'Brighton: The Graphic Novel'
Apr. 18th, 2014 06:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
blahflowersBrighton: The Graphic Novel.
By Various
Twenty-eight writers and artists tell stories set between 1728 and 2013. Some are historical, some are personal, a few are fantastical, a couple aim for realism. We see beginnings, we see endings, we see life. We often see Brighton as it perhaps is rather than as it would like to be seen, a city supposedly noted for its liberality and creativity, as long as you're rich and white and don't want to rock the boat. If there is a theme that runs through the disparate and self-contained stories in this collection it is often one of façades being torn down, sometimes this is literal, such as with Henry Phillips's Anthaeum in the 19th century, sometimes it's more figurative when the truth behind a murder is exposed. Of course when each chapter is written and drawn by different people you sometimes have great stories badly illustrated and sometimes great artists wasted on inferior scripts. I'd be interested to know how much collaboration there was between the writers and artists on this work when this was an open call for scripts.
It's not terrible but really such faint praise is all I have to offer. Despite getting the nod from Bryan 'Alice in Sunderland' Talbot it cannot hope to compare, that was a focused and singular vision, this is just a bunch of stories. I generally prefer the historical stories (in this case I mean everything pre-1945) as they are mostly telling stories about the construction of Brighton. The post WW2 stories are largely personal stories that could be set anywhere that has a seafront and a pier. 'Brighton's Angels' by Glenn Stevens, Emelie Marjarian and Collette Tarbuck and 'Beside the Seaside' by Tom Harrop and Iain Buchanan inadvertently distil Brightons queer culture into drag queens and 70s homophobia while the latter story and 'Jonas Tindale: Night Man' by Jon Sapsed and Pete Katz are the only two stories with non-white characters. The blurb from the publishers suggests that the content of the stories was left up to the writers, all of whom from their bio pics are all white so what could QueenSpark Books do?
My favourite story is probably 'Short Back & Sides' by Mark Pembrey and Adam Moore about a local barber of the 70s and 80s. I love the artwork of 'The Sea Swimmer' by Ottilie Hainsworth and Salka (one of only a couple of the stories that address the sea that Brighton borders) and 'One Step Into the Future, One Step Into the Past' by Robin Tulley and Kathryn Miller which has Talbot-like qualities.
Getting hold of this outside of Brighton might be tricky. I got it from my local library and they had fun purchasing a copy. So why not try contacting the publishers or Dave's Comics in Brighton if you want a copy? Even if not entirely successful it's still a laudable project and, in the end, what could be more Brighton than that?
By Various
Twenty-eight writers and artists tell stories set between 1728 and 2013. Some are historical, some are personal, a few are fantastical, a couple aim for realism. We see beginnings, we see endings, we see life. We often see Brighton as it perhaps is rather than as it would like to be seen, a city supposedly noted for its liberality and creativity, as long as you're rich and white and don't want to rock the boat. If there is a theme that runs through the disparate and self-contained stories in this collection it is often one of façades being torn down, sometimes this is literal, such as with Henry Phillips's Anthaeum in the 19th century, sometimes it's more figurative when the truth behind a murder is exposed. Of course when each chapter is written and drawn by different people you sometimes have great stories badly illustrated and sometimes great artists wasted on inferior scripts. I'd be interested to know how much collaboration there was between the writers and artists on this work when this was an open call for scripts.
It's not terrible but really such faint praise is all I have to offer. Despite getting the nod from Bryan 'Alice in Sunderland' Talbot it cannot hope to compare, that was a focused and singular vision, this is just a bunch of stories. I generally prefer the historical stories (in this case I mean everything pre-1945) as they are mostly telling stories about the construction of Brighton. The post WW2 stories are largely personal stories that could be set anywhere that has a seafront and a pier. 'Brighton's Angels' by Glenn Stevens, Emelie Marjarian and Collette Tarbuck and 'Beside the Seaside' by Tom Harrop and Iain Buchanan inadvertently distil Brightons queer culture into drag queens and 70s homophobia while the latter story and 'Jonas Tindale: Night Man' by Jon Sapsed and Pete Katz are the only two stories with non-white characters. The blurb from the publishers suggests that the content of the stories was left up to the writers, all of whom from their bio pics are all white so what could QueenSpark Books do?
My favourite story is probably 'Short Back & Sides' by Mark Pembrey and Adam Moore about a local barber of the 70s and 80s. I love the artwork of 'The Sea Swimmer' by Ottilie Hainsworth and Salka (one of only a couple of the stories that address the sea that Brighton borders) and 'One Step Into the Future, One Step Into the Past' by Robin Tulley and Kathryn Miller which has Talbot-like qualities.
Getting hold of this outside of Brighton might be tricky. I got it from my local library and they had fun purchasing a copy. So why not try contacting the publishers or Dave's Comics in Brighton if you want a copy? Even if not entirely successful it's still a laudable project and, in the end, what could be more Brighton than that?