You see here the versatile Peters’ visual interpretation of W.B. Yeats’ “When You Are Old,” a natural choice given his apparent poetic interests, but one drawn in the style of Japanese manga. In adapting Yeats’ words to a lady in the twilight of life, Peters has paid specific tribute to the work of Clamp, Japan’s famous all-female comic-artist collective known for series like RG Veda, Tokyo Babylon, and X/1999.
Clamp fans will find that, in three brief pages, Peters touches on quite a few of the aesthetic tropes that have long characterized the collective’s work. (You’ll want to click through to Peters’ own “When You Are Old” page to see an extra illustration that also fits well into the Clamp sensibility.) Yeats fans will no doubt appreciate the chance to see the poet’s work in an entirely new way. I, for one, had never before pictured a cat on the lap of the woman “old and grey and full of sleep” reflecting on the “moments of glad grace” of her youth and the one man who loved her “pilgrim soul,” but now I always will — and I imagine both Yeats and Clamp would approve of that. You can read and hear Yeats’ 1892 poem here. If you click on the images on this page, you can view them in a larger format.
Did Bram Stoker’s world-famous Dracula character—perhaps the most culturally unkillable of all horror monsters—derive from Irish folklore? Search the Gaelic “Droch-Fhoula” (pronounced droc’ola) and, in addition to the requisite metal bands, you’ll find references to the “Castle of the Blood Visage,” to a blood-drinking chieftain named Abhartach, and to other possible native sources of Irish writer Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel. These Celtic legends, the BBC writes, “may have shaped the story as much as European myths and Gothic literature.”
Despite all this intriguing speculation about Dracula’s Irish origins, the actors playing him have come from a variety of places. One recent incarnation, TV series Dracula, did cast an Irish actor, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, in the role.
Hungarian Bela Lugosi comes closest to the fictional character’s nationality, as well as that of another, perhaps dubious source, Romanian warlord Vlad the Impaler. Protean Brit Gary Oldman played up the character as Slavic aristocrat in Francis Ford Coppola’s somewhat more faithful take. But one too-oft-overlooked portrayal by another English actor, Christopher Lee, deserves much more attention than it receives.
The audio here was also recorded in 1966 by the book’s editor Russ Jones. Comics blogger Steven Thompson remarks that “since Dracula is made up of a series of letters, journal and diary entries, the writers here logically take a more straightforward route of telling the tale while maintaining the episodic feel quite well.” Rather than the voice of Count Dracula, Lee reads as the novel’s epistolary narrator Jonathan Harker, and the Dracula in the artwork, drawn by artist Al McWilliams, “bears more than a passing resemblance here to actor John Carradine,” a notable American actor who played the character in Universal’s House of Frankenstein and House of Dracula. Nonetheless, Lee’s voice is enough to conjure his many exceptional performances as the prototypical vampire, a character and concept that will likely never die.
Scholar and writer Bob Curran, a proponent of the Irish origins of Dracula, argues in his book Vampires that legends of undead, blood-drinking ghouls are found all over the world, which goes a long way toward explaining the enduring popularity of Dracula in particular and vampires in general. We’ll probably see another actor inherit the role of Stoker’s seductively creepy count in the near future. Whoever it is will have to measure himself against not only the performances of Lugosi, Carradine, Oldman, and Meyers, but also against the debonair Christopher Lee. He would do well, wherever he comes from, to study Lee’s Dracula films closely, and listen to him read the story in the adaptation above.
Two years ago, we highlighted for you the beginning of a promising project — Julian Peters’ comic book adaptation of T.S. Eliot’s 1910 poem “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.” At the time of our post, Peters had only completed the first nine pages of his adaptation. And, about those first pages, our Josh Jones had this to say:
Dante is where “Prufrock” begins, with an epigraph from the Inferno. Peters’ first page illustrates the agonized speaker of Dante’s lines, Guido da Montefeltro, a soul confined to the eighth circle, whom you can see at the top of the title page shown above. Peters’ visual choices place us firmly in the hellish emotional realm of “Prufrock,” a seeming catalogue of the mundane that harbors a darker import. Peters gives us no hint of when we might expect new pages, but I for one am eager to see more.
Note: Julian is looking for a publisher to help put his comic book in print. If any publishers want to chat with him, you can find his contact info on his web site.
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In the past, we’ve brought you the creative work of R. Sikoryak. An illustrator who teaches at the Parsons School of Design in NYC, Sikoryak has a penchant for creating comic book adaptations of literary classics. Take for example Dostoyevsky Comics where Batman stars in a comic book version of Crime & Punishment. Or Waiting to Go, which marries Waiting for Godot with Beavis and Butt-Head.
In his latest project, Sikoryak veers sharply away from literature toward language that is much more technical. Now, on his tumblr, you can findiTunes Terms & Conditions: The Graphic Novel.
Adding a new page every day, Sikoryak is creating an illustrated version of the “complete, unabridged legal agreement.” You can currently view the first 49 pages. Click here. Go to the bottom of the page. Then start scrolling up as you read.
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Would John Lennon’s “Imagine” have been such a big hit if it had come from an unknown singer/songwriter instead of one of the most famous rock stars in the world? Impossible to say. Maybe a better question is: could anyone else have written the song? “Imagine” has become much more than a soft rock anthem since its release in 1971; it has become a global phenomenon. Among the innumerable big events at which the humanist hymn appears we can include, since 2005, New York’s New Year’s Eve celebration and, just recently, a performance by pop star Shakira at the UN General Assembly just before Pope Francis’ historical appearance.
It seems an odd choice, given the song’s apparent anti-religious message. And yet, though Lennon was no fan of organized religion, he told Playboy magazine in a 1980 interview that the song was inspired by “the concept of positive prayer” in a Christian prayer book given to him by Dick Gregory. “If you can imagine a world at peace,” said Lennon, “with no denominations of religion—not without religion but without this my God-is-bigger-than-your-God-thing—then it can be true….” As if to underscore that particular point in his adaptation of “Imagine” in the video above, cartoonist Pablo Stanley includes such religiously diverse, yet ecumenical figures as the agnostic Albert Einstein, Protestant Martin Luther King, Jr., Hindu Mahatma Gandhi, and Rastafarian Bob Marley, along with less-famous freedom fighters like Harvey Milk and murdered Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya.
Stanley’s “Imagine” originally appeared in webcomic form, sans music, on his blog Stanleycolors.com. It seems that several people took exception to an earlier, mostly black-and-white draft (which also included what looks like the once-very-Southern-Baptist Jimmy Carter), so Stanley issued a multi-point disclaimer under his revised, full-color version. He states that this “is NOT an anti-religion/atheist propaganda comic”—charges also unfairly levied at Lennon’s song. Stanley doesn’t address the fact that most of the famous people in his comic, including Lennon, were assassinated, though this blog post offers a suggestive theory with interview footage from Lennon himself.
In every respect, the comic adaption of “Imagine” hews pretty closely to Lennon’s call for world peace. In another Beatles-penned ballad-adaptation, however, things take a much darker turn. Stanley uses his personal experience of near-suicidal depression in his comic realization of Paul McCartney’s song of lost love, “Yesterday.” (See a video version above, webcomic version here.) This is grim stuff, to be sure, but Stanley assures us that he “overcame that situation.” His commentary offers a hopeful take on the painful ending: “Looking at the yesterday reminds me that I should thrive for the tomorrow.” I’m sure McCartney would agree with the sentiment.
For many more smart, moving—though non-Beatles-related—comics from Pablo Stanley, see his blog, Stanley Colors.
Bob Kane created Batman in 1939 as a way to fulfill the public’s need for more comic book superheroes in the wake of Superman. And, by 1943, Batman made his way from pulpy print to the screen for first time.
In this video tribute to the many looks of Batman through the ages, Jacob T. Swinney advances chronologically, but also thematically, focusing on the interplay between Batman and his sidekick Robin; the fetishization of Batman’s tool belt; and the evolution of his costume from fabric (his classic look up through the ’80s) to the BDSM-inspired rubber outfits that have lasted since Michael Keaton donned the solid black get-up through Christian Bale’s interpretation. (It does seem that Ben Affleck’s version will not deviate from this course, but add some armor. He will also continue to perch on top of spires and tall buildings and stand watch over the city.)
The other evolution worth noticing is in Batman’s voice, and what it says about America’s relationship with authority. In the early serials up through Adam West’s iconic TV version, Batman speaks in clipped but enunciated tones, somewhere in the region of newscasters and G‑men. This connects Batman to the detective part of his character and telegraphs his innate goodness. But once Keaton takes on the role, Batman speaks in a low, gravely tone to suit his vigilante ethos, designed for meetings in dark alleys. This is how we want our heroes now.
This “serious” shift takes its cue from Frank Miller’s groundbreaking The Dark Knight Returns comic book, which is ground zero for every superhero film since that wears its gritty realism on its sleeve. This affected speech reaches its fairly ridiculous apotheosis in Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises, where both hero and villain are incomprehensible. The only thing left is parody, and that’s how we end this video, with Will Arnett’s voice animating the Lego Movie’s version of the superhero: affected, narcissistic, and believing too much in his own myth.
Ted Mills is a freelance writer on the arts who currently hosts the FunkZone Podcast. You can also follow him on Twitter at @tedmills, read his other arts writing at tedmills.com and/or watch his films here.
Even if you don’t like comic books, think of names like Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman, and you get a very clear mental picture indeed. Classic superheroes live, breathe, battle supervillians, and even die and return to life across decades upon decades of storylines (and often more than one at once), but we all know them because, just like the most enduring corporate logos, they also stand as surpassingly effective works of commercial art. But given that countless different artists in various media have had to render these superheroes over those decades, how have their images remained so utterly consistent?
That owes to documents such as the 1982 DC Comics Style Guide, scanned and recently posted to a Facebook group for fans of comic-book artist José Luis García-López. Having spent most of his career with DC Comics, caretaker of Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, and many other well-known and much-licensed heroes and villains besides, García-López surely knows in his very bones the sort of details of costume, physique, posture, and bearing these style guides exist to convey.
Being 33 years old, this particular style guide doesn’t perfectly reflect the way all of DC’s superheroes look today, what with the aesthetic changes made to keep them hip year on year. But you’ll notice that, while fashions tend to have their way with the more minor characters (longtime DC fans especially lament the headband and big hair this style guide inflicted upon Supergirl), the major ones still look, on the whole, pretty much the same. Sure, Superman has the strength and the flight, Batman has the wealth and the vast armory of high-tech crime-fighting tools, and Wonder Woman can do pretty much anything, but all those abilities pale in comparison to the sheer power of their design. You can flip through the rest of the Style Guide here.
It is surprising to me, but a few people I’ve come across don’t know the name of cartoonist Robert Crumb, cult hero of underground comics and obscure Americana record collecting. On second thought, maybe this shouldn’t come as such a surprise. These are some pretty small worlds, after all, populated by obsessive fans and archivists and not always particularly welcoming to outsiders. But Crumb is different. For all his social awkwardness and hyper-obsessiveness, he seems strangely accessible to me. The easiest reference for those who’ve never heard of him is Steve Buscemi’s Seymour in Terry Zwigoff’s Ghost World. There’s an obvious tribute to Crumb in the character (Zwigoff previously made an R. Crumb documentary), though it’s certainly not a one-to-one relation (the film adapts Daniel Clowe’s comic of the same name.)
Whether or not Ghost World (or Zwigoff’s Crumb) rings a bell, there’s still the matter of how to communicate the lovable lewdness and aggressive anachronism that is Crumb’s art. For that one may only need to mention Big Brother & the Holding Company’s 1968 classic Cheap Thrills (top), the first album cover Crumb designed—and which Janis Joplin insisted upon over the record company’s objections. With its focus on musicians, and its appropriation of hippie weirdness, racist American imagery, and an obsession with female posteriors that rivals Sir-Mix-a-Lot’s, the cover pretty much spans the spectrum of perennial Crumb styles and themes. Above, see another of Crumb’s covers, for a compilation called The Music Never Stopped: Roots of the Grateful Dead, which collects such roots and old-school rock and roll artists as Merle Haggard, Chuck Berry, Bob Dylan, Reverend Gary Davis, Howlin’ Wolf, and more.
Though he objected to the 1995 assignment—saying to Shanachie Records, “You want all these people on a CD cover? What are they, like, five inches across?”—Crumb must have relished the subject. (And he was paid, as per usual, in vintage 78s.) Next to those posteriors, Crumb’s true love has always been American roots music—ragtime, swing, old country and bluegrass, Delta country blues—and he has spent a good part of his career illustrating artists he loves, and those he doesn’t. From famous names like Joplin, Dylan, and B.B. King (above, whose music Crumb said he “didn’t care for, but I don’t find it that objectionable either”), to much more obscure artists, like Bo Carter, known for his “Please Warm My Wiener,” on the 1974 compilation album below.
Crumb’s use of racially questionable and sexist imagery—however satirical—has perhaps rendered him untouchable in some circles, and it’s hard to imagine many of his album covers passing corporate muster these days. His recent work has moved toward more straightforward, respectful portraiture, like that of King and of Skip James on the best-of below, from a series called “Heroes of the Blues.” (Crumb also illustrated “Heroes of Jazz” and “Heroes of Country,” as we featured in this post.) See Crumb’s inimitable, looser portrait style again further down in 2002 album art for a group called Hawks and Eagles.
Crumb may have shed some of his more unpalatable tendencies, but he hasn’t lost his lascivious edge. However, his work has matured over the years, taking on serious subjects like the book of Genesis and the Charlie Hebdo massacre. For an artist with such peculiar personal focus, Crumb is surprisingly versatile, but it’s his album covers that combine his two greatest loves. “What makes Crumb’s art so appropriate for the album sleeve,” writes The Guardian’s Laura Barton, “is its vividness, and its certain oomph; it’s in the mingling of sex and joy and compulsion, and the vibrancy and movement of his illustrations.”
Crumb hasn’t only combined his art with music fandom, but also with his own musicianship, illustrating covers for several of his own albums by his ragtime band Cheap Suit Serenaders. And he even provided the illustration for the soundtrack to his own documentary, as you can see above—an extreme example of the many self-abasing portraits Crumb has drawn of himself over the years. Crumb’s album cover art has been collected in a book, and you can see many more of his covers at Rolling Stone and on this list here.
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