WRR@LARGE

by Tim E. Ogline

NEW YORK, NY — The synchronized daily rhythm of the life of the world’s greatest metropolis is conducted by the interaction of people and place... of commerce and dreams... of art and life. The calculus of collaborations great and small work together to give this place its tempo and its pulse.

And sometimes, this pulse quickens... as it has this week. The influx of 162 writers from 45 countries for the Third Annual PEN World Voices International Literary Festival has brought a shot of adrenaline into the cultural epicenter of America. This gathering of thinkers from around the planet are here in unison — a collaboration of voices having serious conversations about how we all work together... at home and away in far-off lands.

And on this particular cool April evening on West 37th Street — that’s just the topic of conversation tonight: Collaboration. Neil Gaiman (see “Myth, Magic, and the Mind of Neil Gaiman”) and Marguerite Abouet brought insight and delight to an appreciative audience in an intimate performance space at Midtown Manhattan’s 37 Arts at this 26 April PEN World Voices event. This dialogue, moderated by Novelist Sean Wilsey, featured a wide-ranging discussion about the collaborative process in the creation of graphic novels as well as working in other media and of the expatriate experience.

Gaiman (a 20-year veteran of the comics industry with Sandman, The Eternals, 1602, Violent Cases and many more — as well as New York Times bestselling novelist, children’s book author and screenwriter) and Abouet (whose freshman outing with Aya has drawn international acclaim), with the aid of an interpreter, had some intriguing responses to one of Wilsey’s intial questions about the desire to draw their own comics as well as working with an artist.

MARGUERITE ABOUET: I would like to be able to draw myself — but it’s like the English language... I don’t speak it very well.

Neil Gaiman discussing the collaborative process and experiencing his work as visualized by an artist.

NEIL GAIMAN: I used to wish I could draw as well as some of my artists do. And then I made the fatal mistake of trying to draw — and it was a thing called the “24 Hour Comic.” It was an invention of Scott McCloud. You had to write, draw and letter a 24 page comic in 24 hours.

And I saw the type of comics that my friends who could draw were doing and I thought that I could do something as good as this. I tried... and failed. In fact I did a 14 page comic in 24 hours. But, by the end of that I was definitely cured of any desire to draw my own comics.

I realized that part of the fun of writing comics is to be able to say, “And then 5000 spaceships come over the hill.”

SEAN WILSEY: And you’re done.

NEIL GAIMAN: And I’m done.

And the idea that five hours later that you’re sitting there still drawing spaceships going, “What idiot wrote this? My hand hurts.”

I’m also think I’m very, very fortunate that I get to work with brilliant artists that can draw some of what’s in my head.

And when I want to have complete control, I go off and write a short story or a novel. But I take no pleasure in novels. I take no pleasure in my own prose. I can’t pick up a prose work that I’ve written and look at it and think what a wonderful piece of work this is. Whereas, I look at something that I’ve scripted with pleasure — and think what a great job they did. This is great. I can be proud of it in a way I can never be with my own prose.

Wilsey also inquired about the expatriate experience as a citizen of a colonial power now living in its former colony (Gaiman) and a denizen of a former protectorate residing in the former patron state (Abouet).

Marguerite Abouet on Aya as a hopeful and spirited coming of age story in Ivory Coast.

NEIL GAIMAN: I think it’s very good for a writer to be an expatriate in a way. I think it’s good for a writer to be out of their own environment because it’s good for a writer to be anywhere that makes them feel slightly uncomfortable and watch things.

SEAN WILSEY: Creatively speaking, does that distance inform what you’re doing?

MARGUERITE ABOUET: As a citizen of a colonized country who emigrated to the dominant country, I’m very proud to write a story about my country about the good side of my country and show that to the French people.

NEIL GAIMAN: When I moved out from England to America I found myself writing for the first 8 years fiction all set in England it was in some ways easier to write about the place that I had left now that I had distance.

MARGUERITE ABOUET: Same thing with me. I understand — that happened to me too.

I thought I would have forgotten everything that I had lived in Africa. So when I arrived in France, I could remember easily all the stories that had happened back in my country. It’s true that it’s easier.

The conversation was punctuated with Wilsey’s clelever banter, Gaiman’s gentle wit, and Abouet’s earnest remarks. The hour-long program was followed by a book signing.