Pagine

Apr 29, 2022

A for Anachronisms

Alan Moore reveals you the secrets of writing: HERE!
Excerpt from page 44 of Alan Moore's BBC Maestro Course Notes 1.0, related to the 21th episode of the series,  Period. Full course: HERE!
Alan Moore: [...] Watch out for anachronisms, as they can pull you out of the period quite forcefully. In Boardwalk Empire, Stephen Graham as Al Capone compared a character with half a tin mask on his face to Frankenstein. Although Mary Shelley had written the novel in 1815, and Thomas Edison had produced a silent short film in 1910, a semi-literate Chicago gangster is not going to be referencing a Mary Shelley novel in 1920. Similarly, Steve Buscemi’s character greets his stepchildren as munchkins. While L. Frank Baum’s novel was written, nobody would have been referencing Wizard Of Oz characters until the MGM film in the thirties. This sort of thing can completely destroy a sense of period. Perhaps not everybody will notice, but there will always be people like me who will and probably bear a grudge against you for the rest of your life. And you don’t want that. [...]

Apr 28, 2022

Tarot Moore by Sergio Algozzino

Digital art by Sergio Algozzino
Above, a stunning and magic Alan Moore, extraordinary tarot version, by Italian multi-talented artist - comic book artist, graphic novelist, colorist, musician, pop culture expert and... much more - SERGIO ALGOZZINO!
 
Grazie mille, Sergio, my dear friend!
 
For more info about the artist: Instagram - YouTube - Facebook - Wikipedia page (in Italian)

Apr 22, 2022

Illuminations covers and... more!

Above, UK cover for Illuminations. Below, US cover version.
The book, published by Bloomsbury, will be available in hardback, eBook and audiobook on 11 October 2022. 
Furthermore, from an interview published on EW.com site:
What is your favorite part of this book?
Alan Moore: I have favourite scenes in every one of the collection's stories, but the one my thoughts keep drifting back to is a brisk, athletic — and, to my mind, intensely moving — swimming sequence in Illuminations' longest piece, "What We Can Know About Thunderman."

What was the hardest plot point or character to write in this book?
The most demanding story — all of it –—was "American Light: An Appreciation," where I first composed a lengthy poem by an imaginary Beat writer, good enough to have credibly restarted his career, and then added critical annotations in a different voice to provide the other half of the narrative. I certainly had to take my coat off for that one.

Write a movie poster tag line for your book.
THE MOST ILL-ADVISED ADAPTATION OF ALL TIME!!!
Read the complete article HERE.

Apr 15, 2022

Miracle Moore by Jeffrey Lewis

Art by Jeffrey Lewis
Above, an intense portrait of Moore by musician and comic book artist Jeffrey Lewis.
He posted it on his Facebook page some weeks ago with the accompanying text:
"I struggle... to impose a structure... that has meaning... on the madness that churns... within this continent... within this world... But tonight... I looked into a man's eyes... and glimpsed the abyss... and I fear... that it may... be bottomless...  I know... that there must be an answer... a light in the blackness... but I don't know... if I can find it... on my own. Constantine... Constantine... Where are you...? Why... did you leave me... in the dark...?" - Swampy
From Swamp Thing 44, the first Alan Moore comic I ever read!

Apr 12, 2022

Steve Gerber on Miracleman and Moore

Cover art by Garry Leach
Excerpt from the introduction written by American comic book writer Steve Gerber for Miracleman Book One, published by Eclipse in 1988.
[...] There is, however, a scene in this book that stayed with me since I first read it almost seven years ago, and a line in that scene that's equally unforgettable.
Mike Moran, having recently rediscovered his super-human abilities, is placed in the awkward position of having to explain to his wife Liz that is, in effect, a living cartoon.
[...] When Liz reacts the only way any reasonable human being would, with involuntary giggles, you can hear those, too.
The voices are real, and so are the emotions. Poor Mike can barely believe the words he's speaking; poor Liz doesn't want to snicker, but can't help herself.
Finally, overcome with embarrassment and frustration, Mike explodes: "Damn you, Liz, you are laughing at my life!"
When I read that bit of dialogue, I knew Alan Moore was to become one of the most important writers in comics.

[...] What impressed me was that Moore had actually thought about the characters --- and understood them. [...]

Steve Gerber
Burbank, California
August 31, 1988

Apr 6, 2022

2023: The Year of Magic!

Cover design by John Coulthart
Yesterday BleedingCool's Rich Johnson wrote
I attended London Book Fair today, and bumped into Tony Bennett from . [...] He [...] told me that a publication date had been set for The Moon and Serpent Bumper Book of Magic by Alan Moore and the late Steve Moore. [...]
 
Tony Bennett told me that there was now a firm publication date for The Moon and Serpent Bumper Book of Magic for 2023. The book is described as "a clear and practical grimoire of the occult sciences that offers endless necromantic fun for all the family."
Exquisitely illuminated by a host of adepts including Kevin O'Neill, Melinda Gebbie, John Coulthart, José Villarrubia and other stellar talents (to be named shortly), this marvelous and unprecedented tome promises to provide all that the reader could conceivably need in order to commence a fulfilling new career as a diabolist." We are also told that "
 
Its contents include profusely illustrated instructional essays upon this ancient sect's theories of magic, notably the key dissertation "Adventures in Thinking" which gives reliable advice as to how entry into the world of magic may be readily achieved. Further to this, a number of "Rainy Day" activity pages present lively and entertaining things-to-do once the magical state has been attained, including such popular pastimes as divination, etheric travel and the conjuring of a colourful multitude of sprits, deities, dead people and infernal entities from the pit, all of whom are sure to become your new best friends.

Also contained within this extravagant compendium of thaumaturgic lore is a history of magic from the last ice-age to the present day, told in a series of easy-to-absorb pictorial biographies of fifty great enchanters and complemented by a variety of picture stories depicting events ranging from the Paleolithic origins of art, magic, language and consciousness to the rib-tickling comedy exploits of Moon & Serpent founder Alexander the False Prophet ("He's fun, he's fake, he's got a talking snake!").

In addition to these manifold delights, the adventurous reader will also discover a series of helpful travel guides to mind-wrenching alien dimensions that are within comfortable walking distance, as well as profiles of the many quaint local inhabitants that one might bump into at these exotic resorts. A full range of entertainments will be provided, encompassing such diverse novelties and pursuits as a lavishly decorated decadent pulp tale of occult adventure recounted in the serial form, a full set of this sinister and deathless cult's never-before-seen Tarot cards, a fold-out Kabalistic board game in which the first player to achieve enlightenment wins providing he or she doesn't make a big deal about it, and even a pop-up Theatre of Marvels that serves as both a Renaissance memory theatre and a handy portable shrine for today's multi-tasking magician on the move.

Completing this almost unimaginable treasure-trove are a matching pair of lengthy theses revealing the ultimate meaning of both the Moon and the Serpent in a manner that makes transparent the much obscured secret of magic, happiness, sex, creativity and the known Universe, while at the same time explaining why these lunar and ophidian symbols feature so prominently in the order's peculiar name. (Manufacturer's disclaimer: this edition does not, however, reveal why the titular cabal of magicians consider themselves to be either grand or Egyptian. Let the buyer beware.)

A colossal and audacious publishing triumph of three hundred and twenty pages, beautifully produced in the finest tradition of educational literature for young people, The Moon and Serpent Bumper Book of Magic will transform your lives, your reality, and any spare lead that you happen to have laying around into the purest and most radiant gold.
 
A 320-Page Super-Deluxe Hardcover, co-written by Alan Moore and Steve Moore, and illustrated by various luminaries from the comic book field.
Read the article here.
 
So, it seems the wait is over... almost! I confess that I will believe it only when the book will be in my hands. And I can't wait to see any preview material. 
All is full of magic!
 
The Moon and Serpent Bumper Book of Magic is a co-production Knockabout and Top Shelf.

Apr 5, 2022

Sketching Moore by Marco Galli

Art by Marco Galli
In the past days I received the Alan Moore portrait commission that Marco Galli did for me. It's phenomenal: you can see it HERE!
The package was enriched by a small quick sketch (above): it's 100% Marco Galli, of course but... it makes me think of a strange magical mix of... Eddie Campbell's scratchy pen-and-ink style and Moebius' visions.
 
Grazie ancora, Marco!

Apr 3, 2022

Jarett Kobek, Zodiac and... Moore

From the blurb on the back-cover of Jarett Kobek's How to find Zodiac.
"A scruffy masterpiece of criminology. It seems to me that either Kobek's painstaking deductions are correct, or we must urgently revise the laws of probability." - Alan Moore, author of From Hell

Apr 2, 2022

Love the Language

Alan Moore reveals you the secrets of writing: HERE!
Excerpt from page 14 of Alan Moore's BBC Maestro Course Notes 1.0, related to the 7th episode of the series,  Language As Technology. Full course: HERE!
Alan Moore: [...] you’re going to need a love of language, of new and unusual words. There wasn’t a lot of that around in the working-class neighbourhoods that I grew up in. Nevertheless, my mother particularly enjoyed unusual words, as if they belonged to better-off people but that she had somehow got hold of them.
She would take such glee in saying, ‘Oh, our Alan, why do you have to be so obstreperous?’
I think it was contagious because I began to gather unusual words and there are some fantastic ones out there: craquelure, which is the web of fissures in the varnish on a painting; or xanthic, which is a much nicer way of saying yellow; and quaquaversal, which means spreading out evenly in all directions.

I used the last to describe a massive pile of pornography as a ‘quaquaversal strumpet cascade’. You might only ever use these words once, if that, but it’s great to know them.
[...]

Apr 1, 2022

The Leaguers by John McCrea

Art by John McCrea
Above, a stunning League of Extraordinary Gentlemen commission (
A2 in size) by British comic book artist and illustrator JOHN McCREA
Below, some making-of material.
Art by John McCrea
For more info about the artist, visit his official site HERE.