Graphic

After reading, as always, William Safire's On Language column (on the word existential - do you pronounce it as ex-is-sential?), I skipped over to another column which caused me to send Safire this letter:-

In the Sunday Magazine of today, April 8, I found this blurb to a column written about Iraqi refugees in Cairo:-

"G. Willow Wilson is an American writer based in Egypt. She is the author, with the artist M. K. Perker, of a graphic novel, “Cairo,” due out in September."

Graphic?

That always meant to me that there was fairly explicit sex scenes in the book.

But somehow, I presume that the adjective is referring to a novel with pictures - for sure, being a novel, it would not be containing charts and data presentation forms, aka, graphs.

If existential, as you wrote, now means three things, what are we to make of graphic?

Yisrael Medad

Will let you all know what the Great Maven replies. If.