Jan 31, 2025

Brian Eno, again!

Below, final Q&A from the interview SOME MOORE. Part 2 of THE INTERVIEW FROM HELL! by Steve Darnall, published in Hero Illustrated n.8, 1994.
Excerpts from Part 1 are available here.
Obligatory dumb question: which album would you take to that mythical desert island?
Alan Moore: [long, slow, thoughtful breath] It's very difficult. I could never really whittle it down to one album or even 10 albums. I mean, you'd have to leave something brilliant at home, wouldn't you?
I suppose if I had to look at big influences, it'd probably be Brian Eno. Perhaps one of the early ones, like Taking Tiger Mountain By Strategy or Here Come The Warm Jets
Or maybe Another Green World. That‘d be nice music for a desert island, wouldn't it?

Jan 25, 2025

Superheroes, Herb Trimpe, Don Heck and celebrity

Art by Don Heck
Excerpts from an interview featured in Off Centre n.1, October 1989, a British fanzine edited by Gary Pearce. 
AN INTERVIEW WITH
THE EXCELLENT WRITER ALAN MOORE 
WITH QUESTIONS BY STEPHEN POULACHERIS
[...] Are you still as disillusioned with the "super-hero" as you have previously stated, and does this mean, if so, that we should expect from you in the future less stories of an overtly "heroic" or "adventurous" nature. Aren't elements of adventure, such as moments of extremity and a sense of the exotic, major forces in all narrative art-forms, and isn't the larger-than-life "heroic" figure ideal as a means by which to convey these-dating back, as it does, to the Greek gods, and so on?
[...] No, there won't be any super-heroes or adventure-hero stories in the foreseeable future, I'm not just tired of heroes... I'm feeling limited by the whole adventure format.
Real life just isn't structured like an adventure story..or like a comedy, a pornography, a horror story or any other genre for that matter. Genres are reductionist things that force the creator and reader to trim down their perception of the world until it fits the traditional confines of one specific genre. In horror stories,everything has to be creepy. In comedies, everything must be funny. I don't know about you, but my life is exciting, boring, creepy, funny, sad, sexy, prosaic and mysterious, and if I want to talk about my life or your life then I want to talk about all those things.
That's not to say that I don t enjoy doing the Bojeffries, which is mostly funny, or that I might not decide to work in any of the above genres in future. I might, if I feel the urge. What I'm saying is that at the moment, I feel a need to do work that gets to grips with the wider world that exists beyond the ghettoes of genre.
Hopefully, this is reflected by what I'm doing in "From Hell","Big Numbers" and "A Small Killing" ,as well as the work I did in "AARGH" and "Brought To Light".
To answer your question, yes, the adventure tradition may stretch back unbroken to Gilgamesh and beyond, tut that doesn't mean it's the only tradition worth considering, or even the best. It can express part of human experience, but by virtue of being a genre it cannot express it all, which is what I'm aiming for.

Who's the greatest: Herb Trimpe or Don Heck? (Don't answer if you can't decide!)
Without wishing to adopt a lecturing tone, you really shouldn't take the piss out of people just for the sake of a very old comic fan gag that should have been put out to grass long ago.
One of the important dividing lines between fans and pros is a certain openness and humility that comes from realizing just how much fucking hard work goes into a Don Heck or a Herb Trimpe page or just how many pages those gentlemen have turned out in the course of their not inconsiderable careers.
For the record, both ere extremely competent visual storytellers and precise draftsmen. Herb Trimpe, after Alex Toth and George Evans, is one of one of the best aviation story artists ever to grace the comic book medium. Don Heck, during the 1950s and early sixties was one of the most accomplished stylists working within the mainstream field. For my part, I'd trade a dozen of the John Byrne copyists that have erupted over the past five years for either one of the above-mentioned pair.
If I'm honest, in terms of the originality of the work stylistically speaking, I'd probably also trade Mr. Byrne himself. Hey, c'mon you guys. Let's have some respect where respect's due, eh?

[...] Do you still welcome the new acceptance of comics,or do you secretly wish that your favourite ones could be hoarded away from the sullying hands of the masses?
I want comics to be for everybody, not just for en elite, so no, that aspect doesn't bother me.The only thing that does bother me about the sudden mass acceptance of comics is the way in which all the signs point to us becoming a more literary version of the pop music industry, with all the shit, image and
hype that entails. Although I must take some of the blame for instigating this situation, I personally want no more to do with that phoney,redundant pop star element of things. Hence I don't do interviews in the fan press as such. Hence I swear never to appear on "The Tube" or "Get Fresh again in my life. All I want to do is work on stuff that feels good. I don't want to be a celebrity. For one thing, celebrities spend far too much time answering interviews when they should be showering and cleaning their teeth and wondering which of their many beautiful and exotic pairs of shoes and socks they should wear this evening.
Art by Herb Trimpe

Jan 18, 2025

AOS of London

 
AoS of London
Psychogeographia Zosiana


A unique guide to Sparean London with maps in the book, including one gatefold. And a large format fold-out map with the deluxe edition.

Presented here is the full interview transcript (7,600 words) with Alan Moore conducted by Steve Crabtree for the BBC Culture Show on the occasion of the 2010 ‘Fallen Visionary’ exhibition, Cuming Museum, Walworth, London.

Moore discusses his enduring fascination for Spare in relation to mystical and quotidian London history. During a taxi cab tour around Southwark, he investigates the Cockney milieu of Spare. And he examines works in the exhibition, discussing the magical implications of Spare’s art and how it nourishes him as a writer and magician.

Contextual History by Gavin W. Semple – Pin-pointing the domiciles and haunts of Spare’s South London, along with the taverns that the artist frequented and exhibited in. This is revised from the Cockney Visionary publication.

Among images of Spare’s art is a previously unpublished nude study belonging to Moore. There are 23 exquisite line illustrations by Ben Thompson (Master of the Art), evoking characters of Spare’s canon; from Paterson to Crowley, Blake to Blavatsky, that underpin Spare’s art and ethos.

Thompson has also produced a stunning cartographical puzzle with graphic inter-dimensional implications, revealing alternate hidden designs when partially unfolded. This is with the deluxe edition only, and a folio edition of signed prints will also be released.

A new concept in Spare studies? A unique guide for exploring sub-rosa London?
You decide, but do keep to the left-hand path…

Order your copy HERE!

Gosh! Comics will kick off their events in 2025 with the launch party of AOS of London... on Friday 31st January 2025! More info HERE.
Art by Ben Thompson

Jan 15, 2025

Prose vs comics

Excerpt from an interview published on Entrainment Weekly site the 3rd of January.
You can read the complete piece HERE
The imagery in The Great When is so arresting and vivid. Did working with great artists over the years, like Kevin O’Neill in League, influence your descriptive writing?
Alan Moore: Yes, I've certainly learned from some of the creators that I've worked with, but you have to remember that I had described those pictures for the artist. I've got the visual imagination, but I just didn't have the artistic chops to realize it as beautifully as I saw it in my head when I made the shift from cartooning to writing comics. My descriptive passages that were intended only for the artist are famously long-winded, and sometimes go on for pages for a single panel. Generally speaking, one page of comics would be about three pages of my script, because I was trying to describe everything that I could imagine in a particular scene.

So working in straight prose fiction, it's always been using the same sensibility and using the same descriptive of abilities, but just shifting the register up so that you are not just writing practical descriptions for an artist. You are actually writing literary descriptions that are meant to entertain and hypnotize the reader.

But it's basically the same process I have. I became very conscious around the time when I was writing Jerusalem, that yes, alright, I'm well-known for being a comics writer, and people have come to expect illustrated narratives from me. So in my prose, I want to really make up for that. If anything, I was being more keen upon generous descriptions to try and compensate for not having an artist like Kevin O'Neill or Melinda Gebbie or any of the other great artists that I've worked with.

And since I happen to be lucky enough to be married to Melinda, she has been very, very useful coming up with colors. If I want to talk about blue, and I've already used ‘blue violet’ and ‘indigo’ and ‘sapphire,’ she'll say, what about ‘lapis’? Oh, that's a lovely word. So that has been very handy.
Read the complete piece HERE.

Jan 12, 2025

Ozymandias by Carlos Dearmas

Above a phenomenal Ozymandias portrait by Argentinian artist CARLOS DEARMAS.
 
For more info about the artist: Instagram - Facebook

Jan 11, 2025

Taboo 2: From Hell and Major Arcana

Art by Alan Moore
Above, Major Arcana: The Lovers and the Star, a great illustration by Alan Moore published on the inside back cover of Taboo n.2 (Spiderbaby Grafix, 1989).

Below, selected excerpts from From Hell - being a melodrama in sixteen parts intro written by Moore, also published in Taboo n.2, page 121-122.
[...] “From Hell” is a post-mortem of an historical occurrence, using fiction as a scalpel. All the characters who populate the story once existed. The motivations I have attributed to them and the words I have placed in their mouths are based whenever possible upon exacting historical research. I have also relied upon guesswork and conjecture which, if not accurate. is at least informed. So far as I know, none of the facts stated in the story contradict those previously reported, and no pertinent fact has been ignored. Theoretically, the events detailed in “From Hell” could have unfolded just the way we describe
them.

But it isn't history. It's fiction. [...]

Indeed, it's worth remembering that all history is to some degree fiction; that truth can no longer properly be spoken of once the bodies have grown cold. The side that wins the battle decides who were the heroes and who the villains; and since history is written by those who survive it, their biases often survive with them.
This is not to diminish the importance of traditional history: it is vital to the continued
well-being of both ourselves and our culture that we understand the events that have
shaped the world that in turn shapes us. [...]

There is no hanging at the climax of “From Hell.“ The verdict remains open, the history books silent, the noose empty. All we have been able to deduce is recorded in these sixteen installments. It is a fiction, a mosaic of tracings and jottings, an enciphered communication from another age. It is a scarcely-legible note of terrible significance.

From hell.
Alan Moore

Jan 8, 2025

Dr. Manhattan by Marco Santucci

Art by Marco Santucci
Above, a recent commission featuring Dr. Manhattan by Italian comic book artist Marco Santucci.
 
For more info about the artist, visit his Instagram page HERE.

Jan 7, 2025

Bits of Magic

Art by Steve Parkhouse
As you know, I am writing a series of articles about The Moon and Serpent Bumper Book of Magic. They are serialized on the Italian web-magazine (Quasi) and so far four episodes are available.
In writing the pieces I contacted some of the contributors to get, if possible, behind the scene info about the book's making-of. 
In the following you can read what I got from Steve Parkhouse, who drew the amazing In the Morning of the Mind comics, and Rick Veitch who created some great illustrations for the first part of "Things to do on a rainy day" section.
Steve Parkhouse: I'm sorry to disappoint - but I have no background stories for you concerning Morning of the Mind. Bear in mind that I drew the strip sixteen or seventeen years ago so it's not really fresh in my mind. I appreciate your kind comments, but the story contains no revelations that I could discern. Since none of us were there at the time, the events depicted were obviously speculative. All the usual problems for an artist were predictable: where to find reference for giant deer, neolithic communities, credible landscapes etc. In other words, how to make the story come to life. 
I was never entirely sure of Alan's intention for the story itself. I formed my own interpretation: that everything in the universe is a fractal of the universe, and consequently natural forms tend to echo each other. That'll have to do.
Rick Veitch: I drew my illustrations over fifteen years ago and all I got to read at the time was the chapter I was working on. So no stories about the rest of it. I really loved finally reading it though. 
Veitch also mentioned The Bumper on his True-Man The Maximortal N.1 book released in August 2024. See the picture below:

Dec 31, 2024

The Bumper Book, TGW, aliens and Glycon

Alan Moore: [...] Well, The Bumper Book is about magic, whereas The Great When has got some magicians in it, but it isn’t really anything that is traditional magic — I was prepared to just make most of it up. The Bumper Book is an encyclopaedic history of magic and all sorts of other things as well, but we’ve got characters like Austin Osman Spare, Aleister Crowley and Dion Fortune in both.

So, there’s a tiny bit of overlap, but the intents of both books are different. One is to explain magic as it is and as it has been, and the other is an attempt to try and create something new in fantasy, without relying upon all the magical tropes you get reiterated so often in fantasy novels. [...]

I mean, the book is me and Steve but if there’s a third contributor it would have to be John, not only for his own beautiful art but his design of the entire book, and making all the other artists fit into it so beautifully. It was him who decided to have the cut-out and assemble temple at the back and the puzzle pages with the goat of Mendes as a join the dots picture, that was him. We thought as well as the immense amount of information in the book, we should have some fun as well. Something that reminds me of an old British annual like the Beano. [...]

[...] with the sequences in Long London I thought I want these to feel as disorienting as it would do if you were suddenly in another world. One of the things about this book is I’m really tired in current fantasy about how the kids go through the back of the wardrobe in Narnia and it’s not really a big deal. Y’know, people go into these worlds as if it was visiting Milton Keynes. [...]

Any time any of my characters enter The Great When, they’re vomiting, weeping, fainting, because that’s what I figure ordinary people would do, if something even slightly fantastic happened. If something happened that challenged your whole ideas of reality, you would fall to bits. Any of us would. We certainly wouldn’t be acting like action heroes. I wanted to get the alienness of this other world, I wanted to establish that. So I thought when we get to the Great When, we shift to italics, because italics makes everything seem more urgent, and shift to the present tense to make it more immediate. [...]

[about alien existence] Let’s act as if we’re on our own. If we do find some nice aliens at some point, that’ll be a treat, but let’s act as if we’re on our own and actively try and sustain life on this planet. Let’s not have these science fiction wank dreams that people like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson seem to be having, this cosmic circle jerk. Let’s not talk about terraforming Mars, because anyone who knows about that stuff knows it’s impossible. First we’d have to work out what turned Mars’ electromagnetic field off in the first place, because it hasn’t got one, and then turn it back on, if that’s even possible. [...]

[about Dennis Knuckleyard's name] Well, it was the first time it’s ever happened to me where it came to be semi-conscious, and I suspect a name like that can only come to you when you’re semi-conscious. I was drifting off to sleep and I was in that hypnagogic wilderness between awake and asleep, where there’s just a load of nonsense going through your head. Just a word salad, a stream of connected words and thoughts that don’t really connect but become a narrative you’re telling yourself as you’re drifting off to sleep.

I was just on the verge of sleep when the internal narrator said “so then Dennis Knuckleyard went…” and I sat up in bed, laughing. I just thought that is the most ridiculous name I’ve ever heard, I’m going to write that down. I did have a pen and pad by the bed for writing down dreams but I’m undisciplined when it comes to that so I don’t generally do it. I’d never written an idea down in the middle of the night before, but I put the light on, wrote “Dennis Knuckleyard” and then went off to sleep. It’s a great name, I did a little piece for the local Arts Lab magazine, an experimental piece where I actually tried out the name, not the character, but it wasn’t very satisfying. When it came to The Long London books, I thought that’s the one, isn’t it.

When I found out that there had never, in the history of the world, been anybody or anything called Knuckleyard then, rather than be discouraged, I thought let’s make him part of the story; that both Dennis and his mother have no idea where his now deceased father got the name from in the first place. Did he make it up as a joke? Is it a misspelling of some foreign name? They’ll never know. It was something of a gift. [...]

What I’m enjoying about Dennis is that in the first book he’s 18. The book I’m writing now he’s 28, he’s not grown up a huge amount but he’s grown up some and he’s doing some of that in the course of the book. At 28, you’re only just out of your adolescence, we don’t get out of adolescence until we’re 25, 26, so you’re not quite settled into adult life — you’re having to pretend that you’re an adult, but you’re not quite settled into what feels like an adult identity yet. That’s where Dennis is at the moment, and it’s interesting. One of the things about writing these books, one’s in 1949, 59, 69, 79 — twenty year gap — 1999.
So, characters like Dennis, you can show their development up through fifty years and you can also do that with the book’s main character, which is London. [...]

[about Glycon] Glycon, in various forms, is in the room with us. He’s on a bunch of Romanian postage stamps and money, that I’ve been sent over the year that have images of Glycon on.
It’s still a very big part of my life, even if he was a glove puppet. Especially because he was a glove puppet. [...]
The complete interview is available HERE.  

Dec 24, 2024

The Book of Magic: The Soul's evolution

The Soul. Art by John Coulthart.
As you know, I am writing a series of articles, diving into The Moon and Serpent Bumper Book of Magic section by section. They are serialized on the Italian web-magazine (Quasi) and so far four episodes are available: the last one is Ben Wickey's interview, in Italian; more to come.
 
In writing the pieces I contacted some of the contributors to get, if possible, behind the scene info about the grimoire. In the following you can read what the amazing John Coulthart revealed about... The Soul's evolution!

Special thanks to Coulthart for his availability and for the permission to share his answer on this blog!
I highly recommend to visit Coulthart's official site and to follow his amazing { feuilleton } entries
Let's talk about The Soul. It was originally a series intended for the ABC line, wasn't it? Was any story or page fully realized, in comics form I mean? I think that back in the day they described it as "a decadent, partly computer-generated occult strip". Then it was "transformed" for the Bumper Book. Can you talk about The Soul's evolution? :)
John Coulthart: The Soul was one of three new series slated to appear in ABC Cascade, a title which Alan described as being based on the DC Showcase comic of the 1960s. The other two stories would have been Pearl of the Deep, an undersea adventure to be drawn by John Totleben, and Limbo, a story about a dead character to be drawn by Shane Oakley. Alan wrote an 11-page outline of the proposed stories for the ABC/WildStorm people; I did a few sketches to rough out ideas for the character, I think Shane did something similar for his story but the Cascade title never materialised.
Showcase #61, 1966. Cover by Murphy Anderson.
The Soul in her original incarnation was named Isla Pascal Lamb, a woman who would have been a female equivalent of the occult detectives who flourished for a while in the written fiction of the Edwardian era, characters like John Silence and Thomas Carnacki. The idea was for the writing to be a combination of detective fiction and weird tales, while the art would be an amalgam of my interest in Art Nouveau, Decadent culture and the illustrators of the years from 1900 to 1925. I was getting heavily involved in computer art and design at the time, hence the interest in pursuing this in the new story but I never developed things to a stage where the amalgam of hand-drawn art and digital art was working to my satisfaction. She would have been slightly older than she is in the book, probably mid-40s, and looking like a silent film star or one of the flamboyant aristocrats of the era, women like Ida Rubenstein and Luisa Casati. Isla was definitely more of an aristocrat than she is in the book. Alan wanted her driving around in a huge luxury automobile like a Duesenberg, with a decorative scarab beetle on its bonnet.
Luisa Casati in 1922.
Adeline Carr, The Soul in the Bumper Book, is obviously a scaled down version of Isla Lamb, a younger woman who lives in a flat above a bookshop. The story retains some of the earlier characteristics of the Cascade outline--the chapters and the story itself are all titled like weird tales--while the scarab-clad Duesenberg became Alban's smaller motor car. The original Soul had already had occult experiences whereas Adeline's story is all about her first journey into the world of magic.

Dec 20, 2024

The Illuminist Moore

Above, cover of The Illuminist book: a collection of essays on Moore's work by Kristian Williams published by eMERGENCY heARTS.
The Illuminist: Philisophical Explorations in the work of Alan Moore

Alan Moore changed the way we think about heroes, monsters, and the stories we tell about them. From Swamp Thing and Watchmen to Promethea and Neonomicon, he has continuously subverted genre conventions and expanded the range of the comics medium.

He has also, as Kristian Williams argues in the essays collected here, given us in these stories important tools for re-examining the possibilities for justice, the nature of our society, and the sources for value and meaning in our lives.

You can order a copy here and here. Read a review here.