crests and troughs
18:57 24/06/2004
Dear Reader,
please note that this letter was first begun several weeks ago and whilst many, many things have happened since then, I felt it necessary to complete and post this one first, before continuing with any other letter.
Progress has been slow and hard since last I wrote. Indeed, even as I set pen to paper, I think I was fast falling into a trough. My mind has often felt clouded and stuck, as if it were in treacle. All the same, some work has been done and I hope and believe that another crest is approaching as the pressure increases. In any case, let us put such matters to the side and return to the subject, that I hinted at and ended with in my last correspondance.
You may have figured out the connection between the writers that I mentioned, but just in case, the connection is that they have all created characters that appear in The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. When I first bought this book, my interest in comics had been waning, but this book is such a marvellous piece of work. The writing is brilliant, the art is wonderful, but perhaps the best thing for me is the actual idea of the book. It is a piece of concept art, taking the idea of a 19th Century Picture Paper, complete with puzzles and a colour by numbers picture. There is a sheer sense of fun that pumps through the entire thing, however there is an adult sense about it. It’s quite violent, surprisingly so for me at first. But all this is probably not its greatest achievment.
In my mind the greatest accomplishment, and probably what the creators hoped to do, is to promote a lot of characters from the 19th Century that have mostly been forgotten these days, characters such as Allan Quatermain, Captain Nemo, Jekyll and Hyde and The Invisible Man. The actual idea of using these wonderful characters is I feel a stroke of genius. It is also very much in the tradition of storytelling, where older characters already established are used in new tales. A lot of the old art of storytelling has fallen by the wayside with modern literature, and whilst there is nothing wrong with originality, it is to be commended! It should also not be forgotten that there is a lot of work already completed that could be used to create new stories.
To finish with The League, I have also bought the second volume, which is just as good as the first. I look forward to future volumes. Just before reading the book, I saw the movie. I thought it was very enjoyable, sheer fun, if not the best film ever made. It of course is not as good as the book, very rarely is that the case. There is so much more in the book and the villain in the film just doesn’t quite live up to the villain in the book itself.
Yours truly,
The Writer.