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?

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

AOS of London

From Jerusalem Press.

 

AoS of London
Psychogeographia Zosiana

by Alan Moore, Gavin Semple
Art by Ben Thompson

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

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.

Ozymandias by Carlos Dearmas

Above a phenomenal Ozymandias portrait by Argentinian artist CARLOS DEARMAS.

 

For more info about the artist: Instagram - Facebook

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

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.

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: