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Without Words: Sarah Howell’s Untitled Squishface Booklet

~ matthewkirshenblatt ~ 5 Comments

I know that’s an ironic title considering that this is a writing blog, but it is also about a comic and I rarely use graphics on here anyway. The comic I want to talk about–created by Australian artist and cartoonist Sarah Howell–is challenging in this way to say the least.

In fact, I will be honest and say I never heard of Sarah Howell or the group she co-founded Squishface Studio, but I’m glad that I did. I didn’t actually run into Sarah or her work until after the Toronto Comics Arts Festival (or TCAF) a month ago. I’d finished my Volunteer shift there–mostly moving, taking apart boxes, and cleaning stuff up or what I really like to call the Teardown Shift–and after some dinner that was way too expensive I went to Lee’s Palace (which some of you might know from Bryan Lee O’Malley’s Scott Pilgrim, or just by living in Toronto in general) for the post-volunteering celebration.

It was actually Sarah who started talking to me first when she saw my rather bright sort of orange-pink TCAF shirt. She introduced me to her husband and collaborator David Bluemenstein and the rest of her team. They had apparently been on the Caravan of Comics Tour: an event in which Australian cartoonists traveled to comics events throughout the North-Eastern USA and Canada. So then over some very loud conversation and music we somehow managed to cover a wide area of subject matter. And yes, Neil Gaiman did come up. In fact, the ideas that formed my earlier Blog post about Jeff Smith and Bill Watterson came–in part–from our conversation at Lee’s Palace. Really, it was the most I’d talked with anyone at the Festival: before or after.

But at one point myself and another Volunteer asked her about her work (at least I think so over the noise, err music) and she placed in front of me this small chapbook. And now here is where the challenge really begins. Basically, Sarah’s comic is about a 16-paged booklet–double-spaced–with a scene on each page. It has no title and in fact it is a wordless sequential story: a wordless comic.

This is a concept that has fascinated me. I have seen really old woodcuts and copies of said woodcuts that do something very similar in just telling a story in pictures and little or nothing else. In fact, the only words in it were “The End” and Sarah’s professional email addresses on the very back of the booklet. Also, the way each sequential image is on its own page–instead of on different panels on one–is reminiscent of an illustrated book: except without words.

The figures in the book are drawn like glyphs. There is something very elemental and–if I had to choose another word–essential about them. I really wish I could find more bibliographic information on this untitled, wordless comic or even post a link to the comic itself because I feel that by describing it in words, I’m really not doing it justice. I feel also feel like Nevin Martell and his Looking for Calvin and Hobbes book that has no illustrations from the comic strips whatsoever, only even worse because I don’t have anything to really show here from it. It does figure these two characters–these snippets taken from Sarah Howell’s website–in the first and third pictures. There is also another picture in the Gallery of her site, but I don’t want to link to that because I don’t want to create any intentional spoilers. I will say though that the character resembles a well-known comics super-villain but it is not that being.

Sarah Howell’s comic was about two beings that meet and get to know each other: but when one seems to unwittingly overreach everything changes and it takes the third character to step in and change things some more. And he does not change things in the way that you may think he does when you first see him. That is all I can really say: that and even in the relative darkness of the Club, from what I could see then the story was touching enough to still make me cry a little.

It was a beautiful silent comic. Of course the term “silent comic” is a misnomer or a bit of wordplay in itself. After all, even written words do not have sounds unless they spoken verbally. I said something similar in an earlier review I wrote about Neil Gaiman’s graphic novel Signal to Noise. In a lot of ways, and I’m sure Scott McCloud has said this to some extent, comics is a silent art: as is writing in a lot of ways, but works like Sarah Howell’s here are all the more so.

Sarah Howell let me keep this sample of her work after she showed it to me and I will treasure it always. I’m not sure how or if you can order some of them, but I imagine if you query her on her website she will let you know, or have some kind of FAQ that might deal with it. I wish I could be more helpful. In a lot of ways, this comic is one of the most simplified but mysterious ones I’ve come across. If anyone has more direct information, you are more than welcome in posting it here. Also, you should definitely check out Sarah Howell’s works–and works in progress–at her above website.

Whatever the details, I’m glad I have it. I learned new things, met new people and got a comic. It was one of the highlights of my time at–and after–TCAF.

After the Fiction

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I wrote my first bit of fiction on here yesterday called Lethe and Mnemos. I haven’t directly linked anyone to it yet because I’m not sure how it turned out and it’s kind of an experiment: like a lot of the things that I planned to put in “Mythic Bios”: both on and offline. I’ll leave it up to you if you want to read it and the subsequent cycles of the thing that I plan.

When I first started “Mythic Bios” as an online Journal, I thought I would be writing a lot more fiction on here than non-fiction. It does make more sense though that I’d be writing articles on films, books and comics on here as well as some of my own personal thoughts. Writing stories takes time and a certain focus: at least on my part.

But this isn’t a bad thing. Not at all. Perhaps it makes more sense for me to have my creative notebook exist offline and have some commentary and popular culture articles be more public here. I also realize that anything I write on here in terms of fiction may well be construed as being published and it would be difficult to send these stories elsewhere.

However, this will not stop me. “Lethe and Mnemos” started off as a joke: or more specifically a creative “half-joke.” It came from a series of “oral stories” that I tend to make when I’m in a brainstorming mood and talking out loud: a more fanciful way of saying that it came from the place where I sometimes “make shit up on the spot.” Originally, Lethe and Mmemos were just the names of the different philosophies or orders of the people that I planned to combat each other and it was meant to be somewhat semi-silly. I do have another story that I wrote down previously that I can adapt onto here as well, and I think at some point I might do that.

I can always self-publish these stories–beyond them simply being on my Blog–and some of the things I come up with deserve to be serialized and have more immediate viewers. I also admit that I really like to have an audience for my work and thoughts and experiments like “Lethe and Mnemos” can be fun.

I will admit though that the above linked story probably has its faults: perhaps being a little too ostentatious and pseudo-philosophical–really just being plain trite at times–but maybe posting my other “Lethe and Mnemos” story might show it something of the way it was supposed to be. Perhaps some of the silliness will offset the cliche: like parodies are supposed to. Still, it was experiment to try it in that tone and I don’t regret it. After all, I’ve learned that a combination of silliness and seriousness–that parody that says something–can be very effective a story.

In other news, I’ve applied to another contest The CZP/Rannu Fund: specifically for the short story segment of their contest. The deadline was yesterday and it was yet another last minute entry on my part. Luckily, I had a short story on hand that I was proud of, and worked on enough to actually send. I have not heard back from them yet as to whether they had received the entry and I know I had some formatting issues with regards to sending it to them (try copying and pasting a Word document into inline email plain-text format sometime without it becoming single-spaced and eliminating all of your underlining: it can be a lot of the fun that it is not). But I was fascinated enough to see where I can go with it, so we will see what happens.

In the meantime, I need to write more stories and send them out. I also need to keep writing, and that is exactly what I am going to do.

Film Review: The Avengers and their Mythology Revisited

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There be spoilers here. You’ve been warned.

I wrote a very short review of The Avengers film a little while ago, but in light of much more detailed reviews and analyses: such as the relationship between genii Tony Stark and Bruce Banner, and Loki as master manipulator and challenger of the once and future geek status quo I thought that I might expand on some things a little more and maybe even respond to a few of these articles as well.

Remember, this is a spoiler alert: if you have not watched this film–and you should–then you have again been duly warned.

Avengers really reminded me of a lot of the lore that I used to read from Marvel cards and it totally played on the fandom that has generated around the Marvel universe and the superheroes that make up the Avengers team for decades. Again, I was at somewhat of a disadvantage myself in viewing this film because I have not seen Thor, or Captain America. Unlike Ex Urbe in the second link I posted, I knew that this wasn’t an extension of the great Ragnarok event that plagues the Nordic gods and it deals with the Marvel comics mythology instead: unfortunately I have been pretty rusty to that regard and having not been there in a very long or consistent time.

Each character was bang-on with regards to their comics incarnations as far as I remember. But like I said, I really like how they were played for the most part. If Captain America had been created in our time, he would been seen as a very transparent and tasteless living embodiment of propaganda. I know that during his Death in the comics world, there was a whole thing about selecting a new Captain America and showing just how different that Captain in our time would have been from Steve Rogers we know from WWII.

The Captain America in the film was played as a legendary hero–a relic of a certain moral structure that not even many people in his time or country embodied–and I like how he is seen as a piece of history: which for all intents and purposes he is. He is also still a human being who–while he follows orders–does not follow them blindly. After all, even after ages of suspended animation, Cap is not like the enemy soldiers he used to fight during the second World War. In fact, he makes reference to that time at one point in a very poignant but quick way that devolves into another battle.

Tony Stark is still a wise-ass that always thinks about contingencies, while Thor is still a strong being yet also very noble and cautious. I like that portrayal of the Asgard: because while his mythological archetype was generally stupid and little more than an over-sized brute that would have rivaled the Hulk in mentality and action, the Marvel Thor that we see is a being that wants to protect others and actually thinks about the implications of his advanced people’s presence and technology on the people of Earth.

I can’t say much about Black Widow and Hawk-Eye except to say that they seemed more like secondary characters compared to the others. I do like, however, how Loki plays on them: how he plays on both of them and you see as a viewer just how–for all everyone involved are supposedly superheroes–they are not all innocent. Certainly Samuel L. Jackson’s Nick Fury is as no-nonsense and as much of an “inglourious basterd” as ever: though a little more refined than the comics Fury (who I believe was a contemporary of Wolverine and Cap during WWII and he was the one who fought H.Y.D.R.A. instead of Cap) and in some ways very much more underhanded for the “greater good.”

I think though that the performances that really got me were Bruce Banner and Loki. First, let me deal with Dr. Banner. I have in fact seen both relatively recent films created around the Hulk, yet this film does something the others really don’t. Avengers looks at Bruce. You notice how I don’t say the Hulk and there is a reason why I do this in particular. In almost every other bit of media–film or otherwise–the green gamma beast is brought out for his spectacle effect and Bruce Banner simply tries to contain him. But here we see Bruce Banner as a person. We see a brilliant but haunted man who does not want to cause destruction and pain. He has suffered and yet despite this still tries to help people with his knowledge. He is a solitary person by his own perceived necessity if not by choice and in a lot of ways he is a very sad man.

A good portion of the film has people walking egg-shells around him and thinking they have contingencies in dealing with the “green nuclear djinn in a human bottle”: not realizing just how strong Banner actually is and how many “contingencies” he himself has undergone. Beth in her own review shows that the only person who doesn’t treat Banner as an accident waiting to happen or a potential resource is Tony Stark and she gives very compelling parallels between the two: to the point where I remembered Tony Stark taking a drink before dealing with Loki and actually wincing at that segment alone more than anything else in the film. They are both brilliant men that have their own demons. and they can relate to each other. However the difference is that Bruce Banner has a lot more control over the Hulk than people even think.

Personally, I think there is a difference between Banner being agitated enough to release him and purposefully bringing his alter-ego out. When he does the latter, the Hulk is in a lot more control and in fact–when it comes down to it–there is no difference between Bruce Banner and the Hulk. They are and always have been the same person. “The Other Guy,” that kept Bruce Banner from killing himself, is not just anger but a fury for passion and life and ironically as the film progresses you see Banner actually almost coming to terms with that. It is no coincidence how in the comics, Bruce Banner changes into the Hulk permanently yet manages to keep all of his intellect along with the righteous fury. Even in the movie, Banner says that the secret to controlling his power is that he is “always angry.”

And then you have the threat that brings all of these disparate beings together: Loki. Loki himself, like Thor, has his precedent in the Nordic mythological cycle. Loki is a trickster god and an agent of chaos. He is not biologically related to the Asgard deities but instead has Jotnar (or frost giant) blood in him. While Loki begins as a mischievous prankster, he ends up creating Ragnarok: the twilight of the gods. He transforms from trickster to destroyer. Perhaps in Thor, this role is prevalent as well in its own Marvel incarnation, but I want to talk about him in the film: something that I only alluded to in my earlier article on this Blog.

Loki feeds off of chaos and he is not an overt player. Ex Urbe really goes into immense detail with regards to Loki in the film, but let me just reiterate something I said in my last article in that he plays a really good game. He manipulates and feeds on the power of discord that the Avengers feel towards each other. His very presence caused their assembling and exacerbated the cracks between them. In many ways, he arranged it so that they were almost as dangerous as he and his allies were. As to how far his foresight goes–if he knew they and they particular would be chosen to deal with him–is another matter entirely.

As I said, Ex Urbe really looks at how clever Loki is. You notice, for instance, he barely ever fights and he likes to make his enemies think that they can always beat him. The moment Black Widow thought her interrogation strategy had worked on him, I knew she was screwed. Never try to trick a trickster or play their own game because they will beat you with experience. He sat back and let Captain America, Iron Man and Thor fight each other. And then, when he seemed to have failed in his mission to conquer Earth, he conveniently gets captured by Thor and they go to Asgard with the cube away from the wrath of the trickster god’s vengeful allies. All and all, I think he was right to postpone and then later ask for that drink.

I also really like the part where Loki is in Germany and he asks everyone to bow down to him and one old German man won’t who states, “Not to men like you,” and then later adds, “There are always men like you.” The thing that you need to understand is that Nordic mythology really played a powerful role in German culture. Others, including Richard Wagner, played off of these archetypes in the collective unconsciousness of the German and Germanic people. Wagner was also a really well-known anti-Semite and his operas were well loved by various members of the Nazi Party later on. Nietzsche referred to a figure of the “actor” or “demagogue in music.” Looking at Loki forcing everyone to bow in front of him–with the compelling words and presence of a trickster and “god”–with all of that historical resonance the immediate background and that old man standing up to him really put chills down my back.

In this, Ex Urbe might seem wrong in stating that Loki is attempting to help humans and gods beyond the status quo: that he is just another fascist power. Of course, there is another way of looking at this in an analytical sense: that by posing as a dictator (and one really bad at ruling apparently and inefficient in other ways), he is making humanity challenge him and the established order of things. Remember that the role of a trickster deity in mythology is to challenge the status quo and subvert authority. A trickster also helps humanity by giving it something that can potentially destroy itself and stealing it from the divine order, but also creating an order with it. In addition, trickster gods can take a lot of physical punishment–a lot of it–and they almost seem to goad others into delivering it to make them think they have the upper-hand. In this way, Loki is almost a comic mockery of the things he rebels against, a Wagnerian parody and by serving as that cardboard cut-out effigy he helps to subvert it. So perhaps in that way, Loki is more like Nietzsche’s Zarathustra than his “demagogue in music.”

Then there is Captain America’s reply to that–which actually plays well into the above idea: if Loki is leading him and others by the nose. There is also something else Captain America says afterwards. When Black Widow refers to Loki and Thor as virtual gods, he states, “There’s only one God, ma’am. And I don’t think he dresses like that.”

While this last quote can be seen as very culturally chauvinistic, because there are many different beliefs out there, it definitely shows Cap as a relic of his time: as someone who views the world in a certain way. At the same time though, if looked at from a different perspective, Cap could be seen as stating that even these perceived gods and superheroes–least of all himself–are not above a greater morality or law of some kind. He interprets that as God. The others interpret it as something else. Loki probably interprets it as freedom of power and chaos.

Of course, there are other concepts of absolute powers or incarnations of concepts as well. Long after the film is over and Loki is captured, you find out that the invaders were working with someone behind the scenes. The leader of the invaders tells his real master that invading Earth will only bring destruction and Death. Notice how I capitalize *Death.* Neil Gaiman was not the only writer who created incarnations of certain facts of life in anthropomorphic figures. In the Marvel Universe, there are beings called Embodiments and while you do not see Death at the end, you do see the being that … serves her female incarnation. And if you have read the comics, you know who I am talking about and you begin to realize that Loki is not the only being that plans things out. This is the Marvel plots-within-plots structure in film form, social commentary and mythological cycles of sequential drama all done well by Joss Whedon.

I think that I am going to leave this off right here. All and all I really loved The Avengers. I never even thought of a movie based on them and it worked very well. The mythology–both comics based and older–created excellent resonance along with Whedon’s trademark snappy dialogue. I also look forward to its sequel and I wonder … just what was that small dagger that Loki stabbed Thor with towards the end of the film? And just what role will Death and her harbinger play in the scheme of things? I hope to find out soon enough.

ETA: Here is an obligatory and intriguing article by M. Leary on gods in Avengers and Marvel. Excelsior!

Mini-Opera Aftermath

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So, after the events of the Impromptu Mini-Opera Escapade I undertook with only three days to spare, I came up with two small supposedly five to seven minute operas. Like I said before, this is something I’d never done before until this point and, quite frankly, I didn’t really know what to expect. This was one of the great challenges of doing something like this: basically showing the judges my writing skill through a form which I was almost completely unfamiliar.

I came up with one concept and then after sleeping on it, I came up with another that ended up superseding it. So because I really want to talk about my recent works, here is something of an outline about what I did in writing them and what I learned.

Words on a Screen: A 16-Bit Opera on an 8-Bit Track was the unexpected piece of the two that I made. It was derived from the seed-story On Paper by A.L. Kennedy: a story about two lovers that maintain a long-distance relationship by letters across the world. It was a very interesting story that talked about how people can touch each other perhaps more intimately through correspondence and words than even face-to-face, but I didn’t really know what–if anything–I could do with it. I was more interested in doing something with Neil Gaiman’s “The Sweeper of Dreams.”

Then I read an example opera taken from this seed-story entitled Facing the Truth by Tamsin Collison: the English National Opera’s librettist. She took what was in Kennedy’s short story and expanded on it into an interaction between two Soloists texting each other and debating whether or not it would be a wise idea to meet in the flesh. The irony is that as they interact and contemplate their decision, they are already in the same coffee house but are completely physically unaware of each other. It really struck me just how much that reflects the human condition: how we are an inherently social species yet at same time we are separated by space and our own heads.

“Words on a Screen” was something of a response to both Collison and Kennedy. I thought about a scenario where two geeks meet on the Internet, fall in love, correspond through different media and then actually plan to meet and follow through with it. I also wanted it to deal with the themes of human communality verses isolation, and distance and connection as well. Some of the verses just seemed to flow into place, but for the most part the entire opera–such as it is–struggled with me and it took a day indoors, and a food and Calvin and Hobbes break to finish what I started. The aesthetic of the thing–resembling an online chat room transcript–was inspired once I finished typing the thing on this site. For all it was an unintended piece, I was very pleased with it and saw a lot of ways it could be used to challenge what the operatic form can actually be.

Then there was my intended piece that turned into something else: The Sweeper: A Teardown Epilogue. Like I said before, the story-seed for this miniature opera was Neil Gaiman’s The Sweeper of Dreams: a story about a being that cleans up the detritus of dreams once dreamers awaken or are finished with them. I have read this story before in Neil’s Smoke and Mirrors collection, and then on the Mini-Opera site and got to listen to Neil read it on there as well: which is always a pleasure. Tamsin Collison’s own libretto of the story, What Dreams May Come, was also really intriguing in that it was specifically from the point of view of the dreams themselves.

Reading the seed-story and Collison’s creative example made me really think about my very intricate idea. Unfortunately, I didn’t spend as much time on it as I wanted to and my original idea would have been much longer than the five to seven minute duration we were given. I also realized that I needed more research on certain details and I wasn’t as qualified in my own mind to use my idea in the way I wanted to as I thought at the time. I will pursue this outside of this context, but let me just keep on track here. Although Neil’s story dealt with the Sweeper on a purely distant third-person level and Collison created her libretto from the first-person collective perspective of the dreams, I started to ask myself a question: how does the Sweeper of Dreams feel cleaning up the dreams and nightmares of others? Isn’t it a lot of work to keep being on teardown duty? Doesn’t it get tiresome after a while? Would he get tired of the long hours between sleep and daydreaming and absolutely get fed up by harassment and abuse? And does the Sweeper of Dreams dream?

In the end, the libretto that I wrote ended up dealing with exactly these kinds of questions. I looked at a possibility as to what it would be like to be the Sweeper of Dreams. In retrospect, I am not sure how well this piece turned out. There are some elements from my first idea that I couldn’t resist adding in there as an example of what happens to those who refuse to have their dreams cleaned away, but I don’t know how well that meshes and flows in there. Also, I think the piece ended up being more like a Musical than opera material.

But hey, they were both ad hoc experiments: done on the fly and with only the examples I looked at. I got to make some new things and experiment with a new form. In addition, although I am not a musical expert or creator, I could almost “hear” something in the almost poetic verse rhythms that I ingrained into both pieces to some extent. This Challenge really made me think and I am grateful for that. It was totally worth doing and definitely worth being the first creative works to end up on my Blog.

May there be many more.

ETA: I just found out that the Script Entries have seemingly been all posted up on the Mini-Opera site here. Unfortunately, it seems as though “Words on a Screen” didn’t make it, but The Sweeper: A Teardown Epilogue did. It also seems a few few other people are making their librettos from the Sweeper’s perspective as well. It’s a pity about “Words on a Screen.” I really liked that one, but I will say that my “Teardown Epilogue” has its moments as well. I don’t know how I will do–the judges have to choose ten entries out of all the ones that are posted there–but you know I’m just glad that I will get some reading.

ETA: ENO added my Words on a Screen script after all. Hurray! 😀

As they might say in the opera business, may the best fat lady sing. 😉

A Challenge

~ matthewkirshenblatt ~ 2 Comments

I’ve been very busy lately with a few things. This is going to be a short post. A day or so ago, Neil Gaiman’s Facebook profile informed me of a Contest he contributed a story to called Mini Operas. Essentially, the object of this competition is to create a script for a 5-7 minute opera using a “seed-story” contributed by one of three writers as inspiration. Neil himself sent in his “The Sweeper of Dreams” short story.

The challenge for me here is three-fold. First of all, I have never written an opera script before. I have barely even seen sample scripts of this kind. I am operating with a basic structure in mind: a story summary or idea outline followed by dialogue or script placed in creative or poetic stanza arrangements. I also know it will probably have a soloist and a chorus. The second difficulty is the idea for this impromptu mini-opera. I do have at least one idea, but it will take time to do it: assuming it is not still evolving. Then there is the final aspect of this challenge: I have approximately five days to develop an idea, evolve it, write it and send it in.

You might ask yourself why it is I’m doing this. What do I hope to gain from it. The answer to this question is weird. One reason is that Neil is involved in this Contest and he is one of my writing influences and inspirations. But another reason is very simply this: I want to see if I can in fact do this.

The Contest link is: http://www.minioperas.org/the-script-competition/

We will see what happens.

ETA: Sorry, I just have three days to make something. My bad.

Comics Review: Jonathon Dalton’s Lords of Death and Life

~ matthewkirshenblatt ~ 1 Comment

I know I’m not doing very much Creative Writing on this site yet, but I want to write about this particular work before I forget. I’ve always been interested in comics: both in particular stories and in comics as a literary art-form and accepted medium. A lot of my own academic studies focused on certain comics works, though I will also admit that I’d been studying them long before I ever applied to York’s Humanities Graduate Program.

So this is going to be a comics review: which is something that I like to do from time to time. Like I said in my last review, I appreciate the difficulty in analyzing a comic: especially when you don’t feel comfortable copying or pasting parts of it for others to see in your review. However, I will do my best to make clear references here, but to also not spoil any of the details.

Unlike my last review, which looked at an examination of a cartoonist creator of a comic strip, this review will focus on a comic I picked up not too long ago. I found Lords of Death and Life at this year’s Toronto Comics Arts Festival at the booth of its creator Jonathon Dalton. The cover struck me first: with a fallen Mayan man and a priest above him with an obsidian dagger. They are surrounding by Mesoamerican glyphs or pictographs. It looked like the cover of a children’s storybook or an introductory junior level book into Mayan or Aztec culture: much like something I would have looked at in back when our class examined the Aztecs back in elementary school.

It’s storybook illustrations did catch my eye, but I admit I almost didn’t buy the book: even when talking with its creator for while. Very few books at this year’s Festival intrigued me enough to buy anything with the little birthday money I had left over. However, something called me back to it. And I noticed there was a small review by Scott McCloud on the back cover talking about how Dalton’s book was “an intoxicating fusion of ancient design and modern imagination.” Scott McCloud is not only a well-known cartoonist in his own right, but he is also a comics-scholar that wrote a series of books talking about the comics medium in and through the comics medium–as comics themselves–such as Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art, Making Comics and the rest.

The reason I mention this is that he, along with the legendary comics creator legend Will Eisner–considered by some to be the grandfather or godfather of the comics medium–point out that many ancient cultures possessed a sequential pictographic format of telling stories, or recording language. I believe both Eisner and McCloud look at Egyptian hieroglyphics and Mayan friezes as examples of a “sequential art” used to depict stories and record information.

This is another thing that I found so fascinating about Dalton’s comic. He actually incorporates Mayan or Mesoamerican glyphs into his comic. There is an entire section of panels that tells a part of the story as if the reader is looking at a Mayan frieze. At first, this can be very confusing until you realize that he has a very handy glossary at the end of his book which also tells you which glyphs he had learned and which ones he also had to make some creative approximations or guesswork for. If you don’t know about this, however, the beginning can be very confusing: especially when the main character Mol Kupul keeps referring to the date of each day from the Mayan understanding of time.

I also don’t know what to say without spoiling the story, but as I read on I was greatly impressed with where the plot went. You begin to see that a series of seemingly unrelated events are actually quite related and there is a truly epic battle at the end of the narrative, followed by an ending more bittersweet than Mayan chocolate drunken out of a golden cup of blood: so much so that I think it really opens itself up to the potential for a sequel and one I would definitely not mind reading.

If Lords of Death and Life has any more issues, it would be that there are many Mesoamerican cultural references and names of which many readers might not be familiar and would have to greatly pay attention to or reread carefully to get full reading comprehension. Also, the speech of the spirit character in this work–the uay companion spirit–is more than a little over the top and sometimes choppy. However, Dalton does succeed in bringing you into a whole other world with the interaction between Mayans and Aztecs and he definitely plays with your expectations as to what will happen. Also know that by the time the story begins, it is already over and you as a reader are only beginning to find out how everything transpired. It is an excellent storytelling device and it gives you a peak into how an ancient Mesoamerican mindset functions as well.

I am very impressed with Jonathon Dalton’s work here. He manages to make a comic that goes back to the basics or the essentials of the form’s creation, and tap into that place where ancient pictographs and modern comics both parallel each other and meet. He has made something special and I wish I had talked with him more about it: though I take solace in that he signed the book I bought from him with an ancient Mesoamerican monster growling out my name. I think more people need to know about his work and more of it–along with information about him–can be found on his website here: http://www.jonathondalton.com/ where he has a few more comics and a work in progress.

I’d definitely give Dalton’s Lords of Death and Life a four out of five stars. I just find it incredible that one person could have done this much illustrative and written work along with all of the research to get there.

Now, hopefully next time, I will have a story of my own to begin here. Perhaps even a series.

Hello and Welcome

~ matthewkirshenblatt ~ Leave a comment

Hello everyone. My name is Matthew Kirshenblatt and this is my first ever Writing Blog. While I have had other online journals before this, I am both excited and somewhat daunted by the prospect of making this one. But before I go on some other kind of tangent, I’d like to go into a little more detail about myself and what I want to do here.

Up until fairly recently, I’ve been a Graduate Student at York University working for my Master’s Degree in the Humanities. I guess it might just be easier to say that I have been in school for a very long time and it will be very strange not to be after my Convocation this coming June. At the same time, I am greatly relieved to finally graduate and move on towards some other pursuits. Perhaps I’ll pursue my PhD one day, or perhaps not.

Now I’m finding that with one long-term goal no longer hanging over my head, I have another Damoclean sword to contend with: finding a job. This has forced me to make some very difficult decisions–both financially and personally–but at the same time, it poses me with enough impetus to pursue a whole variety of different possibilities.

As a writer, I have published a few stories on Gil Williamson’s Mythaxis Magazine as well participated in a few writing contests such as Dark Idol, The Friends of the Merill Collection Short Story Contest and Albedo One’s Aeon Award. Aside from these, a whole lot of Amazon comics and novel reviews, and winning first place  in Zauberspiegel’s Adventurers in Hell Contest by writing a 400-word entry that sent Friedrich Nietzsche into Hell, much of my work still isn’t out there and I know that I need the means to make myself known. One of these means will be this Blog.

I mention in my site description that the title Mythic Bios created as a challenge and a promise to myself. I began this collection of creative writing sketches, vignettes, and short stories many years ago when I found myself in a creative rut. Really, I think of it as a creative space where I created–and still create–a writing laboratory for myself: a place where I could experiment with what I do.

It was at that time that I sat down and realized that I could only write about what I knew. At the same time–however–I also knew that what I didn’t know I could learn. It’s one thing to know something intellectually, but it is a whole thing to understand it on a deeply intuitive level. It’s awesome when these things line up, but it takes a lot of growing to happen and if there is one thing three years of Grad School and living on campus and downtown Toronto taught me it is closing that gap between knowledge and experience.

I’m still not done doing that, of course, but I have made a lot of progress. Which brings me back to the purpose of this Blog. I now realize that the Mythic Bios that I write for myself in various notebooks isn’t enough. I have written reviews of books that are scattered throughout Amazon, but that is also not enough. I have stories on Facebook, Mythaxis Magazine and other places but they are not unified. Moreover, I need a place to articulate my thoughts.

This Blog is going to function as all of these things and I will do my best to update it as regularly as I can: to make myself known, to find my reader-audience, to have my friends know what I am working on, and to perhaps even find new readers. I am still toggling around the settings here (I do tend to have some difficulty with technology), however please expect to see some short stories, thoughts, the occasional poem, philosophical fragment, book review and anything I find interesting enough that I want to post a link to or talk about.

So, I just want to say hello and actually begin this. I hope that whatever else, at the very least, you will be entertained.