Cómic, memoria histórica y activismo LGTB en diálogo: el ejemplo de la novela gráfica El Violeta

This paper aims to show how the graphic novel entitled El Violeta (2019) is an interesting example of the dialogue between the artistic medium of comics, historical memory, and LGBT activism, as it creates a collective homosexual experience of Francoism that is particularly relevant in the current context of discussions on Spain’s recent past. Based on various individual testimonies, this graphic novel undertakes a fictional reconstruction of the physical and symbolic violence perpetrated by the Franco regime, thus creating a narrative place of memory of a common traumatic experience, often silenced or made invisible. In this way, El Violeta contributes to shaping the historical memory of the homosexuals who suffered under the Spanish dictatorship, since it conveys, through the language of the comic art form, the repressive homophobia of the Franco regime. In the absence of a complete legal and institutional reparation, it therefore contains at least an attempt at symbolic recognition on the socio-cultural level.