You Can’t Buy That Kind Of Empowerment. To Just Know That As Far As You Are Aware, You Have Not Got A Price; That There Is Not An Amount Of Money Large Enough To Make You Compromise Even A Tiny Bit Of Principle That, As It Turned Out, Would Make No Practical Difference Anyway. I’d Advise Everyone To Do It, Otherwise You’re Going To End Up Mastered By Money And That’s Not A Thing You Want Ruling Your Life.

-Alan Moore

Please Wait....
Translating....

You Can’t Buy That

Alan Moore

Topic

Differences

Empowerment

Principles

More From Alan Moore

Life Is A Lot More Interesting If You Are Interested In The People And The Places Around You. So, Illuminate Your Little Patch Of Ground, The People That You Know, The Things That You Want To Commemorate. Light Them Up With Your Art, With Your Music, With Your Writing, With Whatever It Is That You Do.

Art

Writing

Light

I'm Very Pessimistic About Adaptations From One Medium To Another. I've Got A Very Kind Of Primitive, Puritan View Of It. I Tend To Think That If Something Was Derived For One Medium, Then There's No Real Immediate Reason To Think That It's Necessarily Going To Be As Good Or Better If Adapted Into Another One. There Have Been Very Good Stage Plays That Have Made Some Very Good Films. But There Are Not So Many Differences Between The Theater And The Cinema As There Are Between The Cinema And, Say, Reading A Book Or Reading A Comic.

Real

Book

Reading

Everybody Has Their Story To Tell.

Stories

There's No Flesh Or Blood Within This Cloak To Kill. There's Only An Idea. Ideas Are Bulletproof.

Blood

Ideas

Flesh

I've Had Years Of Bizarre Hallucinogenic Magical Experiences In Which I Believed I Had Communicated With Entities That May Well Have Been Disassociated Parts Of My Own Personality Or Conceivably Some Independent Entity Of A Metaphysical Nature. Both Would Seem Equally Interesting.

Independent

Years

Interesting

The Announcement That There Is A League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen Television Series Hasn't Caused Me To Drastically Alter My Opinions. Now It Seems They Are Recycling Things That Have Already Proven Not To Work.

League

Gentleman

Television

It's Funny, But Certain Faces Seem To Go In And Out Of Style. You Look At Old Photographs And Everybody Has A Certain Look To Them, Almost As If They're Related. Look At Pictures From Ten Years Later And You Can See That There's A New Kind Of Face Starting To Predominate, And That The Old Faces Are Fading Away And Vanishing, Never To Be Seen Again.

Years

Style

Faces

There Is No Future. There Is No Past. Do You See? Time Is Simultaneous, An Intricately Structured Jewel That Humans Insist On Viewing One Edge At A Time, When The Whole Design Is Visible In Every Facet.

Past

Jewels

Design

I'd Prefer To Include Sex Scenes Alongside The Adventure Scenes And Everyday-life Scenes, As If They Were All Part Of The Same Thing. Which Of Course They Are. Sex Is Not Discrete From The Rest Of Our Existence.

Sex

Adventure

Everyday

I Love Films That Are Made With Almost No Budget.

Film

Made

Budgets

If We Can Come Up With All Sorts Of Imaginative Ways In Which People Die, Then I Really Don't See What The Problem Is With Coming Up With Imaginative Ways In Which People Can Procreate.

Crazy

People

Mad

Memory's So Treacherous. One Moment You're Lost In A Carnival Of Delights With Poignant Childhood Aromas, The Flashing Neon On Puberty, All That Sentimental Candyfloss. The Next, It Leads You Somewhere You Don't Want To Go.. Somewhere Dark And Cold, Filled With The Damp Ambiguous Shapes Of Things You'd Hoped Were Forgotten.

Memories

Dark

Childhood

I Have So Very Much. I Have So Very Little.

Littles

If You Give Me A Typewriter And I'm Having A Good Day, I Can Write A Scene That Will Astonish Its Readers. That Will Perhaps Make Them Laugh, Perhaps Make Them Cry - That Will Have Some Emotional Clout To It. It Doesn't Cost Much To Do That.

Writing

Good Day

Emotional

I Am Brother To Dragons, And Companion To Owls. My Skin Is Black Upon Me, And My Bones Are Burned With Heat.

Brother

Dragons

Black

All Culture Must Have Arisen From Cult.

Culture

Cult

Remember, Remember, The Fifth Of November, The Gunpowder Treason And Plot. I Know Of No Reason Why The Gunpowder Treason Should Ever Be Forgot... But What Of The Man? I Know His Name Was Guy Fawkes And I Know, In 1605, He Attempted To Blow Up The Houses Of Parliament.

Kings

Dark

Blow

You've Got To Be Able To Pay Your Bills, Otherwise You're Not Going To Sleep At Night. But Beyond That, The World Inside My Head Has Always Been A Far Richer Place Than The World Outside It. I Suppose That A Lot Of My Art And Writing Are Meant To Bring The Two Together.

Art

Sleep

Writing

The Main Thing That I Learned About Conspiracy Theory, Is That Conspiracy Theorists Believe In A Conspiracy Because That Is More Comforting. The Truth Of The World Is That It Is Actually Chaotic. The Truth Is That It Is Not The Iluminati, Or The Jewish Banking Conspiracy, Or The Gray Alien Theory. The Truth Is Far More Frightening - Nobody Is In Control. The World Is Rudderless.

Believe

Comforting

Banking

I Think That We Need Mythology. We Need A Bedrock Of Story And Legend In Order To Live Our Lives Coherently.

Thinking

Order

Needs

As People Get More Desperate, History Suggests That They're Not Going To Rise In A Mighty Proletarian Tidal Wave And Wash Away Their Oppressors. They're Gonna Turn On Each Other.

People

Wave

Desperate

On My Fortieth Birthday, Rather Than Merely Bore My Friends By Having Anything As Mundane As A Midlife Crisis I Decided It Might Be More Interesting To Actually Terrify Them By Going Completely Mad And Declaring Myself To Be A Magician.

Mad

Interesting

Midlife

If You're Functional, It Doesn't Matter If You're Mad.

Mad

Matter

Ifs

Heard Joke Once: Man Goes To Doctor. Says He's Depressed. Says Life Seems Harsh And Cruel. Says He Feels All Alone In A Threatening World Where What Lies Ahead Is Vague And Uncertain. Doctor Says, "treatment Is Simple. Great Clown Pagliacci Is In Town Tonight. Go And See Him. That Should Pick You Up." Man Bursts Into Tears. Says, "but Doctor...i Am Pagliacci.

Lying

Men

Simple

It's All A Joke! Everything Anybody Ever Valued Or Struggled For... It's All A Monstrous, Demented Gag! So Why Can't You See The Funny Side? Why Aren't You Laughing?

Dc Comics

Laughing

Sides

Existence Is Random. Has No Pattern Save What We Imagine After Staring At It For Too Long. No Meaning Save What We Choose To Impose.

Long

Patterns

Imagine

That Pompous Phrase (graphic Novel) Was Thought Up By Some Idiot In The Marketing Department Of Dc. I Prefer To Call Them Big Expensive Comics.

Marketing

Phrases

Idiot

Well, What Do You Expect? The Comedian Is Dead.

Comedian

Wells

Technology Is Always A Two-edged Sword. It Will Bring In Many Benefits, But Also Many Disasters.

Technology

Two

Benefits

Nothing's That Simple, Not Even Things That Are Simply Awful.

Simple

Awful

I Don’t Think People Realise How Vital Libraries Are Or What A Colossal Danger It Would Be If We Were To Lose Any More. Having Had A Truncated School Life Myself, All Of My Education From The Age Of 17 Has Been Self-taught. I Wouldn’t Be The Person I Am Today If It Wasn’t For The Opportunities The Library Gave Me.

School

Opportunity

Thinking

No One Will Ever Forget That Night, And What It Meant For This Country. But I Will Never Forget The Man And What He Meant To Me.

Country

Night

Men

Janey Accuses Me Of Chasing Jailbait. She Bursts Into Angry Tears, Asking If It's Because She's Getting Older. It's True. She's Aging More Noticeably Every Day — While I Am Standing Still. I Prefer The Stillness Here. I Am Tired Of Earth. These People. I Am Tired Of Being Caught In The Tangle Of Their Lives.

Tired

Here I Am

People

I Think I'm A Bit Like A Kind Of Shark, That If I Stop Swimming, I Won't Be Able To Breathe, Something Like That.

Swimming

Thinking

Sharks

Authority Allows Two Roles: The Torturer And The Tortured. Twists People Into Joyless Mannequins That Fear And Hate, While Culture Plunges Into The Abyss.

Hate

Two

People

The Central Question Is, Is This Guy Right? Or Is He Mad? What Do You, The Reader, Think About This? Which Struck Me As A Properly Anarchist Solution. I Didn't Want To Tell People What To Think, I Just Wanted To Tell People To Think And Consider Some Of These Admittedly Extreme Little Elements, Which Nevertheless Do Recur Fairly Regularly Throughout Human History.

Thinking

Mad

People

The Cold, Suffocating Dark Goes On Forever And We Are Alone. Live Our Lives, Lacking Anything Better To Do. Devise Reason Later.

Reason

Event Horizon

Lacking

I Am Not Saying People Should Not Be Free To Join Whichever Reason They Choose But Should We Be Forced To Live Our Lives Around A Belief System That Originated Somewhere Around The Fourth Or Fifth Century Bc. I Cannot See Any More Reason To Base A Belief System Around Christianity, Judaism Or Islam Than I Can Around Lord Of The Rings.

People

Islam

Belief

Madness Is The Emergency Exit. You Can Just Step Outside, And Close The Door On All Those Dreadful Things That Happened. Forever.

Judged By The Stark, Sure-footed Portrait In Hard Time, Brian Azzarello And Richard Corben Clearly Have John Constantine Down, Cold And To The Life. Azzarellos Grasp Of Pacing, Character And Situation Resonates Through Every Scene With A Black Crystal Clarity Thats Short Of Masterful, While Corben Contributes What Is, Perhaps, One Of The Most Darkly Expressive Pieces In A Long, Already-legendary Career.

Character

Hard Times

Careers

I'm A Very Smug Show-off At Heart. I'm Altogether Too Pleased With Myself. The Big Boost For Me Is To Be Able To Turn Out Something That I Think Is Pretty Marvelous, Like 'lost Girls.' I'm Not In It For Money, I'm Just In It For The Glory.

Heart

Thinking

Able

Behind This Mask There Is More Than Just Flesh. Beneath This Mask There Is An Idea... And Ideas Are Bulletproof.

Ideas

Flesh

Mask

I Really Can't Be Bothered Going To A Barber. And Shaving Every Morning, That's Nightmarish. I Spent My Teenage Years Covered In Tiny Little Bits Of Toilet Paper.

Morning

Teenage

Years

Nothing Ends, Adrian. Nothing Ever Ends.

Ends

London Has Been Used As The Emblematic English City, But It's Far From Representative Of What Life In England Is Actually About.

Cities

London

England

You Wear A Mask For So Long, You Forget Who You Were Beneath It.

Honesty

Long

Wearing A Mask

There Has Been A Rather Unpleasant Sensibility Apparent In Frank Miller's Work For Quite A Long Time.

Long

Frank

Has Beens

Who? Who Is But The Form Following The Function Of What, And What I Am Is A Man In A Mask.

Men

Mask

Form

You Know What I Wish? I Wish All The Scum Of The Earth Had One Throat And I Had My Hands About It.

Hands

Scum Of The Earth

Wish

Once A Man Has Seen Society's Black Underbelly, He Can Never Turn His Back On It. Never Pretend, Like You Do, That It Doesn't Exist.

Men

Black

Rorschach

Roses Are Red Violets Are Blue Everything's Possible Nothing Is True.

Blue

Rose

Red

I've Never Watched Any Of The Adaptations Of My Books. I've Never Wanted To, And There's Absolutely No Chance Of Me Doing So In The Future.

Book

Chance

Adaptation

It Seems Strange That My Life Should End In Such A Terrible Place, But For Three Years I Had Roses, And Apologized To No One.

Years

Rose

Three

The Past Can't Hurt You Anymore, Not Unless You Let It.

Heartbroken

Hurt

Past

It Is The Oldest Ironies That Are Still The Most Satisfying: Man, When Preparing For Bloody War, Will Orate Loudly And Most Eloquently In The Name Of Peace.

Peace

War

Men

There Is No Coincidence. Only The Illusion Of Coincidence.

Coincidence

Illusion

I've Never Really Cared Much About Money. I've Got Enough To Live On. And It's Not Like I Live In A Fancy House, It's Not Like I Own A Car, And It's Not Like I Ever Go On Holiday.

Holiday

Car

House

The Things We Do Without The Fear Of Failure And The Desire For Success Are The Purest Acts We'll Ever Do

Desire

Desire For Success

Fear Of Failure

I Shall Die Here. Every Last Inch Of Me Shall Perish. Except One. An Inch. It's Small And It's Fragile And It's The Only Thing In The World Worth Having. We Must Never Lose It, Or Sell It, Or Give It Away. We Must Never Let Them Take It From Us.

Giving

World

Lasts

Dan, I'm Not A Republic Serial Villain. Do You Seriously Think I'd Explain My Master-stroke If There Remained The Slightest Chance Of You Affecting Its Outcome? I Did It Thirty-five Minutes Ago.

Thinking

Republic

Outcomes

With Science, Ideas Can Germinate Within A Bed Of Theory, Form, And Practice That Assists Their Growth... But We As Gardeners, Must Beware... For Some Seeds Are The Seeds Of Ruin... And The Most Iridescent Blooms Are Often The Most Dangerous

Practice

Ideas

Growth

I've No Objection To The Term 'graphic Novel,' As Long As What It Is Talking About Is Actually Some Sort Of Graphic Work That Could Conceivably Be Described As A Novel. My Main Objection To The Term Is That Usually It Means A Collection Of Six Issues Of Spider-man, Or Something That Does Not Have The Structure Or Any Of The Qualities Of A Novel, But Is Perhaps Roughly The Same Size.

Mean

Men

Talking

I'm The Idea Of The Human Imagination, Which, When You Think About It, Is The Only Thing We Can Really Be Certain Isn't Imaginary.

Thinking

Ideas

Imagination

I Was Kind Of A Selfish Child, Who Always Wanted Things His Way, And I've Kind Of Taken That Over Into My Relationship With The World.

Children

Selfish

Taken

Love Your Rage, Not Your Cage.

Cages

Rage

Vendetta

American Love — Like Coke In Green Glass Bottles...they Don't Make It Anymore.

Glasses

Rorschach

Bottles

I'm Very Distanced From The Comics Industry. I Love The Comics Medium, But I Have No Time For The Industry.

Mediums

Industry

I've Come To Think That The Universe Is A Four-dimensional Site In Which Nothing Is Changing And Nothing Is Moving. The Only Thing That Is Moving Along The Time Axis Is Our Consciousness. The Past Is Still There, The Future Has Always Been Here. Every Moment That Has Existed Or Will Ever Exist Is All Part Of This Giant Hyper-moment Of Space-time.

Moving

Past

Thinking

In The Sixties, For Anybody To Suggest That The Government Didn't Have Our Best Interests At Heart And Policemen Sometimes Killed People Would Have Automatically Made Them A Radical Firebrand Lefty. That's Not The Case Anymore.

Heart

Government

People

Certainly, My Many Years Working In The Comics Industry, Creating Products That I Do Not Own, Has Made Me Rather Fierce On The Subject Of Giving Up Rights.

Giving Up

Rights

Years

It Doesn't Do You Any Service To Demonize Any Group Of People. It's Much Better To Try And Understand From The Inside.

People

Trying

Groups

The Entire Universe - For One Thing - Only Exists In Your Perceptions. That's All You're Gonna See Of It. To All Practical Intents And Purposes This Is Purely Some Kind Of Lightshow That's Being Put On In The Kind Of Neurons In Our Brain. The Whole Of Reality.

Reality

Brain

Perception

It's Pretty Much A Fact That Our Entire Universe Is A Mental Construct. We Don't Actually Deal With Reality Directly. We Simply Compose A Picture Of Reality From What's Going On In Our Retinas, In The Timpani Of Our Ears, And In Our Nerve Endings.

Reality

Nerves

Ears

While A Truncheon May Be Used In Lieu Of Conversation, Words Will Always Retain Their Power.

May

Used

Conversation

Rather Than Being Able To Have A Healthy Relationship With Our Own Sexual Imagination, We're Driven Into Some Dark Corners By Shame And Embarrassment And Guilt, And Those Dark Corners Breed All Sorts Of Monsters.

Dark

Imagination

Healthy

When I Hear Alcoholics Talk About Having Their Demons, I Think That They're Probably Absolutely Literally Correct.

Thinking

Demon

Alcoholics

The Dusk Reeks Of Fornication And Bad Consciences.

Dusk

Conscience

Truth Is A Well-known Pathological Liar. It Invariably Turns Out To Be Fiction Wearing A Fancy Frock. Self-proclaimed Fiction, On The Other Hand, Is Entirely Honest. You Can Tell This, Because It Comes Right Out And Says, "i'm A Liar," Right There On The Dust Jacket.

Liars

Self

Dust

Please! Don't All Leave. Somebody Has To Do It, Don't You See? Somebody Has To Save The World.

World

Please

Save The World

I Doubt That There Are Many Screenplays Of Movies That Either Of Us Have Seen Over The Past 10 Years That Were First Drafts, Or Were The Work Of Purely One Person. In My World, The Actors And The Director Are All Made Of Paper, And They Do Exactly What I Say. I Feel Much More In Control Of The Finished Work. I Feel Like The Statement That I'm Making - Even Though It's In A Medium By No Means As Glamorous Or As Widely Recognized As Film - Is At Least The Statement That I Wanted To Make. That's A Lot More Important To Me Than The Allure Of Working For Hollywood.

Mean

Past

Doubt

The Roots Of The Word 'anarchy' Are 'an Archos,' 'no Leaders,' Which Is Not Really About The Kind Of Chaos That Most People Imagine When The Word 'anarchy' Is Mentioned. I Think That Anarchy Is, To The Contrary, About Taking Personal Responsibility For Yourself.

Responsibility

Thinking

Roots

I Increasingly Fear That Nothing Good Can Come Of Almost Any Adaptation, And Obviously That's Sweeping. There Are A Couple Of Adaptations That Are Perhaps As Good Or Better Than The Original Work. But The Vast Majority Of Them Are Pointless.

Couple

Majority

Adaptation

There Is Some Confusion As To What Magic Actually Is. I Think This Can Be Cleared Up If You Just Look At The Very Earliest Descriptions Of Magic. Magic In Its Earliest Form Is Often Referred To As “the Art”. I Believe This Is Completely Literal. I Believe That Magic Is Art And That Art, Whether It Be Writing, Music, Sculpture, Or Any Other Form Is Literally Magic.

Art

Believe

Writing

The Ending Is Nearer Than You Think, And It Is Already Written. All That We Have Left To Choose Is The Correct Moment To Begin.

Thinking

Moments

Vendetta

With So Much Chaos, Someone Will Do Something Stupid. And When They Do, Things Will Turn Nasty.

Stupid

Nasty

Chaos

A Lot Of The Critique Of Our Growing Mechanization Was Actually At Its Strongest, And Arguably At Its Most Perceptive, During The Late '60s.

Growing

Late

Critique

My Only Problem With Fans Is When They Turn Pro. For Example, When All The Professional Writers Were Fired By Dc In The '60s, They Brought In A Generation Of Comic Book Fans Who Would Have Paid To Have Written These Stories.

Book

Example

Fans

My Dear, Beautiful And Imaginative Things Can Be Destroyed. Beauty And Imagination Cannot.

Beautiful

Imagination

Dear

They Say We Have We Created The Man To End All Wars; I Say We Have Created A Man To End All Worlds.

War

Men

World

They Say That Life's A Game, & Then They Take The Board Away.

Games

Boards

Vendetta

Yes, There Is A Conspiracy, In Fact There Are A Great Number Of Conspiracies That Are All Tripping Each Other Up. And All Of Those Conspiracies Are Run By Paranoid Fantasists And Ham-fisted Clowns. If You Are On A List Targeted By The Cia, You Really Have Nothing To Worry About. If However, You Have A Name Similar To Somebody On A List Targeted By The Cia, Then You Are Dead.

Running

Names

Numbers

I Am Watching The Stars, Admiring Their Complex Trajectories Through Space And Time. I Am Trying To Give A Name To The Force That Set Them In Motion.

Stars

Names

Space

Admittedly, I Do Have Several Bones... Whole War Fields Full Of Bones, In Fact... To Pick With Organised Religion Of Whatever Stripe. This Should Be Seen As A Critique Of Purely Temporal Agencies Who Have, To My Mind, Erected More Obstacles Between Whatever Notion Of Spirituality And Godhead One Subscribes To Than They Have Opened Doors. To Me, The Difference Between Godhead And The Church Is The Difference Between Elvis And Colonel Parker... Although That Conjures Images Of God Dying On The Toilet, Which Is Not What I Meant At All.

War

Doors

Differences

My Main Point About Films Is That I Don't Like The Adaptation Process, And I Particularly Don't Like The Modern Way Of Comic Book-film Adaptations, Where, Essentially, The Central Characters Are Just Franchises That Can Be Worked Endlessly To No Apparent Point.

Book

Character

Way

Sexually Progressive Cultures Gave Us Literature, Philosophy, Civilization And The Rest, While Sexually Restrictive Cultures Gave Us The Dark Ages And The Holocaust.

Sex

Philosophy

Dark

The Past Can't Hurt You Anymore. Not Unless You Let It. They Made You Into A Victim, Evey. They Made You Into A Statistic. But, That's Not The Real You. That's Not Who You Are Inside.

Hurt

Real

Past

Truly, Whoever We Are, Wherever We Reside, We Exist Upon The Whim Of Murderers.

Whim

Murderer

The World's A Stage, & Everything Else Is Vaudeville.

Vaudeville

World

Stage

I'm Not A Particularly Dark Individual. I Have My Moments, It's True, But I Do Have A Sense Of Humor.

Dark

Sense Of Humor

Moments

It Seems That Every Movie Is A Remake Of Something That Was Better When It Was First Released In A Foreign Language, As A 1960s Tv Show, Or Even As A Comic Book. Now You’ve Got Theme Park Rides As The Source Material Of Movies. The Only Things Left Are Breakfast Cereal Mascots. In Our Lifetime, We Will See Johnny Depp Playing Captain Crunch.

Book

Cereal

Tv Shows

Happiness Is The Most Insidious Prison Of All.

Prison

Insidious

Vendetta

Because Our Entire Universe Is Made Up Of Consciousness, We Never Really Experience The Universe Directly We Just Experience Our Consciousness Of The Universe, Our Perception Of It, So Right, Our Only Universe Is Perception.

Spiritual

Perception

Consciousness

Looked At Sky Through Smoke Heavy With Human Fat And God Was Not There. The Cold, Suffocating Dark Goes On Forever And We Are Alone. Live Our Lives, Lacking Anything Better To Do. Devise Reason Later. Born From Oblivion; Bear Children, Hell-bound As Ourselves, Go Into Oblivion. There Is Nothing Else.

Children

Dark

Sky

On The One Occasion Where I Did Try Writing A Screenplay, I Found The Rewriting Just Unendurable.

Writing

Trying

Unendurable

Does The Human Heart Know Chasms So Abysmal?

Heart

Doe

Chasms

I’ve Known A Lot Of People Go Mad Over The Years, And It Is More Distressing Than People Dying. People Dying Is Quite Natural, People Going Mad Is The Complete Antithesis Of That.

Years

People

Mad

One Of The Advantages Of Travelling The World Is That You Get To Know The World Broadly. And One Of The Advantages Of Staying In One Place Is That You Get To Know The World Deeply.

World

Advantage

Staying

Who Imprisoned Me Here? Who Keeps Me Here? Who Can Release Me? Who's Controlling And Constraining My Life Except...me?

Release

In Countries Like The U.s. And Great Britain, We Exist In A Wholly Sexualized Culture, Where Everything From Cars To Snack Food Are Sold With A Healthy Slathering Of Sex To Make Them More Commercially Appealing.

Country

Sex

Snacks

Blake Understood. Treated It Like A Joke, But He Understood. He Saw The Cracks In Society, Saw The Little Men In Masks Trying To Hold It Together...he Saw The True Face Of The Twentieth Century And Chose To Become A Reflection Of It, A Parody Of It. No One Else Saw The Joke. That's Why He Was Lonely.

Lonely

Reflection

Men

As I Come To Understand Vietnam And What It Implies About The Human Condition, I Also Realize That Few Humans Will Permit Themselves Such An Understanding.

Understanding

Vietnam

Realizing

My Mother Said I Broke Her Heart...but It Was My Integrity That Was Important. Is That So Selfish? It Sells For So Little, But It's All We Have Left In This Place. It Is The Very Last Inch Of Us...but Within That Inch We Are Free.

Mother

Integrity

Selfish

The Magician To Some Degree Is Trying To Drive Him Or Herself Mad In A Controlled Setting, Within Controlled Laws.

Law

Mad

Trying

Romantic Poetry Had Its Heyday When People Like Lord Byron Were Kicking It Large. But You Try And Make A Living As A Poet Today, And You'll Find It's Very Different!

Kicking It

People

Trying

What Does Fighting Crime Mean, Exactly? Does It Mean Upholding The Law When A Woman Shoplifts To Feed Her Children, Or Does It Mean Struggling To Uncover The Ones Who, Quite Legally, Have Brought About Her Poverty?

Children

Struggle

Mean

Magic And Art Tend To Share A Lot Of The Same Language. They Both Talk About Evocation, Invocation, And Conjuring.

Art

Magic

Language

There Are People. There Are Stories. The People Think They Shape The Stories, But The Reverse If Often Closer To The Truth. Stories Shape The World. They Exist Independently Of People, And In Places Quite Devoid Of Man, There May Yet Be Mythologies.

Men

Thinking

People

It Wasn't So Much All The Sex That Robbed Me Of My Moral Bearings, But All The Narcotics. I Must Say, There's Something About Opium That Goes Very Well With Lesbianism.

Sex

Moral

Wells

Ideas Are Bulletproof.

Change

Ideas

Bulletproof

If Light Is Outlawed, Then Only Outlaws Will Be Able To See Where They're Going.

Light

Able

Outlaw

Look At Him Now, Poor Fellow. That's What A Dose Of Reality Does For You...never Touch The Stuff Myself, You Understand. Find It Gets In The Way Of The Hallucinations.

Reality

Doe

Looks

None Of You Understand. I'm Not Locked Up In Here With You. You're Locked Up In Here With Me.

Rorschach

Locked Up

Locked

Anarchy Wears Two Faces, Both Creator And Destroyer. Thus Destroyers Topple Empires; Make A Canvas Of Clean Rubble Where Creators Can Then Build A Better World. Rubble, Once Achieved Makes Further Ruins' Means Irrelevant. Away With Our Explosives, Then! Away With Our Destroyers! They Have No Place Within Our Better World. But Let Us Raise A Toast To All Our Bombers, All Our Bastards, Most Unlovely And Most Unforgivable, Let's Drink Their Health, Then Meet With Them No More.

Mean

Two

Bombers

I Sat On The Bed. I Looked At The Rorschach Blot. I Tried To Make It Look Like A Spreading Tree, Shadows Pooled Beneath It, But It Didn't. It Looked More Like A Dead Cat I Once Found, The Fat, Glistening Grubs Writhing Blindly, Squirming Over Each Other, Frantically Tunneling Away From The Light. But Even That Isn't The Real Horror. The Horror Is This: In The End, It Is Simply A Picture Of Empty Meaningless Blackness.

Real

Cat

Light

I Don't Think Any Of Us Grew Up Into The World We Were Hoping For Or Expecting.

Thinking

World

Expecting

I Wouldn’t Be The Person I Am Today If It Wasn’t For The Opportunities The Library Gave Me.

Opportunity

Library

Today

It's Cold And It's Mean Spirited And I Don't Like It Here Anymore.

Mean

Cold

Mean Spirited

Love Doesn't Have A Point. Love Is The Point.

Love Is

To Some Degree Satanism Is Purely A Kind Of Disease Of Christianity. You've Got To Really Be Christian To Believe In Satan.

Christian

Believe

Degrees

War Is A Perversion Of Sex.

Sex

War

Perversion

Your Pretty Empire Took So Long To Build, Now, With A Snap Of History's Fingers, Down It Goes.

Long

Empires

Fingers

There's A Widespread Cultural Barrenness Across Art And Political Culture. But There Are Some Pockets Of Resistance On The Extreme Margins, Like The Techno-savvy Protest Movements, Small Press, The Creator-owned Comics, That Seem To Be Getting Some Signs Of Hope For The Future.

Art

Political

Pockets

All We Ever See Of Stars Are Their Old Photographs.

Stars

Photograph

Old Photographs

Of Course, Marxism Is An Example Of What Carl Popper Would Have Called A 'world Three' Structure, In That It's Got Immense Power As An Idea, But You Couldn't Actually Hold Up Anything In The World And Say: 'this Is Marxism'.

Ideas

World

Example

I Should Just Keep Me Mouth Shut, I Just Upset People.

People

Upset

Mouths

The Comics Medium Has Some Unusual Features That Do Make It Very Different, In That It's Combining A Verbal Narrative With A Visual One That Allows For Much Richer Possibilities Of Transmitting Information.

Different

Narrative

Information

...my Point Is, I Went Crazy. When I Saw What A Black, Awful Joke The World Was. I Went Crazy As A Coot! I Admit It! Why Can't You?

Crazy

Dc Comics

Black

This Is Not Anarchy, Eve. This Is Chaos.

Anarchy

Chaos

Vendetta

Nothing Is Insoluble. Nothing Is Hopeless. Not While There's Life.

Rorschach

Hopeless

This City Is Dying Of Rabies. Is The Best I Can Do To Wipe Random Flecks Of Foam From Its Lips?

Cities

Dying

Rorschach

I Still Can't Believe It . . . Him Comin' Here Everyday, Nobody Realizin'. Still, That's Life: Lotta Stuff Happens Under The Waterline.

Believe

Everyday

Stuff Happens

There's Been A Growing Dissatisfaction And Distrust With The Conventional Publishing Industry, In That You Tend To Have A Lot Of Formerly Reputable Imprints Now Owned By Big Conglomerates.

Growing

Bigs

Distrust

I Don't Really Have Any Great Interest In Writing For Movies. Comics, To Me, Is A Much More Promising Field. There's Still A Lot Of Ground To Be Broken In Comics, Whereas Movies, To A Degree... I Don't Know. They're A Wonderful Art Form, But They're Not My Favorite Art Form. They Might Not Even Be In The Top Five Of My Favorite Art Forms.

Art

Writing

Broken

It Was Kovacs Who Said "mother" Then, Muffled Under Latex. It Was Kovacs Who Closed His Eyes. It Was Rorschach Who Opened Them Again.

Mother

Eye

Rorschach

To Me, All Creativity Is Magic. Ideas Start Out In The Empty Void Of Your Head - And They End Up As A Material Thing, Like A Book You Can Hold In Your Hand. That Is The Magical Process. It's An Alchemical Thing. Yes, We Do Get The Gold Out Of It But That's Not The Most Important Thing. It's The Work Itself.

Art

Book

Writing

I Suppose That The Main Drive Is To Find The Edge Of Something And Then Throw Myself Over It.

Over It

Edges

Who Makes The World? Perhaps The World Is Not Made. Perhaps Nothing Is Made. Perhaps It Simply Is, Has Been, Will Always Be There…a Clock Without A Craftsman.

World

Clock

Craftsman

How Can Two People Hate So Much Without Knowing Each Other?

Hate

Two

Knowing

A World Grows Up Around Me. Am I Shaping It, Or Do Its Predetermined Contours Guide My Hand?

Growing Up

Hands

World

We're All Puppets, Laurie. I'm Just A Puppet Who Can See The Strings.

Puppets

Strings

Rorschach: Used To Come Here Often, Back When We Were Partners. Dreiberg: Oh. Uh, Yeah... Yeah, Those Were Great Times, Rorschach. Great Times. Whatever Happened To Them? Rorschach: [exiting] You Quit.

Rorschach

Back When

Quitting

There Are Two Worlds We Live In: A Material World, Bound By The Laws Of Physics, And The World Inside Our Mind, Which Is Just As Important.

Law

Two

Mind

Art Is, Like Magic, The Science Of Manipulating Symbols, Words Or Images To Achieve Changes In Consciousness

Art

Magic

Consciousness

Right From The Outset, The Prevailing Mindset In British Comics Fandom Was A Radical And Progressive One. We Were All Proto-hippies, And We All Thought That Comics Would Be Greatly Improved If Everything Was A Bit Psychedelic Like Jim Steranko.

Hippie

Would Be

Fandoms

This Is An Imaginary Story...aren't They All?

Stories

Imaginary

Please Don't Worry. It's A Psychological Complaint, Common Amongst Ex-librarians. You See, She Thinks She's A Coffee Table Edition.

Coffee

Thinking

Worry

Art Makes Us Feel Less Alone. It Makes Us Think: Somebody Else Has Thought This, Somebody Else Has Had These Feelings.

Art

Thinking

Feelings

If You're Using Sex To Sell Sneakers, Then You're Not Just Selling Sneakers, You're Selling Sex As Well, And You're Contributing To The Sexual Temperature Of Society.

Sex

Sneakers

Temperature

Things Are Tough All Over, Cupcake, An' It Rains On The Just An' The Unjust Alike...except In California.

Rain

Cupcakes

California

I Don't Think You Can Separate A Place From Its History. I Think A Place Is Much More Than The Bricks And Mortar That Go Into Its Construction. I Think It's More Than The Accidental Topography Of The Ground It Stands On.

Thinking

Bricks And Mortar

Topography

Everything You've Ever Read Of Mine Is First-draft. This Is One Of The Peculiarities Of The Comics Field. By The Time You're Working On Chapter Three Of Your Masterwork, Chapter One Is Already In Print. You Can't Go Back And Suddenly Decide To Make This Character A Woman, Or Have This One Fall Out Of A Window.

Fall

Character

Three

I Think That Storytelling And Creation Are Very Close To What The Center Of What Magic Is About. I Think Not Just For Me, But For Most Of The Cultures That Have Had A Concept Of Magic, Then The Manipulation Of Language, And Words, And Thus Of Stories And Fictions, Has Been Very Close To The Center Of It All.

Thinking

Magic

Culture

To Paint Comic Books As Childish And Illiterate Is Lazy. A Lot Of Comic Books Are Very Literate - Unlike Most Films.

Book

Lazy

Film

For Whatever The Future Holds, One Thing Is Certain... It Just Won't Be The Same.

Certain

One Thing

It Has Occurred To Me That The Superhero Really Only Originates In America. That Seems To Be The Only Country That Has Produced This Phenomenon.

Country

America

Superhero

The One Place Gods Inarguably Exist Is In The Human Mind.

God

Mind

Humans

The Multiplying Villainies Of Nature Do Swarm Upon Him... [from Macbeth]

Vendetta

Multiplying

Swarms

Famously, There's Not Really Anywhere To Go After Nihilism. It's Not Progressing Toward Anything, It's A Statement Of Outrage, However Brilliant.

Progress

Nihilism

Brilliant

Why Do We Argue? Life's So Fragile, A Successful Virus Clinging To A Speck Of Mud, Suspended In Endless Nothing.

Successful

Viruses

Mud

Language Comes First. It's Not That Language Grows Out Of Consciousness, If You Haven't Got Language, You Can't Be Conscious.

Firsts

Language

Consciousness

Remember, Remember The Fifth Of November Of Gunpowder Treason And Plot. I Know Of No Reason Why The Gun Powder Treason Should Ever Be Forgot.

Gun

Plot

Reason Why

Way Back In The Day, When I First Started And Had Delusions Of Adequacy As A Cartoonist, I Would Listen To Music. When I Switched To A Career As A Writer, I Would Try To Listen To Music, But If The Songs Had Lyrics They Would Get In The Way Of The Words I Was Trying To Write. So I Switched To Listening To Purely Instrumental Pieces.

Song

Writing

Careers

There's A Notion I'd Like To See Buried: The Ordinary Person. Ridiculous. There Is No Ordinary Person.

Ordinary

Ridiculous

Buried

I Thought As Much. Miss Murray, Though I Am A Beast, Do Not Think That I Am Stupid. I Know That I Am Hideous And Hateful. I Am Not Loved, Nor Ever Hope To Be. Nor Am I Fool Enough To Think That What I Feel For You Is Love. But In This World, Alone, I Do Not Hate You. And Alone In This World, You Do Not Hate Me.

Hate

Stupid

Thinking

Noise Is Relative To The Silence Preceeding It. The More Absolute The Hush, The More Shocking The Thunderclap. Our Masters Have Not Heard The Peoples Voice For Generations, Evey And It Is Much, Much Louder Than They Care To Remember.

Voice

Silence

Generations

It Is Not The Job Of Artists To Give The Audience What The Audience Want. If The Audience Knew What They Needed, Then They Wouldn’t Be The Audience. They Would Be The Artist. It Is The Job Of Artists To Give The Audience What They Need

Inspirational

Jobs

Artist

It's Early Days. A Few Skeletons Are Bound To Keep Jumping Out Of The Closet.

Skeletons

Jumping

Closets

I'm Dependent On Writing For A Living, So Really It's To My Advantage To Understand How The Creative Process Works. One Of The Problems Is, When You Start To Do That, In Effect You're Going To Have To Step Off The Edge Of Science And Rationality.

Writing

Creative

Steps

I'm Disappointed In You, Adrian. I'm Very Disappointed. Reassembling Myself Was The First Trick I Learned. It Didn't Kill Osterman. Did You Really Think It Would Kill Me? I Have Walked Across The Surface Of The Sun. I Have Witnessed Events So Tiny And So Fast, They Could Hardly Be Said To Have Occurred At All. But You, Adrian, You're Just A Man. The World's Smartest Man Poses No More Threat To Me Than Does Its Smartest Termite.

Men

Thinking

Events

I Don't Really Think That Very Much Is Interesting About The Superhero As An Archetype.

Thinking

Interesting

Superhero

My Experience Of Life Is That It Is Not Divided Up Into Genres; It’s A Horrifying, Romantic, Tragic, Comical, Science-fiction Cowboy Detective Novel. You Know, With A Bit Of Pornography If You're Lucky.

Life

Romantic

Cowboy

Life Isn't Divided Into Genres

Genre

Divided

Don't Leave Home Without Your Sword - Your Intellect.

Home

Intellect

We Gaze Continually At The World And It Grows Dull In Our Perceptions. Yet Seen From Another's Vantage Point, As If New, It May Still Take The Breath Away.

Perception

World

Dull

Every Film Is A Remake Of A Previous Film, Or A Remake Of A Television Series That Everyone Loved In The 1960s, Or A Remake Of A Television Series That Everyone Hated In The 1960s. Or It's A Theme Park Ride; It Will Soon Come To Breakfast Cereal Mascots.

Cereal

Television

Breakfast

A Lot Of People Have Found The Idea Of Living Your Life Over And Over Again Absolutely Terrifying; There's Some People That Find It Very Comforting. There Are Others That Are Appalled By It.

Ideas

People

Live Your Life

I Didn't Really Sign Up To Be A Celebrity, I Only Signed Up To Be A Writer.

I'm Not Personally Connected To The Internet, Although Nearly Everyone That I Know Is, And Many Of Them Have A Great Time And No Problems With It. And On The Surface You Can See That The Internet Could Go An Awful Long Way To Educating, Enlightening, Informing And Connecting The World.

Long

World

Awful

In Comics The Reader Is In Complete Control Of The Experience. They Can Read It At Their Own Pace, And If There's A Piece Of Dialogue That Seems To Echo Something A Few Pages Back, They Can Flip Back And Check It Out, Whereas The Audience For A Film Is Being Dragged Through The Experience At The Speed Of 24 Frames Per Second.

Echoes

Pace

Pieces

I'm Not A Very Shy Person. I'm Just Somebody Who's Got A Lot Of Work And Who Doesn't Like To Parade Himself In New Celebrity Contexts.

Shy

Parades

Persons

I Don't Like To Go To Conventions, And I Don't Like To Relate To People On A Level Of Hero Worship, Because There's No Real Communication Going On There.

Real

Communication

Hero

I'm 65 Years Old. Everyday The Future Looks A Little Bit Darker. But The Past, Even The Grimy Parts Of It, Well, It Just Keeps On Getting Brighter All The Time.

Past

Years

Everyday

I Think If You Were To Sever The Connection Between Arousal And Shame, You Might Actually Come Up With Something Liberating And Socially Useful. It Might Be Healthier For Us, And Lead To A Situation Such As They Enjoy In Holland, Denmark, Or Spain, Where They Have Pornography All Over The Place - Quite Hardcore Pornography - But They Do Not Have Anywhere The Incidence Of Sex Crimes.

Sex

Thinking

Connections

The Only Reality We Can Ever Truly Know Is That Of Our Perceptions, Our Own Consciousness, While That Consciousness, And Thus Our Entire Reality, Is Made Of Nothing But Signs And Symbols. Nothing But Language. Even God Requires Language Before Conceiving The Universe. See Genesis: “in The Beginning Was The Word.

Reality

Perception

Language

Lsd Was An Incredible Experience. Not That I’m Recommending It For Anybody Else; But For Me It Kind Of – It Hammered Home To Me That Reality Was Not A Fixed Thing. That The Reality That We Saw About Us Every Day Was One Reality, And A Valid One – But That There Were Others, Different Perspectives Where Different Things Have Meaning That Were Just As Valid. That Had A Profound Effect On Me.

Home

Reality

Profound

There Is An Inverse Relationship Between Imagination And Money.

Imagination

Inverse

As Far As I Can See, It's Not Important That We Have Free Will, Just As Long As We Have The Illusion Of Free Will To Stop Us Going Mad.

Long

Mad

Important

I Think That In An Increasingly Virtual World, Lovingly Produced Artefacts Are At A Premium.

Thinking

World

Premium

There's Always Been This Feedback Between Comics And Films. But I Think That If You Take That Analogy Too Far, If You Only See Comic Books In Terms Of Films, Then Eventually The Best We Can End Up With Is Films That Don't Move. It Would Make Us A Poor Relation To The Movie Industry.

Moving

Book

Thinking

Understanding Quotes: Their Essence and Application

Quotes, or quotations, are powerful tools in communication, encapsulating ideas, emotions, and wisdom in concise expressions. They serve various purposes across different contexts, from academic writing to everyday conversation.

1. Defining Quotes

A quote is a repetition of someone else's statement or thoughts. It can be a direct replication of words spoken or written by another individual, often used to support arguments, provide evidence, or convey profound insights.

2. The Importance of Quotes

2.1. Enhancing Credibility

Incorporating quotes from authoritative sources can bolster the credibility of your work. By referencing experts or primary sources, you demonstrate thorough research and a solid foundation for your arguments.

2.2. Providing Evidence

Quotes serve as concrete evidence to support claims. In academic and professional writing, they validate points made, offering readers a basis to trust the information presented.

2.3. Conveying Emotions and Perspectives

Quotes can encapsulate emotions and perspectives succinctly. They allow writers to express complex feelings or viewpoints through the words of others, often more eloquently than paraphrasing.

3. Types of Quotes

3.1. Direct Quotes

Direct quotes involve copying the exact words from a source, enclosed in quotation marks. They are used when the original wording is significant or particularly well-expressed.

3.2. Indirect Quotes (Paraphrasing)

Indirect quotes restate the original message in your own words. While not enclosed in quotation marks, they still require proper attribution to the original source.

3.3. Block Quotes

Block quotes are lengthy direct quotations, formatted as a separate block of text. They are typically used for quotes exceeding a certain length, varying by citation style. For instance, in APA style, quotes longer than 40 words are formatted as block quotes.

4. Proper Usage of Quotes

4.1. Contextual Relevance

Ensure that the quote you choose is relevant to the topic and adds value to your content. Avoid inserting quotes solely for decorative purposes.

4.2. Integration into Your Writing

Seamlessly integrate quotes into your writing. Introduce them appropriately and follow up with analysis or commentary to connect them to your main points.

4.3. Attribution and Citation

Always attribute quotes to their original authors and provide proper citations according to the required style guide (APA, MLA, Chicago, etc.).

5. Common Mistakes to Avoid

5.1. Overusing Quotes

Relying too heavily on quotes can overshadow your voice. Use them sparingly to support your arguments, not replace them.

5.2. Lack of Analysis

Presenting a quote without analysis or explanation can leave readers questioning its relevance. Always follow up with your interpretation or discussion.

5.3. Misquoting or Taking Out of Context

Ensure that quotes are accurate and not taken out of context, as this can mislead readers and undermine your credibility.

6. Quotes in Different Contexts

6.1. Academic Writing

In academic writing, quotes are used to support arguments, provide evidence, and engage with existing literature. Proper citation is crucial to avoid plagiarism.

6.2. Journalism

Journalists use quotes to provide firsthand accounts, add authenticity, and present multiple perspectives within a story.

6.3. Literature and Creative Writing

In literature, quotes can be used to convey character voices, themes, and stylistic elements. They enrich narratives and provide depth to storytelling.

7. Punctuation and Formatting

Understanding the correct punctuation and formatting of quotes is essential:

Quotation Marks: Always enclose direct quotes within quotation marks.

Punctuation Placement: In American English, periods and commas are placed inside quotation marks, while colons and semicolons are placed outside.

Block Quotes: For longer quotes, format them as block quotes without quotation marks, and indent the entire block.

8. Ethical Considerations

Ethical use of quotes involves accurate representation, proper attribution, and respect for intellectual property. Misuse can lead to plagiarism, which carries serious academic and professional consequences.

9. Tools for Managing Quotes

Utilize tools like citation generators and plagiarism checkers to manage quotes effectively. These tools help ensure proper formatting and originality in your writing.

Conclusion

Quotes are invaluable in enriching content, providing evidence, and conveying complex ideas succinctly. When used appropriately, they enhance the quality and credibility of your writing. Always ensure relevance, proper integration, and ethical usage to maximize their impact.

Trending Author