The flattened American landscape of minor writers

[rich]

One of the things not mentioned w/r/t graphic novels is the qulaity of
the artwork--you can be Shakespeare but if your art sucks, forget it
man.  One of my biggest pet peeves about Frank Miller--stories are
interesting (Daredevil for me) but geez most of the art associated
with Miller's books are atrocious.

I liked From Hell ( and the movie version); I appreciate Watchmen more
than hold it dear to my heart.
I'm waiting to read his newer work that he did with his
wife/girlfriend?  Lost Girls starring Alice (Wonderland), Dorothy
(Oz), and Wendy (Peter Pan) in say..hmm unconventional settings.
thought he was interested in doing a series on the Necronomicon?

Moorcock is all over Pynchon (AtD) I agree-(apologies, Mr P, a slip of
the tongue-oboy oboy)--MM wrote a trilogy of novels about airships and
time travel, in the same takes place during time period of AtD, that
Pynchon had to've read--too many parallels
I agree that comparing genres is unfair to the artists. No point really

Rich

On 2/26/09, Great Quail <quail at shipwrecklibrary.com> wrote:
> John writes,
>
>> Pynchon surely qualifies, along
>> with Roth, as a 'giant' of contemporary American letters, unless McEwan
>> just
>> meant 'giant of mainstream acclaim'.
>
> What about Cormac McCarthy? I would add him there, certainly.
>
>> As for Moorcock and Moore, I loved 'Watchmen' back in the day, and I read
>> some
>> Moorcock fantasy stuff when I was a kid, but when I finally got round to
>> his
>> supposed masterpiece, 'Mother London', I wasn't that impressed.
>
> I love Moorcock, and his influence on the world of speculative fiction
> cannot be truly appraised. But frankly, I prefer his "sword and sorcery"
> stuff, which are genre high-watermarks. "Mother London" was so-so; of his
> so-called more serious works, I prefer "Breakfast in the Ruins" and "Behold
> the Man."
>
>> To compare Moorcock with
>> Pynchon is laughable.
>
> I know what you are saying, but I disagree. I think Pynchon is a superior
> novelist from a purely "literary" standpoint (whatever that means! "You know
> it when you see it," etc.), but they actually share a lot of themes,
> particularly regarding the fluid nature of identity and the energies of
> sexual liberation. And on a more superficial level, well -- some sections of
> Against the Day -- the Chums of Chance, the sand-ships -- could have been
> lifted right out of Moorcock, if not lifted and skewed at a different
> angle... So, yes -- They can be compared, and I think *should* be compared.
>
>> Yes, there are some great comics, yes Watchmen is intelligent
>> and multilayered etc., but can it really stand comparison with the best
>> actual
>> novels of the post-war period, with Roth or Bellow or Pynchon, with
>> 'Herzog'
>> or 'Humboldt's Gift', 'Gravity's Rainbow' or 'Mason & Dixon', 'The
>> Counterlife' or 'My Life as a Man', the Rabbit Books, etc.? Surely the
>> answer
>> has to be, however regretfully, 'no'?
>
> Sorry -- I think the answer has to be "yes." I think that "The Watchmen" and
> "From Hell" stand at the pinnacle of their medium, the comic or "graphic
> novel." There are themes, passages, ideas, even *sentences* in "Watchmen"
> that affect me just as much as anything in Pynchon.
>
> But more to your point -- I think you are demanding a skewed playing field.
> The mediums are so different -- I am not sure it's fair to nail "the novel"
> to the masthead and proclaim, "All written word must compete for this coin!"
>
> I mean, I can just as easily imagine over at an Alan Moore group, someone
> saying, "Can 'Against the Day' stand in comparison to 'The Watchmen?' Why,
> Pynchon makes no attempt to juxtapose language and imagery, and there's all
> these crazy parts with cowboys having sex with poodles, and women are
> entirely two-dimensional characters!"
>
> --Quail
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