"Who will help the widow's son?"

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So, From Hell. I'm reading it right now and I'm entranced. I'm also reading The Club Dumas so it's like a double dose of secret society/occult madness. I know that Moore's theory may not be correct (and he acknowledges that the source book was prpbably a hoax), but it's still a ripping good yarn. But it just doesn't read like a comic book.
Things I like about it: The dedication, the scratchy artwork, the humanization of prostitutes, the character of a flawed detective, the main theory. The fact we don't see Dr. Gull for the first 3 or so chapters, just his voice.
Things I don't like about it: Too many cameos by famous Victorians (William Butler Yeats, what the...?) too many drawings of penises, the overly long chapter where he goes around London in the carriage pointing out every monument, the futuristic visions.
So discuss with me all of your thoughts and theories here. C or D?

jocelyn (Jocelyn), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 12:56 (nineteen years ago) link

Classic, but more because of Eddie Campbell, for me. Alan Moore is, at times, too easily led by his desire to tell a completely different story.

Yes, Moore says in 'Dance Of The Gull Catchers' that there's probably no truth in any of it.

There's a lot of nice Hawksmoor references though, even if it does owe a lot to Ackroyd and Sinclair (who makes it into Dance Of The Gull Catchers himself).

aldo_cowpat (aldo_cowpat), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 13:40 (nineteen years ago) link

too many drawings of penises??? No such thing. EVER.

Huck, Wednesday, 1 September 2004 13:44 (nineteen years ago) link

Too much hermetic knowledge crawling around London? No such thing.

Indubidably classic. Should probably give it another read, actually.

Matt Maxwell (Matt M.), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 13:48 (nineteen years ago) link

I believe my girlfriend had some issues with the historical angle and the parts with fill-in writing by the London Department of Tourism. I'll let you know when I read it.

Jordan (Jordan), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 13:49 (nineteen years ago) link

The London tourism stuff is pretty fun for me except that it's all bloody Peter Ackroyd / oh the mysteries of the East End stuff - USE OTHER LONDONS PLEASE.

Great comic - the Canary Wharf sequence!!! Wow.

Tom (Groke), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 13:51 (nineteen years ago) link

It's certainly Moore at the top of his game. I think I've read it twice now, and it's so dense I still can't properly get my head round it. There are some magnificent sequences.

Wooden (Wooden), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 15:03 (nineteen years ago) link

"I made it all up and it came true anyway"

The only bit I don't like at all is the OMG HITLERS PARENTS bit.

Tom (Groke), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 15:18 (nineteen years ago) link

Things I don't like about it: [snip] the overly long chapter where he goes around London in the carriage pointing out every monument,

are you on crack? that's the best bit.

DV (dirtyvicar), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 15:21 (nineteen years ago) link

DV OTM - I'm a sucker for big conspiracy / plot reveals.

David R. (popshots75`), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 15:28 (nineteen years ago) link

too many drawings of penises

Whoa, I had no idea. [Click clickitty clicky] Okay, I've just ordered it from Amazon.

Vermont Girl (Vermont Girl), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 15:32 (nineteen years ago) link

I am on crack. I sold the baby, the white baby...
DV, I think I will re-read the monuments chapter after I finish the book--I'm up to the introduction of Mr. Lees--and it will probably be more interesting in perspective. I do like secret Masonic conspiracies though.
Yes, there can be too many drawings of uh, spunky penises.
Why did they change everything in the movie!? (Acutally, I don't think I need an answer to this question. This also fits in well with The Club Dumas reading, as they changed that too to make the more "horror" Ninth Gate) Sigh.
Has anyone read Patricia Cornwall's book about Jack? Jordan, what did your grilfriend not like about the historical angle?

jocelyn (Jocelyn), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 15:42 (nineteen years ago) link

Um, that would be your girlfriend. Although you may have a grilfriend, too.

jocelyn (Jocelyn), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 15:44 (nineteen years ago) link

Is she the one who wrote the one about Sherlock Holmes being Jack, or is that someone else?

I think she is my grillfriend, perhaps, we do use the George Foreman a lot.

Jordan (Jordan), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 15:48 (nineteen years ago) link

I think she is my grillfriend, perhaps, we do use the George Foreman a lot.

Madolan, that is, not Patricia Cornwall.

Jordan (Jordan), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 15:57 (nineteen years ago) link

I think Patricia Cornwall decided it was Walter Sickert. Though I have not read her book, I heard her being interviewed on the radio about it and she said she could tell from his paintings.

jocelyn (Jocelyn), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 17:06 (nineteen years ago) link

I haven't read Cornwall's book, so I don't know if it's good fiction or not, but for historians it's considered about on par with The Ten Commandments or Excalibur (as a historian, she's a good mystery writer, etc.) There was actually some tongue-in-cheek speculation about whether or not she realized there were, um, other people who had made a living out of studying the Ripper case and 19th century London in general, and that she might want to maybe read their books and stuff.

I like From Hell, but I liked it better when I read it in issues as it came out than when I sat down and reread it as a piece -- I don't know to what extent that might be just the rereading of it being less fun than the first reading, though. But it felt like it was because of not having to wait between issues.

Tep (ktepi), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 17:47 (nineteen years ago) link

What is damn impressive about Campbell's art is that it's almost completely 3x3(?) panels on the page.

And unlike other people here who think that "Gull, Ascending" was indulgent tripe, it was one of my favorite chapters and a great climax.

Leeeter van den Hoogenband (Leee), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 18:11 (nineteen years ago) link

This also fits in well with The Club Dumas reading, as they changed that too to make the more "horror" Ninth Gate) Sigh.

I'm reading the Dumas Club at the moment, basically because I wuvved the film. And I am thinking "what's all this shite about stupid Dumas novels? When are all the SATANISTS going to start appearing?"

DV (dirtyvicar), Friday, 3 September 2004 11:47 (nineteen years ago) link

The London tourism stuff is pretty fun for me except that it's all bloody Peter Ackroyd / oh the mysteries of the East End stuff - USE OTHER LONDONS PLEASE.

I kind of see your point on this, BUT the East End is really old, and it is kind of where I'm from, and it is where I stay when I go to London, so basically I am always much more interested in the OMG occult secrets of East London being revealed than in the equivalents for Hampstead.

DV (dirtyvicar), Friday, 3 September 2004 11:49 (nineteen years ago) link

Bloody tourists.

Tom (Groke), Friday, 3 September 2004 11:50 (nineteen years ago) link

Yes, the driving around London chapter is much better in retrospect. I am reading the first appendix, and I don't think it adds anything to the reading, really, other than justification for a few things and notes on the source material. Plus I keep thinking that it needed better editing. The second appendix, however, looks much more interesting. (But the Dumas parts are grebt!)
After looking it up, I have decided that I will not read Patricia Cornwall's book. It looks far too didactic and narrow.

jocelyn (Jocelyn), Friday, 3 September 2004 12:18 (nineteen years ago) link

I'm reading the Dumas Club at the moment, basically because I wuvved the film

They made a film? That's by Arturo Perez-Reverte, right? I read one of his other ones about a fencing master (which Amazon tells me is called 'The Fencing Master'), it was like beach reading for grad students.

Jordan (Jordan), Friday, 3 September 2004 12:25 (nineteen years ago) link

The film is The Ninth Gate, dir. by Roman Polanski.
It's a very good occult movie, but very very different from the book.

jocelyn (Jocelyn), Friday, 3 September 2004 13:09 (nineteen years ago) link

three weeks pass...
patricia cornwell's book is SO FUCKING POOR that i wonder if criminals convincted on the basis of her testimony when still a [whatever she wz in the legal system] will be citing it as proof of their conviction

her single best argument (= only argt apart from "blimey sickert painted some creepy paintings") is
i. there are a bunch of letters and postcards received by scotland yard (which no one thinks are) from JtR
ii. sickert's dna (derived from descendents) is identical to the dna on some of these
iii. if by identical you mean "when we use a specific test which narrows it down to mere tens of thousands"

her better bet wd have been to argue - as she does, in fact - by artistic examination, that sickert may have written some of the bogus postcards: this is anyway a more interesting story

mark s (mark s), Sunday, 26 September 2004 18:20 (nineteen years ago) link

nine months pass...
the film FROM HELL is worse that patricia cornwell's book, except for jonnie depp who i adore at all times

mark s (mark s), Sunday, 26 June 2005 21:28 (eighteen years ago) link

"you're only supposed to blow the bloody whores off"

Ward Fowler (Ward Fowler), Monday, 27 June 2005 13:40 (eighteen years ago) link

i gave up watchin when depp sat relaxing while his huge hifi phonograph played opera

mark s (mark s), Monday, 27 June 2005 14:07 (eighteen years ago) link

"I heard her being interviewed on the radio about it and she said she could tell from his paintings."

This alone makes me want to chop out Cornwell's womb and cook her heart in a kettle until the kettle melts.

Austin Still (Austin, Still), Monday, 27 June 2005 15:03 (eighteen years ago) link

A decent kettle is a tenner at the least. Don't do it!

Raw Patrick (Raw Patrick), Monday, 27 June 2005 21:24 (eighteen years ago) link

haha the grapes shtick (= they are more expensive than gold ingots in the 1880s) wz also way overplayed

mark s (mark s), Monday, 27 June 2005 21:29 (eighteen years ago) link


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