This week we’re running a series of replies to a piece Eddie Campbell ran in The Comics Journal. Eddie Campbell himself was kind enough to post an interesting series of replies in comments. I thought I’d highlight them below…so here’s Campbell’s further thoughts on the literaries.
Jaelinque wrote: “The original Campbell’s piece is perplexing. Or am I the only one seeing confusion between ‘literary quality’ and complexity/sophistication of the plot there? As if a ‘literary’ element of a work of art equals the retelling of its plot. This… is not how literature works. True, you can’t explain the value of Casablanca by its plot, but it’s not like you can do it for Anna Karenina either.”
You are very right. A couple of years back I was asked to write a blurb for Nicki Greenberg’s comics adaptation of Shakespeare’s Hamlet. I wrote succinctly about the ways in which Nicki’s cartoons added to, enhanced and decorated the original, to the best of my ability. When I later saw a dummy of the book I was surprised to see that my blurb had been replaced by a plot summary. I got on the phone and argued the matter, saying you wouldn’t put a plot summary on the back of Shakespeare’s Shakespeare, why are you doing it on the back of Greenberg’s? In the end my original blurb was reinstated in an edited form.
A quick check on the internet shows that they are back to using the plot summary:
“Denmark is in turmoil. The palace is seething with treachery, suspicion and intrigue. On a mission to avenge his father’s murder, Prince Hamlet tries to claw free of the moral decay all around him. But in the ever-deepening nest of plots, of plays within plays, nothing is what it seems. Doubt and betrayal torment the Prince until he is propelled into a spiral of unstoppable violence.”
source:
http://www.thenile.com.au/books/Nicki-Greenberg/Shakespeares-Hamlet/9781741756425/?gclid=CNr7iuDHsrUCFUE3pgoddiAAewYou are right to say this is not how literature should work. But a book publisher seems to think it’s how comics should work. Is this a depressing sign of the times, or a depressing sign of the relative esteem in which comics are held?
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In that online ad for the book, there is little about it being Nicki Greenberg’s graphic rendition of the play. It is presented as though it was, not even just the words, but just the plot, which is less than everything. Anybody with half a brain can get the plot in an instant google. The space allotted to that summary is surely wasted. It should have been a clever lure, if not mine then somebody else’s. Or am I overestimating ordinary people?
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Before anybody goes making stuff up again, my original blurb went like this (from the back of the book, as finally published):“The finest thing about Shakespearean drama is that the work can be restaged for every generation and in so many different ways. In Nicki Greenberg’s version, Hamlet is played by an inkblot with a crowquill in his scabbard. The settings sparkle; the interior of the castle has a decor of suspended clock parts, curious only until we realise that “time is out of joint.” Polonius pops in and out of a sheet of paper as he reads Hamlet’s letter to Ophelia, and Ophelia walks us physically through the botanicals so we don’t need opera glasses to follow the symbolism of the flowers. Greenberg’s adaptation of The Great Gatsby was entirely in monochrome and it’s exciting this time around to see her unpack a palette of riotous colour.”
I didn’t think of it at the time, but this is a precise example of my original argument. Book publisher doesn’t quite get comics and wants to replace apt description of the work, from an artist and former self-publisher of comics, with a potted plot summary. And we’re talking about Hamlet.
From Nicki Greenberg’s Hamlet (more images here.
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Now I need to repost my comment, here, right?
I am… let’s say still perplexed. In several ways.
First, I don’t quite get how does this publishing practice relate to comics criticism as practiced by ‘the literaries’. Are you saying that it comes from the same place of considering comics a subset of ‘books’ or is it anything else?
Second, books do come out with blurbs that are summaries, and it still doesn’t make the plot a primary criteria for assigning value to works of literature. Does this practice mean that the publishers don’t get what books are either? Do they not get literature as much as they don’t get comics? More? Less? If we admit that this plot-oriented reductionism doesn’t work for literature either, why do we single out comics as being the form misunderstood in that way?
Third, sorry, but I’m going to return to Casablanca yet again. I might be mistaken, but doesn’t it, just like most movies do, come with a plot ‘blurb’ of its own, be it on the back of the DVD or in the description of the movie on the streaming service website? Does that mean that its value is described by the plot?
Joe Wright’s Anna Karenina is now being shown in theaters in Moscow, and its promotion includes the plot summary. Its promotion in Russia, where the bare outline of that particular plot is known to ten year olds. Is this a depressing sign of of the relative esteem in which movies are held? Is this marketing practice a projection of the evaluation of the form’s place in the arts’ hierarchy?
The purpose of the cover of a book is to sell the book, it’s marketing copy. Eddie’s statement fails to address that fact.
Charlie Stross on book covers:
“The goal of the blurb is to convert the person handling the book from a handler to a purchaser; nothing more or less. It does not need to reflect the content of the book accurately, although most authors get awfully itchy and irritable in the presence of actively misleading blurbs. It shouldn’t spoiler the contents if there’s an element of surprise: this is one good reason for publishers to show marketing-written blurbs to authors before running with them. But that’s all. The blurb is an advertisement, not a plot synopsis.
The review quotes on the back cover/inside the front matter … obviously, good reviews are gold dust. But you don’t need good lemons to make lemonade. If Kirkus Reviews say of a hardback “this was an exercise in meretricious misogyny, stunning in the depths of it’s depravity”, do not be surprised if you subsequently see a back-cover quote like this: “Stunning — Kirkus”. (In general, the longer the quote, the more likely it is to accurately reflect the review. But see above about the purpose of a book cover.)”
http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2010/03/cmap-6-why-did-you-pick-such-a.html
Maybe the publisher in question thought Eddie was describing the book in his blurb, not selling it? It’s not clear why a plot summary would sell it either, however…
My point, or one of them, was simply that an awful lot of people who are in the position of talking about comics don’t know what to say, so they just tell you the plot. The business about the ‘literaries’ was a suggestion that a lot of this stuff comes from a bookish environment where discussing comics is still something of a novelty.
While most people I know chuckled when I told of the publisher who blurbed Hamlet with a plot teaser (I guess I am mistaken in thinking everybody would find that amusing- the world of today), I allow that telling the plot is probably the way to describe the contents of a book you are selling. Describing Hamlet as a revenge tragedy or Romeo and Juliet as the story of star-crossed lovers is no doubt useful. But leading with the fact that the book above is an ambitious and very unusual pictorial setting of almost the entire text of Hamlet would have been much more useful to both the Publisher and the reader, as this plot description is appearing in an online spot that doesn’t show this.
As a footnote, not relevant to my major argument, setting up the plot like that perhaps suggests that the book is to be aimed at modern eleven-year-olds who are not familiar with Shakespeare. It would probably also not be wise to presume that that they know what a “Denmark” is. They wouldn’t be buying the book for the plot. They’d be buying because the pictures would make for a quick and simplified reading of a book they are obliged to read for school. I’d have no disagreement with a blurb telling them this book would make their life easier.
Does this diminish your perplexity?
Similarily, if a stage production of Hamlet was blurbed with exclusive reference to the plot – rather than the distinctive direction, acting, set design etc – one would assume the promotional material was intended for the perusal of young children, or some other relatively uncultured folk.
Just off to the side, but…I really like Greenberg’s art. Thanks for bringing it to folks’ attention, Eddie.
Not off to the side at all. That’s what the blurb should have done. :)
Eddie: “My point, or one of them, was simply that an awful lot of people who are in the position of talking about comics don’t know what to say, so they just tell you the plot. The business about the ‘literaries’ was a suggestion that a lot of this stuff comes from a bookish environment where discussing comics is still something of a novelty.”
I don’t want to repeat myself, so I will not say anything about films and operas and, the theatre and yes, comics, having plots too so there’s nothing exclusively literary about plots. The problem is that you, who accuse people of inventing things, didn’t choose as an example of “a literary” a comics scholar who works at an English department in some U (nothing particularly literary there either, believe it or not). You chose Suat who incidentally talked about EC’s drawings in his post. Plus: he has nothing to do with any English department anywhere.
My educated guess is that this really is a defend the sacred cow at all costs kind of situation with the converted cheering on the side, calling names and spitting ad hominem attacks. Typical TCJ sub-cultural self-defensive venom.
Domingos, good day, my old sparring partner.
As in a chess game, I have projected ahead and can see that within three moves we will be reduced to arguing about the meanings of words, and I don’t want to go there.
hope all is well with you,
Eddie
are…are you guys playing chess-boxing? I don’t know about Eddie, but I assumed Domingos wouldn’t care for Bilal
arf! didn’t notice I had mixed my metaphors. But that chess boxing. It should be in the Olympics, I say. They’re cutting the Greco-Roman wrestling. Replace it with the Chess Boxing!!
Feeling guilty that Domingos might think I was I was rudely dismissive:
“he has nothing to do with any English department anywhere.”
Nowhere did I say I was talking about academics. I carefully avoided it. Indeed, several academics chimed in with comments and they knew I didn’t mean them. I deliberately found an inoffensive word that, like ‘comics,’ is an invention (not mine), and being, like that word, the plural of an adjective, some might say it doesn’t really exist.
“there’s nothing exclusively literary about plots”
when I wrote of the critic who “just wants a fair serve of story for his buck.” I could have enlarged the point to talk about ‘plot’ as a consumer measurable. It’s like weight. You can disagree whether a thing has meaning or value, like whether a cheese has quality, but you can’t argue about the weight. Put it on the scales and it’s either right or wrong. A plot is the thing everybody can agree on. A did this, b reacted in such a way, c was the result. And commonplace reviewing is really about no more than consumer recommendations.
Beyond these, it seemed to me that you wanted to get me into vertiginous argument about the meaning of ‘literary.’
If you really want to get literary, you should remove characters. Now that would high art.
I think Eddie has it backwards. You wouldn’t put a blurb on the back of Shakespeare’s Shakespeare, because it would be completely unnecessary: an effective blurb has to come from someone (or something) with cultural/literary capital to bestow on the object being blurbed, and nobody outranks Shakespeare.
The back of one of the Hamlets that I happen to have on my desk (the most mass-market of them) reads: “In this quintessential Shakespearean tragedy, a young prince’s halting pursuit of revenge for the murder of his father unfolds in a series of highly charged confrontations that have held audiences spellbound for over four centuries.”
That sounds like summary, doesn’t it?
Also, the Hamlet thing throws me off re: your larger argument about the overall insignificance of plot/story. If plot/story is subordinate to image, why would someone adapt Hamlet?
I also find Greenberg’s art really striking, and I gotta say, Eddie’s blurb sells me on that book a hell of a lot better than a plot description. The latter evokes a “ho hum, another Hamlet adaptation”, but the former makes me think that I gotta see this, with all the ink blots and colors. And isn’t that what the publisher should be pushing anyway? This seems like a cool, crazy take on the material, an artist trying to do something different and unexpected, and that’s what Campbell’s blurb points to, which a simple plot description could be plugged into any version from Manga Hamlet to Will Eisner’s Hamlet to Hamlet illustrated by Picasso. At the very least, that summary does a pretty terrible job of selling the book.
Hey Eddie: sorry for the lag, busy day…
My main objection goes to your title and the choice of Suat as a target, but, as you suggest, let’s talk about literature… or, better yet, let’s not…
The thing is that everything narrative was co-opted by literature. There are historical reasons for this, of course, hermeneutics started with The Bible, etc… This doesn’t bother me much, but I prefer to talk about narratology than literature. It’s a lot more broad and inclusive.
I’m a relatively good chess player (1800 ELO in a good day), but I would get a serious beat at boxing.
That makes you the only comics-interested person I know who takes part in chess ranking competitions.
I did, many moons ago, but not anymore. Now I just play on the Internet for fun. My “ELO” indication above was just an indication. I doubt that it means much to those reading these comments though.
An indication that’s just an indication. That’s it: I’m Mr. A.
Well, it’s nice to see some attention being paid to Nikki Greenberg. Other great Australian comics creators include Bruce Mutard, Mandy Ord and Pat Grant. With the exception of Pat, all these artists are published by Allen & Unwin, the guilty party here, but also the only publisher attempting to push comics into the literary mainstream in Australia. [Disclaimer: I am also published by Allen & Unwin.]
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Eddie Campbell says:
My point, or one of them, was simply that an awful lot of people who are in the position of talking about comics don’t know what to say, so they just tell you the plot. The business about the ‘literaries’ was a suggestion that a lot of this stuff comes from a bookish environment where discussing comics is still something of a novelty.
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Also, where a proper understanding of the art form and how it can achieve various aesthetic effects is still painfully lacking.
(Why, just this morning I was thinking while driving to work of this master’s “Pyjama Girl” stories in “Taboo,”and his approach of rendering the subject in question — an unidentified woman’s body, “on public display in a vat of formalin solution at Sydney University until the 1940s”*, as an almost childishly-drawn, rag-doll-like figure. Where a realistically rendered corpse would have been repugnant or horrifying, this figure — in an approach the non-comicscenti would be baffled by — made it a figure of infinite pathos.)
In fairness to the publisher, the original “blurb” is more like an excerpt from a critique; pallas is correct in noting their understandable wish for something that’s more of an enthusiastic “sell.”
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pallas says:
…It’s not clear why a plot summary would sell [the Greenberg “Hamlet”] either, however…
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Well, it’s not just a plot summary; for the dumbasses out there who think Shakespeare’s “boring”…
That’s unfair to Frank Miller, he’s a lot better than Shakespeare. He draws better so to all of us “Picturaries” he’s better.