jackcomics

I've decided to start commenting on some of the comics I'm reading, some briefly and others as longer reviews like this one, about Neil Babra's Hamlet, (No Fear Shakespeare Graphic Novels, ISBN:1411498739).

I was first aware of Neil Babra's work when the first volume of the Flight anthology came out back in '05. I've enjoyed his anthology pieces and journal comics quite a bit, and was intrigued (and impressed!) that he'd made this sudden jump to a 200+ page book.

I really enjoy Neil's inking style; its gracefully flowing hatches are countered by a slight crudeness in the way they're applied, and it really works for me. He's gotten more control over time, but the basic feel that attracted me has remained the same. The two-tone gray shading also has jagged edges following the forms that add nicely to the texture set up by the inking.



He also renders faces with great sensitivity, and his character designs for Hamlet are really appealing. They are differentiated by a simple vocabulary of shapes which allows him a lot of leeway in the acting.



And in fact, it is the acting in the close-ups that is probably the most outstanding thing in this book. Ophelia is heartbreakingly charming, Horatio is both cute and stalwart, Uncle Claudius is satisfyingly ape-like, and for a pointy-nosed dude, Hamlet has an amazing dramatic range.


There is one further aspect of Neil's drawing that bears mentioning. In his journal comics he began using a sort of subjective distortion, illustrating the character's inner state with visual metaphors.

An example from his piece in Flight 3: when passing a woman weeping over a failed, stressful examination, his character's empathy is shown as, in his mind, he embraces her with looping, serpentine arms, exhaling flowers all around her. It's the single most moving panel in the whole book, for my money.

Since no cartoonist can deliver all the nuance of a real, human, professional actor performing in real time and real space, it is perhaps an obvious choice to make up the difference by using the kinds of exaggeration that are unique to comics and cartoons.

That said, the emotional turmoil of Hamlet lends itself well to this particular technique, and Neil takes full and effective advantage of it throughout the book. The background freely twists, warps and/or falls away, replaced by sometimes loose, sometimes literal metaphors suggested by the dialog or emotions of the characters. It makes for a lively and continually interesting presentation of what might otherwise often amount to just two or more talking, talking, talking heads.



With Shakespeare, you'd figure the writing is pretty much taken care of, but this edition is intended as an accessible version, so it's been edited for clarity to modern audiences. If you're a purist, you'll definitely want to be aware of that.

What surprised, and impressed, me is that Neil did the text adaptation himself as well as the visual work, and in my opinion he did a fantastic job. [A later note: on reading Neil's production notes in more detail, I see that he did use No Fear Shakespeare's "plain English" version as a starting point, but actually re-introduced much of the original language back into the script.] I'm not cowed by Shakespeare, nor am I the hugest fan ever. I enjoy the language, both spoken and on the page, and I feel that Neil has kept a lot of the imagery and flow. I didn't expect it, but I actually found that the editing made me more aware of the text, and the story, than I might have been otherwise.

Hamlet's honestly not my favorite of Shakespeare's plays, so perhaps I'm more forgiving of revisions than others might be. But I felt that Neil's version, in both text and artwork, gave the story both an added clarity and a crisp freshness that was a real pleasure to read. Great job!