Hyperbole and a Half is a webcomic and blog written and illustrated by Allie Brosh. Started in 2009, Brosh mixes text and illustrations in each post to tell stories from her childhood, general thoughts, and the challenges she has faced, particularly with mental health.
The illustrations are drawn in Paintbrush and use an exaggeratedly simple drawing style as an artistic device. Hyperbole and a Half draws inspiration from "rage comics," with shared diction and simple, almost rudimentary art. The blog principally ran from 2009 to 2011. There were some later updates in 2013 and 2020, and as of 2021 the blog is inactive.
Two books based on the blog have made New York Times Bestseller lists, and the blog and books have received praise, particularly for their depiction of depression.
Creation and updates
Brosh started Hyperbole and a Half in 2009 to avoid studying for her college physics final exam. She uses the Paintbrush software to draw the comic. When the blog was fully active, Brosh would upload a new entry every few weeks. In 2010, she said of her career as a writer, “With my crippling ADHD and impulsive decisions this is a perfect job for me. I make my own schedule."
In October 2011, Brosh made a blog post entitled "Adventures in Depression" in which she revealed that she had severe depression. After that post, Brosh's blog was inactive for more than a year. In May 2013, she made a long follow-up post chronicling her struggle with depression and thoughts of suicide. Her site got 1.5 million visits in a day, and the number of supportive comments from people indicating that they were worried about her surprised her. The two posts from 2011 and 2013 are the most popular on the site.
After the release of a book based on the blog in October 2013, Brosh stopped updating the blog again. In September 2020, Brosh publicly announced the book with a new post on her blog, and in the same month posted a chapter from the book. , this sample chapter remains the latest post on the blog.
Contents and style
Hyperbole and a Half has been described both as a blog and as a webcomic. According to Brosh, "Hyperbole and a Half is not really a web comic, but it isn't really a blog either. Basically, it has lots of pictures and words and it really tries hard to be funny.” Each blog post is a mix of text and illustrations describing her life. Several are about childhood stories, such as attending a children's birthday party while heavily sedated or becoming a monster after getting a dinosaur costume. Others are events or thoughts as an adult, such as attempting to move house despite her dogs' behavioral problems, speculation about her character flaws, a grammatical pet peeve ("a lot" written as "alot"), or her depression. Brosh compared her combination of text and illustrations to stand-up comedy, saying, "[my writing] was more one-dimensional than stand-up comedy, in which you can rely on tone and facial expressions, body posture. And I wanted to find some way to commit that to the page. Drawing fixed all of those problems."
The drawings, mainly stick figures which draw inspiration from rage comics, intentionally appear crude. Brosh scrutinizes and refines her drawings, often doing 10 or more of each illustration, spending hours on facial expressions or body positions. Brosh said that each blog entry took around 24 hours to produce. The character representing Brosh loosely resembles a stick-figure with a pink dress, with wide-grinning, unfocused eyes and a triangle-shaped ponytail sticking up which she jokingly calls a shark fin. The character sometimes wears a grey hoodie when particularly depressed. Brosh said in a 2020 interview, "I feel very awkward a lot, and so I want to represent myself with this awkward thing, this thing that doesn't quite look like a person. Maybe it looks like some sort of bug or some sort of alien, because that's how I feel."
Brosh also posted several YouTube videos; some were animated versions of her blog art style while others were video recordings of herself.