The murders are, of course, the central events of the book, and are depicted as an elaborate Masonic ritual by the killer with pages and pages of Masonic theory to boot , but devotes considerable time to even the minor characters, a sort of pantheistic character study of an entire society.
There is little doubt that From Hell is a "great work" from a strictly literary perspective. Its devilish intricacy and boldly experimental approach make it a pioneering achievement.
At the same time, it is not an enjoyable read. Setting aside for a moment its most uncomfortable moments most notably a gruesomely detailed depiction of every step involved in the Ripper's most famous killing , large patches of the text are dull and technical.
Other tangents, presumably included for "completeness," seem superfluous and distract from the central focus of the story. Making matters worse is the artwork of Eddie Campbell, which can kindly be called "pen-and-ink impressionism" and less kindly be called "chickenscratch.
Readers must depend on gross physical characteristics weight, facial hair, outfit to keep track of which character is which in many cases. Ironically, the best part of the book is an appendix comic-essay called "The Dance of the Gull Catchers," which explores the difficulty of studying the history of the killings. Moore and Campbell also provide an exhaustive overview of which parts of the story are fictionalized and which have some basis in reality, an exceptionally rare move in historical graphic fiction.
On the back cover, Moore states, "For my part I am concerned with cutting into and examining the still-warm corpse of history itself. The sad truth, however, is that this examination, while epic and masterful, still isn't especially rewarding to watch. While a work of fiction, this book includes a greatly expanded and detailed Appendix with factual notations as well as educated speculation from the author for each chapter and a period map of London giving the reader much food "This is the house that Jack built" Jul 20, Devann rated it did not like it Shelves: t-graphic-novel , c-dl , a-adult , g-historical-fiction , star , g-mystery-thriller.
God this has to be about the most boring thing I've read this year. Well, I read maybe I'm sure I'll get tons of shit for this, especially because Moore famously hates all adaptations of his work, but just go watch the movie lmao.
I just Someone else said they thought it was 'intentionally unreadable' and I mean that does sound like Moore, but it's still a dick move and awful to read. View all 5 comments. Oct 22, J. Keely rated it liked it Shelves: historical-fiction , reviewed , comics , crime. Ripperology is a mess of theories and conspiracies, an impossible puzzle which obsessive writers turn into narratives that tell us more about the author than about crime or murder.
Moore knows this as well as anyone, pointing out in his afterward that the whole thing has become a silly game, a masturbatory immediately recognizable to anyone familiar with discussions on the levels of Star Wars canon or Gandalf's particular racial background. I read this not with a notion that by the end I'd come t Ripperology is a mess of theories and conspiracies, an impossible puzzle which obsessive writers turn into narratives that tell us more about the author than about crime or murder.
I read this not with a notion that by the end I'd come to understand the ins and outs of the Ripper case, but to witness yet another of Moore's masterful deconstructions of the stories we like to tell ourselves. If the story had followed the approach laid out in the afterward, I'd be writing a much different review today, one about the presentation of truths and untruths, of allowing the narrative to deconstruct itself, to fall apart while at the same time drawing ever closer to some fundamental truth about storytelling, about our need for stories, our urge to make patterns out of nonsense.
That is an approach I'd expect from Moore--but Moore's presentation here is altogether too precise, too small, too lucid to really capture the grand mythology of The Ripper, a figure larger than any one story, any one account. There are a few excellent moments that draw this simple little story out of itself: strange glimpses of the future, a recognition of an age that is dying which is in fact about to be brutally murdered, its blood flowing through the gutters of all the great cities of Europe but these threads are not fully explored.
They are secondary to the neatly tied-up story, rather than its nebulous core. The long chapter where the killer wanders the city, explaining all the little particulars of his madness, was less than I have come to expect from Moore.
Such a lengthy and unbroken piece of naked exposition detracted from the notion that this was a story at all. As a reader, I want to be shown ideas, I want them to dance before me in all their permutations, then gradually coalesce into something more--a task which I know is not too great for Moore. Instead I received a lecture. Never have I known Moore to do so little to take advantage of the unique physical capabilities of the comic medium.
I also found Eddie Campbell's artwork terribly disappointing. The Mid- to Late Victorian is the single most fruitful period in the history of the pen and ink drawing style. Everything that we have done since then is merely a rehash of the pure variety and invention developed by those artists. One can study the art of the period to the exclusion of all else for a lifetime, and after fifty years, still keep discovering new masters, new styles and forms you've never even heard of before--an embarrassment of riches fathomless to plumb.
With so much to choose from, so much material from which to take inspiration, I was nonplussed by the sketchy, lackluster lines chosen define this story. The sense of individual characters is simply not there--instead we tend to see the same faces and forms, over and over.
There is little sense of form or gesture, flow and movement are lacking, and worse, the stark balance between the white and black spaces--the very power of pen-and-ink work--is absent.
The anatomy is particularly slipshod--especially when aping a period when anatomical precision was such a central, defining aspect of art. I don't merely mean classical forms--the Victorian was also notable for stylized caricatures, as in Punch's--but there still must be a precision there, a delineation of lines, a purpose within the artist's hand.
I understand the concept of an unsure, muddy world, a world of the past, seen through a thousand conspiracy theories and lies, but that thrust of history must still be presented with a sense of forcefulness, a trajectory--or better yet, many trajectories. I think of Duncan Fegredo, the greatest living comic artist, and his work on Peter Milligan's remarkable Enigma : it was slipshod, loose, and fluid, refusing to be confined, yet it still managed to be forceful, impressionistic, and vividly alive.
Some of Campbell's panels are better than others, reaching a height which would have easily carried the book, but alas, the common lot is of literally shaky quality. That is the visual form I would have hoped for here, but overall, the work seems to be a case of good ideas lacking the execution to match them. Moore's concept was beautifully grand and imprecise, but the end result was a narrative much too narrow to hold it. Contrarily, Campbell's art was too broad and nonspecific to capture the weight and thrust of history--even if it is an invented history.
My Suggested Readings in Comics Jun 07, Jonathan rated it liked it Shelves: horror , comics , historical-fiction. An interesting and To me unique take on Jack the Ripper.
I admit I do not know more than precursory knowledge on Jack; I've never heard of the theory that it was a Royal Family cover-up. So to me, this was a delicious tale. Unfortunately, the art, which is bleak and evocative, just didn't gel with me. It certainly fits the story, but I wish it were better somehow.
I also very much appreciated how Alan Moore, at the end of the book, took us through page by page and explained the historical accu An interesting and To me unique take on Jack the Ripper. View 2 comments. Nov 03, Emma rated it really liked it Shelves: comics-and-graphic-novels , crime , victorian-hf , british-hf , kindle-unlimited. Moore uses the royal connection as the true version of what happened.
It seemed plausible enough to me, especially the involvement of the free masons. Doctor Gull was horrible. Feb 01, Kosta Voukelatos rated it really liked it. From Hell is a graphic novel that closely follows the mystery and intrigue surrounding Jack the Ripper. I found it to be a harrowing investigation of the motivations that can lead someone to commit such gruesome atrocities.
I would definitely recommend this book for anyone who is interested in true crime or murder mysteries. Aug 11, Sud rated it it was amazing Shelves: crime , history , comics.
Alan Moore's From Hell could rightfully be called a masterpiece. It is a large tome measuring in at pages of story and 70 pages of annotated notes. It is the last part that truly imparts the tremendous amount of research Mr. Moore conducted on From Hell. Whether or not you will agree with his stated concept is the reader's choice, but do not let it prevent you from reading this wonderful work.
From Hell tells a story on a vast canvas. That canvas is the Victorian Era of London. This book is n Alan Moore's From Hell could rightfully be called a masterpiece. This book is not only a retelling of the Jack the Ripper crimes, but it is also a tour guide to Victorian London, it has social commentary on the rights of women and the rigid thinking associated with the Victorians.
The feel of the story, supplemented by the grim but very appropriate black and white artwork, is one of the miserable, grimy, almost inhuman conditions of the poor Whitechapel slums and the posh, shining and obviously wealthy sections of London where the gentlemen and aristocrats lived.
Moore puts forth the idea that Prince Albert, heir to the Throne, was having an illicit affair with a Whitechapel based prostitute. This affair results in a secret ceremony where the Prince used a fictitious identity of marriage and eventually in a child. When Queen Victoria finds out she has Prince Albert confined to the Palace and the wretched prostitute sent to Bedlam, the famous madhouse. Gull, operating as a loyal Freemason helps the Crown to cover up this delicate turn of events.
Eventually local prostitutes figured out what happened to one of their own and threaten to tell the sordid tale of the Prince, the Prostitute and the Bastard.
This leads to Queen Victoria's request to Dr. Gull to "deal" with the situation. Sadly Dr. Gull is a complete and utter loon. His solution and the subsequent police, media and local reactions are perfectly captured by the rest of the story as it unfolds.
Moore's look at Victorian London shows all the myriad forces at work in creating the Jack mythos. Moore also depicts Dr. Gull as a beacon leading towards the new century. Sometimes in the midst of his orgy of destruction, Dr. Gull will project himself into the future and see's the modern world. Moore implies that it was Jack that ushered in this "new age". The art is completely done in black and white.
Normally, I do not care for art that lacks detail but for this grim and dark story-the art just fits. Subtle touches such as depicting the Whitechapel slums as grimy and dirty by using an art style that emphasizes the shadows and the filth, whereas whenever he would depict the ordinary life of Sir Gull the art style was closer to a painted style which emphasized the opulence of the class of men such as Dr.
The art also serves to frame the gory murders-which are recreated in this story slash by slash. Just a warning for the squeamish.
From Hell is many things. It is a graphic novel, yet it is a great work of fiction as well. It paints a vivid and often brutally honest view of Victorian London.
It is well researched and while the historical accuracy of the Dr. Gull scenario is often debated by experts, Mr. Moore's tale does not lack for plausibility. I would recommend this to a broad swathe of readers- from those who would appreciate a true work of art to those who are interested in the Jack the Ripper tale.
A truly wonderful look at the genius of Alan Moore. Jun 26, Ona rated it did not like it Shelves: reads , graphic-novels. DNF - I had to stop torturing myself. It makes you confused an uninterested in the story.
View 1 comment. Apr 22, Jason Pettus rated it it was amazing. Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter. I am the original author of this essay, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted here illegally. So in what I think is a first since opening CCLaP last year, I got a chance recently to not only read a book for the first time but also watch a movie based on it for the first time in the same week; in this case, it was the "Jack The Ripper" conspiracy tale From Hell , with the original graphic Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.
So in what I think is a first since opening CCLaP last year, I got a chance recently to not only read a book for the first time but also watch a movie based on it for the first time in the same week; in this case, it was the "Jack The Ripper" conspiracy tale From Hell , with the original graphic novel by Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell and the subsequent movie version by Allen and Albert Hughes, known professionally as The Hughes Brothers.
I thought it'd be fun, then, to take a cue off the Onion AV Club's "Book Versus Film" essay series, and write one review encompassing them both; I'm not expecting this to happen very often in my life, though, so don't hold your breath waiting for this to become a regular series.
And indeed, the only reason I took on the original graphic novel in the first place is because I'm a big fan of Moore's, with this for example being the fifth full-length project of his I've now read after Watchmen , Miracleman , V For Vendetta , and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen ; and the reason I'm such a big fan of Moore's is because he is one of the most complex writers in the history of the comics format, penning project after project that not only have the gravitas of a traditional text-based novel but that perfectly exploit why they could only be published as comic books anyway.
And in fact From Hell is yet another good example of what I'm talking about; set right before the turn of the 20th century, in the waning years of the Victorian Era, it relies as much on the pacing of the graphic boxes on each page as it does on the plot itself, with Moore deliberately breaking the story at certain points precisely because of knowing that it's where that page will end in the finished book. Taking place in a grimy, crime-filled East End London, like I said this is Moore's take on the infamous Jack The Ripper legend, the notorious serial killer from the late s who was famously never caught nor even identified; and this being Moore, of course, his take on the whole affair is a complicated and fantastical one, a grand conspiracy involving the royal family, an illegitimate child, the Freemasons, a respected surgeon who doubles as a violent psychopath, brain strokes misinterpreted as religious visions, Medieval Christian churches whose architects snuck pagan references into the plans In fact, the more you read the massive From Hell which, be warned, is almost pages long , the more you realize that the Ripper story isn't really the main reason Moore even wrote this in the first place; this is more of a dark love letter to the city of London itself, one of the bastions of Western civilization and a place so steeped in history according to Moore that you can almost taste it while there.
Like many of his other projects, Moore's main theme here in From Hell is actually the complex and hidden patterns that are layered one by one by society onto history, of how these overlapping patterns both work in tandem and against each other, and how in a place like London it results in a 3,year-old matrix of power and magic, full of "hot spots" around the city where literally dozens of important events have all transpired over the centuries.
Ah, but then this delicate web is handed over to The Hughes Brothers Menace II Society , and things start falling apart alarmingly fast; there's a reason, after all, that this was the movie to make Moore famously declare that he will never again in his life sell the film rights to any of his future projects. Although to be completely fair, the problem is not really with The Hughes Brothers per se although as directors of the project, they are the ones ultimately accountable for the finished film ; no, the real mess starts right off the bat with the muddled, messy script by Terry Hayes and Rafael Yglesias, who surprisingly enough have a number of solid movies in their pasts including Death and the Maiden , Payback , and Mad Max: Road Warrior , so you would think would know better.
For example, the character Johnny Depp plays in the movie version is in actuality an amalgam of three different characters from the original book -- a policeman, a psychic, and a crazed opium addict -- not to mention that in the book, these three characters are supposed to not like each other, with personalities that naturally clash against the other two. Then add the fact that in the book, the psychic is actually fake, and admits so right on page 2 of the manuscript; in the movie, however, Depp's psychic visions are supposed to be real, brought on by the massive amounts of opium he is constantly smoking in seedy Chinatown dens, yet with all of this being suspiciously tolerated by his bosses at Scotland Yard.
It essentially turns the film version of From Hell into a schizophrenic disaster, a movie that can't decide if it's a fact-based police procedural, a horror movie with supernatural elements, or the Hollywood version of a historical thriller i.
Say what you will about Alan Moore's writing style which I admit can get awfully overblown at points, especially when he was younger , but at least he is a master at putting together a sharply focused yet wildly digressive story, and smart enough to understand how two such seemingly competitive elements can actually complement each other when done in the right way. It's a lesson that completely eluded the group of people responsible for the movie version; and that's why the book version of From Hell is ultimately so brilliant, and why the film version is ultimately so terrible.
Out of Book: 9. I bought this digitally from comiXology back in when it was on sale. And then it sat on my iPad for over year, unread and taking up space. One day, I decided to give it a go. I think one should approach this not as a comic, or even a graphic novel, but as a prose novel. It's a very dense read, and requires a lot of your time and attention. But I don't say this as a criticism. Once you get past the first pages or so, it tur I bought this digitally from comiXology back in when it was on sale.
Once you get past the first pages or so, it turns out to be a very fulfilling read. If you come to this after seeing the Johnny Depp film, you'll be in for a shock, as the original source material that the film is based on is much more layered and in depth and quite frankly a lot better than the Hollywood film. There's an appendix in the back which goes into detail of the research process Moore went into when writing the book. There's a lot of myth behind the Jack the Ripper killings, and at times it might be difficult for someone to tell what the difference is between fact and fiction, or if there's even a line between the two at all.
Moore brings all the research together to tell a story that's enjoyable for someone who might not be well versed in the factual knowledge of the white chapel murders.
I feel better for having finished it after it, admittedly, taking me a while and I think you will too. Feb 24, Bradley Timm rated it it was amazing. I find this book to be criminally overlooked; whether its relevance to the god awful adaptation by the Hughes Bros. Here is what I consider to be Alan Moore's personal best work.
When I finished "From Hell" I had a profound, inescapable feeling that I just learned something very important about mankind and human nature on such a level that it was difficult to quantify. The work is at once clinical, unsympathetic and uncomfortable, yet these reactions are so int I find this book to be criminally overlooked; whether its relevance to the god awful adaptation by the Hughes Bros.
The work is at once clinical, unsympathetic and uncomfortable, yet these reactions are so intense that one can only approve of Moores effective allegories. In choosing to employ the retro illustration style of artist Eddie Campbell served to compound the authenticity of his time-warp to the gritty streeys of London in the 's.
The story itself is an examination of the world through the educated dimentia of Jack the Ripper, who manages to make compelling, if not twisted, arguments for his double life as both a respected Physician of high society, but a murderer and mutilator of woman in the world first profession.
One could teach a short course on "Moore's" thoroughly researched gift to contemporary literature, but I'm content just highly recommending it to adventurous readers. Dec 29, Kathryn rated it it was ok Shelves: graphic-novels. I was surprised that I didn't like it. I didn't like the art or even the lettering.
Surprising how great a difference that made. Tiny panels, cramped print, murky and smeary black and white art: it just felt like a monotonous palette, at once over-detailed and sloppy.
I could see using a limited palette, perhaps with accents of red, but the art itself or the reproduction needed to be crispe I was surprised that I didn't like it. I could see using a limited palette, perhaps with accents of red, but the art itself or the reproduction needed to be crisper. I also thought there wasn't enough of a narrative to keep me engaged and sympathetic; various characters appeared and were butchered, but it felt more like death porn than a real story.
Feb 25, Derek rated it it was amazing Shelves: highly-recommended , comic-books , horror , favourites , read-in Ambitious, insightful, affecting, intricately mysterious, unnerving and unflinching in its brutality. I feel that a clock looses a bit of its lustre if you open its face and see the mechanisms and cogs at work.
I feel the reason why Alan Moore is so damn successful in the graphic novel genre is not just because of his experimental and unabashedly irreverent take on pretty much everything under the sun but, the simple fact that he refuses to condescend to his readers.
Alan constantly challenges us. He understands that we live in a chaotic, insane, and utterly absurd existence anyone that says otherwise is delusional and his writing never shies away from this- not just letting it seep into his wr I feel the reason why Alan Moore is so damn successful in the graphic novel genre is not just because of his experimental and unabashedly irreverent take on pretty much everything under the sun but, the simple fact that he refuses to condescend to his readers.
He understands that we live in a chaotic, insane, and utterly absurd existence anyone that says otherwise is delusional and his writing never shies away from this- not just letting it seep into his writings but, completely and utterly saturate them.
And this is exactly the reason why Quentin Tarentino succeeds in his particular medium, film as it is, as well. Because both Tarantino and Moore posit and illustriously illustrate worlds- with the movie camera and the pen, respectively- replete with drug use, sex, violence, gore, profanity, homosexuality, perversity; without treating these aspects as ends to a mean- as all often occurs in pop culture filth where such vulgarities are prepackaged for the wretchedly rapacious unwashed masses.
Instead these darker emanations of humanity's appetitive side exist as what they should be for narratives- means to an end- ways to flesh out the characters that populate them. After a medical procedure goes awry, his family discovers that Dodge's will dictates he be cryogenically preserved.
The book unfolds from there: A viable brain-scanning technology emerges, and Dodge's "connectome"—the full array of his brain's neural connections—gets scanned and saved. When his connectome stutters into digital wakefulness, it begins to shape a world around itself, giving rise to what those in meatspace come to call Bitworld. The uploaded mind is a well-loved trope in sci-fi, but it's often treated as a "hey, humans can do this now" sort of innovation.
In Stephenson's hands, that innovation is very much in progress. It stumbles from infancy into pubescence, with Bitworld and its denizens slowly gathering power and fidelity throughout the book until it becomes a death-haven for those able to afford it. All that power doesn't come cheap. Running Bitworld requires quantum leaps in quantum computing, and the world outside slowly turns into the engine running Bitworld.
As does the book. Fall spends more and more of its time in Bitworld, watching its souls reshape the space in ways both archetypal and transgressive—until about halfway through, when the narrative balance tips, becoming a fantasy novel about a quest inside the still-evolving Bitworld. Stephenson is going for something in this final third of the novel. In the world outside of Bitworld, little of that matters—but the more time spent in Bitworld, so too does that outside world matter less and less.
In shrinking and spacing out those returns to meatspace, the book begins to stall, and eventually unravels. What's most disappointing about Fall 's fall into its parallel prehistory is that it leaves a different, more urgent book unwritten—one in which Stephenson wrestles with the chaotic fallout of today's social internet.
Dodge's death may open the book, but disinformation catalyzes it: a massive hoax that makes the world believe a nuclear detonation has wiped out the small town of Moab, Utah. The perpetrators pull off their put-on with terrifying ease, making recent election-season shenanigans seem like an innocuous appetizer.
But then his world was made up. There were all kinds of obscurities and anomalies that I had to take into account. I mean it might be, but who can say for certain? I had to draw it in a way that was vague. How does adding color affect that vague style? The good thing about computers is they have a million colors. I remember when we used to hand-separate colors. They always like to put these glistening highlights on everything.
The thing with the color is, it gives me another layer of expression to lay over everything. Of all the layers of expression that are already in From Hell , it gives me another layer of suggestion.
I can make things more suggestive than you can in black and white. In black and white I do it with the cross-hatching. The cross-hatching is still there, but now I can take it and make it gray, put a dark gray over a light gray, or vice versa.
Have you been in contact with Alan Moore at all about this? I might jog his memory by getting the stuff to him in the next week or two. We did this page appendix to the original From Hell called Dance of the Gull-Catchers , in which we ridiculed all the theories, including our own.
Alan wants to do another one where he brings it up to date. After working on this for 30 years, why do you think people are still so fascinated by the Ripper murders? Whoever it was got away with it. What was it Popeye said? He was the first great serial murderer, before the term was even invented. Son of Sam and all the others got caught, sent to jail, or executed.
0コメント