Letter

I meant to take a break after wrapping up Babbitt but took The Marvel Universe off the shelf and before I knew it, I was ankle-deep.

It’s another public domain book but contemporary rather than 19th or early 20th century like the two previous books I illustrated. The reasons it’s in the public domain are complicated but boil down to changes in the publishing industry that inhibit personal expression. The book’s writer, Bruce Wagner, decided to make the book available to the public for free rather than make the edits his publisher suggested.

Since the book appeared five years ago, Wagner has signed to a different publisher (which is still part of the same conglomerate to which his previous one belonged. A situation even more absurd and untenable than a writer with a long track record being inhibited by this or that passing fad of decorum…) and this “new” publisher has recently printed an edition of The Marvel Universe.

I reached out to Wagner to see if he’d be okay with my making my own version and he seems happy about the prospect. That’s a luxury I didn’t have with either Herman Melville or Sinclair Lewis. I’m not big on seances and favor spirits that live in bottles over the haunting kind.

It feels a bit different to be working on something made by someone who could react this way or that to what I make. This being the third book I’ve illustrated, there’s also muscle memory and weariness of repetition. I don’t want any of this to become rote. Changing up the style and subject matter of what I illustrate will hopefully keep that from happening.

I’m using Sumi ink this time, after ballpoint pen and pencil, respectively. I expect to return to the ballpoint when I’m done with The Marvel Universe. There’s a chance I’ll try some collage/mixed media things but my choices are limited because I’m committed to grayscale reproduction. Making the interior of these books in color would complicate the humble, democratic underpinnings of the entire experiment.

I’m sacrificing so much aesthetically by having these books printed on demand by the worst corporations going that charging extra for frills like color feels obscene.

I don’t really know if any of this will work out but I’ve got a queue of ten more titles waiting in a folder to be worked on. All by writers long dead. If you know of any topside that might like some art for their books, have them drop me a line.

Read my review of Wagner’s ROAR and/or listen to our talk.

The outside world feels further away than ever. Leaving the house now is like interplanetary travel. I’ve never truly felt part of anything but it’s now as if I’m looking at everything but what I’m working on through a telescope. I don’t know whether this is good or bad. Maybe it was always this way and I didn’t notice.

I’m not jealous of people whose lives revolve around others. I tried that a few times and failed often enough to know that I needed to find a different way. When I sit at bars and coffeeshops, I eavesdrop on conversations. I get a lot out of what people say to one another but it’s rare that I’m envious of the talkers or want to participate. More times than not, I feel relief that I’m not a player rather than someone in the stands.

Aside from chores and the occasional trip to this or that part-time gig, I only leave the house for a movie, a meal, or for music. Extricating myself from a project—Babbitt, in the case of the latest—serves as a necessary pause to gain perspective, to let elements settle into their proper places. In other words, not working on a thing is still a part of working on it. In a narrower sense, putting down a brush and sitting back is as much painting as mixing colors and making marks is.

Last week I went to the Hungry Brain to see a new band featuring a couple people I’m very familiar with. I was the first paying customer through the door so I got my pick of tables. I chose one closest to the stage, with the best light. The band was running through their soundcheck. I read Satantango and listened.

The room filled up. I invited a musician I know to share my table. The opening band was a couple I used to deliver Thai food to in the 90s. Would the 90s me driving around Humboldt Park in a Honda Civic, ringing doorbells, see much difference in the current me sitting in a club a couple miles and twenty-five-plus years away?

I rode my bike home after, as I so often do, looking forward to going back inside and closing the door, but grateful also to’ve forced myself to leave for a few hours.

First thing after getting my coat and hat off and taking a leak, I look through the latest saved PDF iteration of Babbitt to reconnect myself to the place I stopped in the afternoon. In no time, I’m back the world of pencil drawings of the 1910s, of Janson and Futura type, of closeups of this or that detail needing attention. Wherever I was minutes before may as well be another galaxy.

I wonder why I ever left.

Over the past three months I’ve made about a hundred-thirty pen and pencil drawings inspired by two public domain novels. Not much about these drawings is particularly new as far as approach or technique; the novelty is in the way they relate to the source material and in the heavy reliance on photography for visual reference.

The first book was published in 1851. Most of the shots of ships and sailors I drew from were made 1830-1850. It was the dawn of photography. I never tried to recreate these pictures, only to use the positions of people to objects correct, to catch some of what they wore, and, of course, which way the sun or moon lit the scene.

The second book is from 1922 so there are a lot more images to choose from. Having already made ninety drawings for the other book, I was conscious of not just repeating what I just did. That’s why I switched from ballpoint to pencil. It’s not night and day but there’s definitely a difference.

In all the books I made before, the pictures came first, before the words. Now Melville’s and Lewis’s stories were dictating what I drew. When I was studying art as a kid with set designer Alexander Okun, he used to try to make me illustrate books of my choosing. I fought him tooth and nail. I only wanted to draw things I made up rather than somebody else’s work.

Look at me now.

I need to make ten to twenty more pencil drawings for Babbitt before I’m done. I’ve got two more novels queued up to illuminate after, but I’ll probably take a bit of a break to let things settle. I need to make sense of what this latest frenzy of activity adds up to.

In the meantime, I’ve decided to sell all the new drawings for fifty bucks a pop. You can choose from Moby Dick or Babbitt or just get a couple postcards.

I wrote about a Kenneth Lonergan play for the Reader.