When you know going in to a graphic novel that the subject is THE Jeffrey Dahmer, psycho killer par excellence, there is a certain reticence in approaching the material. The book may sit on your desk for a few days; you may not be sure you want to take it home - perhaps you should place a paper bag over the cover so that people don't know what you're reading?
Derf Backderf's graphic novel, My Friend Dahmer, is intimidating to pick up - but it is ultimately an incredibly interesting and profound glimpse in to our dark and inaccessible cultural id. The story mainly addresses the great question we ask of all our demons - do we create them or do they come that way - and can we prevent them from being evil?
My Friend Dahmer is the true story of the author's high school friendship with future serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer and the observations of Dahmer's life and mental deterioration at that time. Was Jeffery Dahmer always weird? The quick answer is yes, but what's more complicated is how and why.
Backderf does a great job in this novel of setting up teenage life in the late 70s - the ennui of the teen years is evident and common - but the freedoms kids had in the 70s are not the same for today's youths. The 70s may have been the last decade that no-one really seemed to care about teenagers. Until marketers found them in the 80s, found their disposable incomes and household purchasing influence, teens in the 70s had days and days of unremitting time with each other and teachers weren't expected to be as 'involved' as they certainly are now. If it happened at home, it was private. Keeping the home life private may have contributed to Dahmer's deterioration.
As Backderf delves into his own life, the extremes of Dahmer's 'weirdness' become a sharp parallel to the 'antics' of the regular teen. To say they were friends may be over stretching the relationship, rather, Backderf saw Dahmer as his 'pet', his odd friend. Think back to your own high school days - and, like many, you may wonder what ever happened to the nutty guy from high school. Those peculiar classmates fade into memory but in this case the memory was quickly brought in to sharp focus when, in 1991, Jeffrey Dahmer was finally arrested for the murder of 17 young men and teenage boys.
His high school descent in to madness is what we find in My Friend Dahmer. Poor home life? -check; substance abuse issues? -check; lack of adult supervision? -check. We meet Dahmer here, before he became a monster, and he may never have been a normal person - that may not have been possible. What Backderf does tell us, though; is that there were warning signs and a lack of attention paid to Dahmer's bizarre behaviours that beggars belief.
This is not a novel that empathizes with the killer. Backderf acknowledges that Dahmer "was a twisted wretch whose depravity was almost beyond comprehension", but he also wants acknowledgement of the circumstantial permissiveness that allowed his perverse nature to develop and expand. When conducting interviews for this book, old teachers would state, "I never noticed anything was wrong with him", a statement the author finds troublingly telling. Backderf states that people often ask him why he didn't tell any one about his early concerns that Jeff Dahmer was having deeper problems than the average teen - and his answer is simple, he was a kid -where were all the grownups?
Not a novel for children, My Friend Dahmer is an excellent and intimate glimpse into a life and a time before the information age we so complain about - and proffers that demons left to fester are just as dangerous as those who tweet around us. So, could Dahmer's crimes have been prevented? That's not an answer we can ever know - but it's certain that no one tried.
My Friend Dahmer is available at the Prince George Public Library.
Andrea Palmer is the library's Communications Coordinator.
