As mentioned last week, I binge-watched The Sandman on Netflix, which adapated the first two volumes (more or less) of the classic graphic novels from the 1990s. I remembered very little of the plots going in, which was probably a good thing, but this also inspired me to go back and dust off my copies of the books (which I could do outside, for a change of scenery without breaking isoaltion). And having started a re-read, I couldn’t very well just stop before getting to the actually good parts of the plots. And having finished The Wake last night, I could hardly fail to write about it here…
I’ve never been a Comics Guy, so this is one of only a handful of highly-acclaimed titles that I’ve actually read (others include 100 Bullets, Astro City, and Lucifer, along with the inevitable Watchmen and V for Vendetta). I tended not to find these a great value proposition back in the day— a graphic novel collection cost the same as a hardcover book, but took a quarter of the time to read— so only went for the stuff that people really raved about. And Sandman was at the top of the list of stuff people raved about…
In the years since initially reading these, I’ve largely lost interest in Neil Gaiman’s work— I was pretty annoyed when Graveyard Book won the Hugo, and I’m not sure I’ve read any of his books since— but I’m not enough of an asshole to do the “Sandman is bad, actually…” contrarian review. These are justly acclaimed books, and once the story hits its stride, it’s absolutely excellent.
That “once the story hits its stride…” is doing a fair bit of work, though, as the start is rockier than I remembered. This probably reflects the value-for-money thing I mentioned above: I was a broke grad student when I was reading these, so the first books I shelled out for were the bigger ones with the main plot— Brief Lives, Season of Mists— and I came back to the less essential titles later on. Re-reading them in order is a very different experience. There’s a lot of stuff in Preludes and Nocturnes and Dream Country that I had forgotten for good reason, and until very late in the run there tend to be these little horror side plots that are just pointless and gross. And even World’s End is pretty forgettable.
The collections that I remember most fondly really do hold up, though, with one exception: I really dislike the art in The Kindly Ones. The plot is just fantastic, but the super-abstract drawing style just doesn’t work for me at all, and really drags down what is otherwise a magnificent achievement. On net, my favorite of the books probably ends up being Brief Lives, edging out Season of Mists because it doesn’t have anything as grating as the issue with the dead boarding school kids. This is very much a Me Thing, though— if I hated the art less, The Kindly Ones would blow everything else away.
The overall story is great, but then I’m a sucker for the core plot of a guy whose overdeveloped sense of responsibility gets him into trouble one day. (He says, blogging from the department chair’s office…) I have a few quibbles about the choices a few of the characters make, and what we’re supposed to think about them, but in general it all comes together very nicely.
As physical objects, the trade paper collections I was re-reading are… suboptimal— the paper is visibly yellowing on pages that are supposed to be white, and I don’t think the reproduction of the art is all that great. We do have the special edition version of four giant tomes, but they weigh a ton, and were not the kind of thing I wanted to drag out to a lawn chair in the back yard. I probably ought to do a compare-and-contrast, though, because if I was noticing the poor quality, it has to be pretty bad… They do at least provide a convenient set of divisions, though— what was a bug 25-plus years ago is now a feature, as I could knock out a whole volume in an hour or two, which is way more convenient now that I have, you know, adult responsibilities.
Anyway, this was a fun re-read, and if you somehow haven’t read these, I definitely recommend the series (with the caveat that it doesn’t really take off until Season of Mists). I may go on to re-read Mike Carey’s Lucifer, which I remember really liking when they were new, because the graphic-novel Thing has been working well. Or I may shift to something else; it’s all up in the air at the moment.
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If you want to reminisce about Sandman or suggest something else that I ought to check out, the comments will be open:
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A friend and I saw Gaiman give a reading back in May. Highly recommended if you have a chance; he's an incredible storyteller and it's a treat to hear his words straight from the author.
I wanted to re-read my trade paperbacks too, but they're packed away at the moment. I mostly make do with the @RandomSandman account on Twitter. What I remember though is less up-and-down between the storylines, at least for me. But it's been fifteen years so my memory is likely not solid.
I do agree with you though on the art for _The Kindly Ones_. It distances me from the storyline. I'm sure there are many who love it - and more power to them - but it's a comfort to me that I'm not alone.
Gaiman's talent for pulling new stories from ancient, well-worn fables is unique. There are so many ideas woven into each volume that it's no surprise some work better than others. But the ones that worked well are locked solidly into my memory even a decade after I've last read them.