Containing Epidemics through Metaphor

Abstract This essay will examine two “graphic novel” depictions of WWI epidemics: one that depicts scientific advances during the dysentery epidemic on European front in World War One; and another Spanish influenza unfolding across United States America. Both texts narrativise an through a verbal visual engagement with historical discourses. These were produced within five years our current Covid-19 pandemic show us how language (visual verbal) can be employed to make sense plague threat involves invisible “enemy”. The way meaning is blended elaborated throughout each text help understand figurative framing might open up new understandings or possibilities. Popular imagination productively link tropes from past, particularly play as role science shifted.