glimpse. And in the end, I’m not just trying to share my own personal experience, I’m also trying to inform and give people some concrete general information to work with–what is euthymia, how long do episodes last, that kind of thing. So it was definitely about finding a balance–I’m sharing a little of myself, but it’s not just unleashing my raw pure experience, I’m doing it with a particular goal of helping people learn and understand better.
You’ve made the comic available for free online. I’m curious if you’d be willing to talk about why that was important to you.
It was something I really struggled with, honestly! Not because I didn’t want people to have access to it, but because it’s a very vulnerable comic, and I wasn’t sure if I was ready or willing to open myself up to that many eyes. But I talked about it with some colleagues, and with Silver Sprocket (my publisher), and in the end decided to go ahead with it, because I realized that that was why I wrote this story. I didn’t write it for me, or just for my friends. I wrote it so that I could help people in general understand more about what bipolar is–not just people who were willing to pay for that understanding, but also people who aren’t (or aren’t able to), and this was the best way to get it in front of the most eyes.
If readers want to learn more about you and your comic work, where can they find you online?
You can check out my other comics and various projects on my website (https://keezyyoung.com/), which has links to all my socials in the header. I’m most active on Bluesky these days, but I also use Instagram and Tumblr, and my Patreon is a free/pay-what-you-want newsletter if you’d rather keep up with me that way!
At the moment I’m just finishing up my latest graphic novel, Hello Sunshine, which will be coming out in September 2025 with Little, Brown and Company. It’s about a missing teenager named Alex, who had a mental breakdown of some sort before he disappeared. When Alex’s friends and brother get together to try and find out what happened to him, eerie things start to happen, and they begin to wonder if he didn’t run away, after all. It’s very much about severe mental illness, family, and grief, and I’m really excited to show it to the world, so hopefully you’ll keep an eye out for it!
Keezy Young is a queer cartoonist from the Pacific Northwest. Their stories are eerie, and often dark, but almost always hopeful at their core. Their work is character-focused, and they use action, romance, and mystery to explore LGBTQIA characters and themes. Mental illness is also an important focus in many of their stories.
Keezy’s first graphic novel, Taproot—a story about a ghost and a gardener—debuted in September 2017 with Oni Press (formerly Lion Forge) and was re-released in 2022. Hello Sunshine is a new graphic novel about a missing teenager, slated to come out in 2025 with Little, Brown. Additional projects include short comics (The July Fashion Issue; Just Going For a Walk; I Only Have Eyes For You, Dear; and Sunflowers), as well as several art books.
S.E. Fleenor is a writer and editor who wears many hats. They are a freelance developmental and line editor, bringing years of experience as a managing editor, publisher, and all around editorial gem-of-all-trades to clients’ fiction, non-fiction, and personal essays. Their essays, creative nonfiction, and fiction appear in various publications including The Independent, Buzzfeed Reader, VICE, Electric Literature, Xtra Magazine, them.us, Upworthy, and many more. Their words have appeared in print in various books covering topics from Star Trek to classism. They co-host the comics and pop culture podcast Bitches on Comics, which is in the top 15-25% of all podcasts in terms of downloads (depending on your metrics), and their short story “Anomalous” was adapted to audio through Decoded Horror Channel’s Graveyard Orbit. They are a member of GALECA: the society of LGBTQ entertainment critics.
Comments are closed, but trackbacks and pingbacks are open.