V for Vendetta is in my estimation Alan Moore's finest work. I know that Watchmen gets enormous attention and deservedly so, but it's always been this more relentlessly somber tale that's captured my fancy first and foremost. Perhaps it's because it all seems so exceedingly real. V for Vendetta first ran in the magazine Warrior, where Moore partnered with David Lloyd created a dour vision of Britain run by Fascists and standing up to them was only a single man who refused to be just a man and instead became a symbol of revolution.
The story survives because it found a home at DC Comics where thanks to the success of Watchmen, it has remained in print. I prefer it, but I think it doubtful this dour tale of a dark tomorrow would be so readily available if Alan Moore wasn't such a bankable name.
In these dystopic times, when leaders lie with abandon and plunder with little opposition, it might be moment indeed to reflect on such Second Amendment remedies. I don't recommend such drastic action, but we must always remember we are the masters of our own thoughts and so our own deeds. Two plus two is four and must ever be so. As the story tells us, the "last inch" of our freedom is our own integrity to know what truth is and hold fast to it.
The story survives because it found a home at DC Comics where thanks to the success of Watchmen, it has remained in print. I prefer it, but I think it doubtful this dour tale of a dark tomorrow would be so readily available if Alan Moore wasn't such a bankable name.
Despite the fact that Moore wouldn't put his name on the film version, the movie is exceedingly entertaining, if a bit more hyperbolic than the relentless comic story. But those are variations I think fitting to the form. V for Vendetta was written many years ago when it seemed that regressive forces were seizing command of both British and American society, a retrograde movement which fought against the future, a future filled with the promise of greater liberties for a broader range of peoples.
The story is about staying true to one's self when doing so is not just upsetting but possibly dangerous. Dangerous times are on us again alas and the words about Guy Fawkes have a resonance in these grim times.
Remember, remember, the Fifth of November
The Gunpowder Treason and Plot:
I know of no reason why the Gunpowder Treason
Should ever be forgot.
More thoughts after this handsome cover gallery.
Rip Off
Despite the election and installation of a new President a year ago there has been no full repudiation of the behavior of the previous four years. We have not turned aside the hateful rhetoric and behavior of leaders intent on making "America Great Again" or to turn it on its head "America White Again". That's really what it's about in the rough and tumble, a longstanding racism which permeates American culture and always has done since the very birth of the nation.
Even open violent attacks on bedrock democratic institutions in the light of day are diminished by some rabble rousers as merely "political rhetoric". Perhaps these folks imagine they operate in the tradition of V, but they attack our institutions not to afflict the powerful but to abet them in their crimes. Demographics will eventually change the destiny of this land, but alas this pitiful land will go kicking and mewling into that future.
Every Saturday morning BBC Radio 4 broadcasts a show called 'From Our Own Correspondent' in which BBC reporters from around the world talk about an event in the countries where they are stationed. On this morning's show one of the topics was about a town in Texas where Christian Evangelicals are trying to completely ban abortion even in cases of rape and incest. The Evangelical/Republican alliance seems like Americas's version of the Taliban and after they've banned abortion I assume they'll want to ban gay rights, civil rights for black people, the teaching of evolution and so on. We have lots of problems here in the UK but thankfully loony Christian Evangelicals stay on the margins of society and don't intrude into politics.
ReplyDeleteIt is a problem. I was raised a Baptist in a little country church so I grew up listening to ideas not very different from what you describe. But back when I was a lad politics was not a big agenda item for churches save perhaps for black churches interested in civil rights. We have a movement here which gets its steam from the internet alas which echoes very much the dystopic vision of The Handmaid's Tale. Women are seen by too many in my country as second class citizens and the struggle for women to get their due has been long in coming. They would be gobsmacked by comparison to the Taliban but it is exactly the same notion, that religious ideas control civil society and people must be forced to comply with the tenets of a given faith. They are open about gay rights and evolution but still coy about civil rights, though that leaks out in longer conversations.
DeleteI am always struck by Christians in the United States who imagine they are put upon because their attitudes are not immediately made into law. There is almost literally a church or two on every block in most of the towns I live around. All kinds with lots of names but even given that absolute dominance of the public culture they still feel like victims, like a little cult that had to meet in secret.
CJ, I don't think there's anything in the Bible that calls for Black people not to have civil rights, so you're over-egging the pudding when you suggest (inadvertently or not) that such a thing is part of Christian teaching.
Delete"Cain said to the LORD, “My punishment is more than I can bear. Today you are driving me from the land, and I will be hidden from your presence; I will be a restless wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me.” But the LORD said to him, “Not so; anyone who kills Cain will suffer vengeance seven times over.” Then the LORD put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him." - Genesis 4:13-15
DeleteI'd agree there's little in the Bible to justify racism per say but that doesn't stop folks from justifying slavery which is a given all of the Old Testament which was defined in racial terms in my country using the quote above.
The KKK was and is a self-identified Christian outfit who use the imprimatur of the Bible (wrongly of course) to justify the fundamental racist attitudes and hatreds of blacks, Jews and even Catholics (though not so much of the latter in modern days).
"From 1915 onward, "second era" Klansmen initiated cross burnings (adapted from scenes in the 1915 film The Birth of a Nation, not only to intimidate targets, but also to demonstrate their respect and reverence for Jesus Christ. The ritual of lighting crosses was steeped in Christian symbolism, including prayer and hymn singing. Modern Klan organizations remain associated with acts of domestic terrorism in the United States."
This is perversion of the teachings of Christ but such grotesque confusions are only some of the violence committed in the name of Jesus.
I think in many ways, Moore's earlier work is his best. It's so crystalline and lucid and it's propelled by the energy of ideas that had likely been percolating, unexpressed, for years. His later work, often brilliant, can feel a bit pedantic and forced, as if it's had to be hammered into shape against its will.
ReplyDeleteLike many great talents they still need an editor, an outside voice to help keep them focused. Once a writer or artist gets "too big" for any editor to really have much sway they can still be dandy but lose that sharpness that made the so singular to begin with. I've seen it many times in filmmakers and more than a few times in comics. A creative mind left alone can conjure grand things but just as often they can fail to find the best path to deliver it to an audience.
DeleteA huge stretch, RJ, with a very small hint of truth. The way some people (or groups) may pervert Bible texts and teaching doesn't and shouldn't define what true Christian tenets actually are. "Let my people go" seems to me to suggest that the Old Testament idea of God didn't endorse slavery per se; in fact, a lot of the OT is about God's 'chosen people' being led out of slavery. And I have to say that it's so obvious that the Genesis texts you started with in no way condone slavery, so anyone trying to (mis)use them in that way (like the groups you mention) have absolutely no basis for doing so. "By their works ye shall know them" is another Bible (NT) line. Not all those claiming to be Christian actually are, especially when they don't adhere to the 'instruction manual'.
ReplyDeleteOf course, the texts of the Old Testament and New Testament are being perverted by nominal Christians to support their prejudices. That's not new as we know from the Crusades, the Inquisition, the Salem witch trials and countless other instances in which Christians of some kind spilled blood in God's name. They also perverted the meaning of the texts to support slavery, that is undisputed.
DeleteI live only a few miles away from The Ark, a notorious theme park attraction of sorts which has recreated what is imagined to be Noah's Ark and filled with an array of displays intended to convince the visitor that the Earth is only several thousand years old and not countless millions. It argues that dinosaurs and man lived together on the planet.
The United States is ripe with folks who misread and misunderstand the Bible, who fear the world as it is whether that means science telling them all sorts of things about the planet, themselves, and most recently disease. The prefer to live in a magical universe, in which they have more control than the universe really gives them.
Ooh, big subject, too little time, too little space. 'Christians of some kind' weren't Christians at all, as witnessed by their conduct which in no way qualified as Christian (love thy neighbour) precepts. And I know what you mean, but they weren't spilling blood in God's name, they were merely claiming they were - a significant difference.
ReplyDeleteAs to the age of the Earth, there's just no way of accurately determining its age; I think it's unlikely to be thousands of years, but it could be ten times as old as scientists estimate. Methods used to guess its age (and it is just a guess), especially Radio Carbon-14), are notoriously fallible. It's also entirely possible that some dinosaurs did co-exist with man, going by legends of flying dragons (Pterodactyls?) and fossils of shod human footprints criss-crossing over dinosaur tracks.
There is, as you will know, two kinds of evolution: the first, the adaption of species to their environment is factual and observable and no sensible and informed person would dispute it. However, there is also the theory of organic evolution, which believes that one species can transform (evolve) into an entirely different one. That has never been observed or replicated under scientific circumstances and the 'evidence' offered is unconvincing to anyone with an enquiring and open mind.
I'd say that whether someone believes in organic evolution or some kind of intelligent designer requires an element of suspension of disbelief (if you knew how kangaroos are born, you'd have to ask yourself how could such 'instinct' happen by mere accident or chance), but I think where there is design, it's not entirely unlikely a possibility that there may be a designer - or God as you will, though I'm not ascribing any theological or denominational concepts of God to the idea. The world is filled with folks who misread and misunderstand 'science', who do so because they want to believe they can understand how things came to be. They prefer to live in a magical universe, in which the illusion that they're privy to the secrets of the universe are open to them.
Incidentally, don't take that to mean I necessarily disagree with the sentiments of your last paragraph.
Meant to say also, that many scientists subscribe to the idea of a universal flood, and accounts of it exist in other religions and ancient texts. I'm not saying that means the details of Noah's tale are necessarily accurate, especially as we don't know exactly what they meant by use of the word 'world'. A worldwide flood in ancient times may simply have referred to the 'world' as they knew it (as far as the eye could see and a little beyond), not the whole planet. (But then again...)
DeleteBoth religion and myth and science seek to explain the world to humans, the give them a framework to understand the workings of their environment. Religion invokes the supernatural to explain the natural and science doesn't. What constitutes natural might change as more understanding is made available through truly rigorous science. If I understand the Bible in terms of myth it makes clear sense to me, a narrative that offers both history and meaning to a culture seeking to validate its claims to the planet. If I seek to see it as science, it shatters and properly so since that was not its intent. (Actually the reverse happened with Scientology or close to it.) Trying to shoehorn the details of a literal reading of the Bible into a shape that will conform to observable data requires faith, but alas not a faith in the science of the day. Science falters when it becomes dogma, Religion falters when it seeks to support its tenets with science.
DeleteA great flood almost certainly happened, but Noah literally shoving two of very kind into a big boat did not. What Noah's Ark suggests about the continuity of life established in Genesis is important to the narrative of the Old Testament. It works in those confines but seeking to make literally true requires a rejection of physics or a malforming of the original text.
And the world ain't flat neither. Bigfoot though might be real. (I hope.)
On the subject of the Ark, if one allows for the possibility of the existence of a Supreme Being directing the animals to shelter in it, then it doesn't seem all that impossible. If you don't believe in a 'Creator', then obviously it all seems too fantastic to be real. It's all down to what you want to believe or disbelieve at the end of the day. Incidentally, there's a bit in the OT about the Earth being a sphere that hangs upon nothing; that seems pretty 'scientific' to me, even if basically expressed.
Delete(The world's not flat? Well, you learn something new every day.) Enjoyed the chat, RJ.