8 August 2004

V for Vendetta

One of Alan Moore's graphic novels, V for Vendetta, is being copiously annotated by Madelyn Boudreaux.

The annotations were put together for a graduate class in Literary Research ... at the Northwestern State University of Louisiana, in the spring of 1994.

The author explains the difficulties she had:
I have undertaken to ferret out the origins of Moore's ideas. The task has been unbelievably arduous, not because any of the sources were too difficult to find, but because Moore covered so much ground. I found myself walking from one end of the library to the other, consulting science dictionaries, rose-naming serials, history books, films, and musical compact discs.

In the Salon interview, Scott Thill compares V for Vendetta's themes (placed in a fictionalized, fascist England) against what's happening today with the American media promoting uncertainty and fear about terrorism.

One of the reasons we singled out media in "V for Vendetta" was because it is one of the most useful tools of tyranny. We invite it into our own home every night; I'm sure that some of us think of it as a friend. That might be a horrifying notion but I'm sure there are people who think of television as perhaps one of their most intimate friends. And if the TV tells them that things in the world are a certain way, even if the evidence of their senses asserts it is not true, they'll probably believe the television set in the end.

Boudreaux's annotations are similar to Moore's own annotations in From Hell. There, he details his research and the source material for the actions on every page and almost in every panel.

[ posted by sstrader on 8 August 2004 at 4:41:23 PM in Culture & Society ]