Interview #137 — Hum Mahbub

by Johanna Ng

Hum Mahbub is an illustrator in Sydney. She has been drawing comics for more than ten years. She's in therapy, so don't worry about it.

After knowing each other for almost two decades, Hum finally talks to Johanna Ng about words and wordlessness, just doing things, and being a literal genius.

What first drew you to comics? I remember when you first started you didn’t even know that there was an indie comic publishing scene!

Actually there is no indie comic publishing scene and I’m the only person who’s ever made a comic so I don’t know what you’re talking about!

I’ve always drawn pictures but I guess when it comes to expressing concrete stuff that other people might understand, or at least you might get to receive confirmation that they understood it, adding words helps? When I was a teen I read a lot of Dinosaur Comics, A Softer World, Hark A Vagrant, and Perfect Stars. Webcomics made me realise you can just draw pictures and add words and put them on the internet, and then people can be like ‘lol nice’ and you can be like I have done my work by communicating my genius to the people who otherwise would have been helpless without my insight.

I find comics to be the shallowest part of any relationship I have with ‘art,’ and I do it the most frequently. The stuff I think is more important is wordless, but not in the sense it doesn’t have words, but more like… it’s not any kind of emotion that is benefited from discussion, so I just do that privately.

I think it’s interesting that you use the word ‘shallow’ to describe the sorts of emotions and ideas that often benefit from discussion. I appreciate that your comics allow for others to find commonality between silly and beautiful thoughts in a comprehensible way. Kind of like Rupi Kaur. Are you enraged that I’ve said that?

This interview is over.

Lmao yes I am enraged but actually you are probably right. I just don’t think I can talk about my feelings in any meaningful way. I do enjoy making comics that are like I’m crazy about the moon and I think they’re fun, but they’re not what I really feel when I look at the moon. I can’t explain how I feel about the moon, that’s the whole problem, so I have to make these dinky ass little drawings about a naked girl screaming at the moon.

I will not get into the rage I’m feeling right now at being compared to Rupi Kaur, but I will be mad at you in person when social isolation is over. How dare you. In my own Liminal interview.

You’ve already self-published three books and your output is at the rate of someone who seems to be pursuing a creative career, but you’re actually breaking into a white collar industry at the moment. Why is that, and have you ever wanted to write comics or illustrate on a ‘professional’ level?

I don’t really think of it as ‘self publishing’—I just printed out my comics from online. I definitely do not want to professionalise this at all. When I was younger I did want to! But now that I'm older I guess I care about different things. I hate having to do art ‘for’ anything now. Also the older I’ve gotten, I think being in the world and having a job and knowing lots of different kinds of people makes better and more interesting art, and I don’t want to retreat to a cloister to wear Gorman and write grant applications. Also, as a Leo and the child of migrants, not having enough money to support myself and anyone else I love is literally the most humiliating thing I can think of. I want to always have enough money that if you committed a crime I could afford your bail. Because I love you. Go do a crime if you want babe.

I guess if someone said ‘here’s a hundred million dollars and you can draw what you like until you die’ I might say yes. But who are they? Who can I now not criticise because they gave me a hundred million dollars? Ugh imagine if I found out it was a weapons manufacturer and I was a kept artist of DeathCorp Pty Ltd.

Thank you for financing any future crimes I might want to commit! I often bring up between us that a dynamic in our friendship is that you’re a doer, and it’s something I admire a lot. Can you tell me your thoughts on action and hesitancy?

Babe honestly you just have to do things. I guess you could also not do things but like why? But also doing things is kind of a privilege. I’ve mostly had the space and time and money and power and temperament to just be like ‘I’m gonna see if I can do this thing.’ People don’t always have that.

But, since I do have that privilege, why would I on purpose not decide what will happen to me or my life? Why would I not ‘do’ and just let things happen to me? I guess maybe there’s value in ‘being’ but I prefer ‘doing’! I’m a fire sign I make the world!!!

I know you are often hesitant to do things but I think you are still oriented toward doing, but you are more deliberative than me maybe. You let yourself explore uncertainty for longer. BUT you also definitely are one of the most conscientious and efficient people I know. Like when you decide to finally do something you just do it well, even if you don’t think you do. You’re more self-critical than me as well which is, I think, tied to how much you think about stuff before you do it, because you do always realistically consider the possibility you could make a wrong choice.

Babe, thank you for exposing my own practice and emotional process in this interview about you! I think it’s a superpower to hardly second-guess yourself. Is this an innate skill or was it a journey you had to take?

You’ve heard this story before, but my mother when I was little was quick to anger, and she would be so mad at me for stuff I hadn’t done, or she wouldn’t let me explain why I did it. I think having the most important authority figure in my life be so disconnected from reality made me just naturally accept that other people can be wrong. Like if my mum was like ‘you broke the remote’ but I knew I didn’t break the remote, I’d know she was wrong and I was right. So like, I just walk around now assuming I’m probably right. And like... even if you could prove to me I’m stupider than most people... I would probably still think I was right about stuff. I know that theory makes no psychological or medical sense, but I’m still confident enough in it’s probable rightness I will publish it in writing. Do you see the dangerous levels of self belief here! I’m insane babe!

Babe, you’re insane! But also not at all. Anyone who has met you knows that you’re very genuine in including others and so openly generous with your resources. However, as a respective Leo and Capricorn, you and I are also firm believers in being selfish. How does your selfishness inform your selflessness?

You have to be selfish. It’s only by being selfish that you get to really be generous! Like if we’re out here being nice to losers and creeps, then where is the time and energy to be nicest and most generous to the people we love and the things we care about? I absolutely hate seeing my simp ass friends be stressed out because some bitch at work was mean to them. Like we don’t even like that bitch, why do you care what they think or do? You could have spent that time getting a pastry for me, your friend, who loves you. That would have been generous.

I think it’s so important to have values beyond being likeable or being nice. Like if someone says they don’t think poor people deserve health care you should want to not be nice to them by saying poor people deserve healthcare. It’s ok to want to fight about some things! That’s how values get made. That said, it’s hard and maybe pointless to fight all the time. As I’ve gotten older I’ve gotten better at being like ‘ok I think that person is stupid’ and letting it end there instead of wanting to ruin them or convince them. I’m sure lots of people think I’m stupid but I’m ok with that too! Who cares! Fuck ‘em! And fuck me!

Have you successfully ruined any people!?

I would hope I’ve at least ruined some idiot’s day. At least.

We’ve talked previously about how people process their thoughts differently and how you specifically don’t tend to think in words. You’ve also mentioned earlier in this interview that the art you value the most is wordless. But you’re a voracious reader and your prose is so thoughtful. Can you describe your relationship with language, and the act of writing versus thinking?

This is so interesting because I was just looking at a tree I don’t know the name of but I know it’s a certain kind of tree. And I know that it’s different from other trees. And that made me think about how meaning has to exist outside of language because I can make that distinction without knowing a word for the tree. I think it’s so interesting that some people think in words first because I often don’t have words for my feelings, they’re all just different kinds of trees I can’t name. They just are in the world and different from other things.

It’s hard for me to compare writing and thinking. I find any expression of a feeling so different from a feeling. It’s a huge unbridgeable gap and experience is basically actually completely incommunicable, even though memes can be relatable. Like you might say you get this, but I don’t ever have a way of knowing if you got it, you know? I wish you and me were bees with a hive mind.

That seems like a very lonely concept. I think finding the right words to express a thought or feeling is often accompanied by a great rush of relief that you can finally communicate the previously indescribable thought/feeling. However, there’s a scene in New Girl where Jess burns her finger on a car cigarette lighter so Nick burns himself too. When Jess asks Nick why he would do that, he says it was so they could be in the same amount of pain together.

Do you think these unbridgeable, incommunicable, wordless gaps you mention are why you like metaphors so much? Can they be bridged through experience instead?

I feel like if you think about it too much you can’t even bridge it through experience because even though Nick thought he was feeling what Jess was feeling there’s no way to tell because any time we try to measure the pain we have to go through some other layer of meaning like language or brain scans. Sorry to get caught up in a first year philosophy lecture about consciousness and experience but it still bothers me!

But today when you texted me that you were a barnacle I felt like I totally did get what you meant. You were a crusty little shell on the hull of life. You are so right that I love metaphors even though I would never say that about myself! Maybe you knowing that about me actually proves that we can connect to other people in a meaningful way despite having to be individuals inside our own brains.

For those that don’t know, you’ve written a TV show called Why Are You Like This. How did writing comics evolve into writing a show, and has your process changed at all during this transition?

People keep congratulating me on this TV show but if it wasn’t for Naomi (my small white wife), I never would have done it! So it’s not like I was doing comics and it naturally evolved to long form on my own steam. I’ve never worked on a project as collaborative and frustrating as making a TV show. It’s insane to get mad at your friends because you disagree about if a joke is funny, but I literally had multiple emotional breakdowns about it. Working on something this collaborative and iterative has actually made me more conscious of the freedom I have with my comics. I can just write something and draw a scribble and not edit it if I don’t want to and throw it out into the world. Like you said, I’m a doer and I love to just be doing!

Babe, you’re a regular Jack Kerouac!

Babe you’re the second person who’s called me Jack Kerouac this year!

Who was the first?

Me.

Anyway, we’ve talked a lot about how you are and why you do. After all is said and done, what is it that you cherish about the process of writing and drawing? What does writing and drawing do for you?

I guess I want to keep trying to communicate feelings and experience even though I’m not very sure that anyone ever gets it. Even though I’m not sure that what I’m trying to say is ever what I do say, I still think it’s my responsibility to bring my genius to the people! To see me struggle to create meaning with my art is edifying for them. Just as me watching you struggle with your art is edifying for me. I wish everyone made art though because I think the doing of it is the most important part. But you’re always telling me brains are different and maybe some people’s brains just don’t get the same thing from trying to make it. Which is very smart, especially given that you’re literally a barnacle without a psychology degree.

Do you have any advice for emerging illustrators, comic artists and writers?

I have no advice that I’m sure would apply universally. Except maybe ‘try not to be a little bitch about it.’

Who are you inspired by?

My own mother for being difficult to understand! And your mother for being a hot Scorpio in her sixties??

What are you listening to?

Kenny Roger’s The Gambler. Babe, the best that you can hope for is to die in your sleep.

What are you reading?

I’m trying to read everything written by Ursula Le Guin.

How do you practise self-care?

I do whatever I want whenever I want and I only ever want good things! I guess I’m perfect.

What does being Asian-Australian mean to you?

Being… cooler than other people.