Alan Moore's work

I am just read Alan Moore's novel, Voice of The Fire. This made me realise that I ought to recognise his work on this blog. As a writer, he has given me lots of inspiration.

Voice of the Fire

A highly experimental novel, Moore takes pretty much every risk he could and pretty much pulls it off. Every chapter takes place in a different period of time in the same location: Moore's home town. Themes and events repeat themselves, linked through history.
The first chapter presents an early form of man where language has not truly developed. Moore recreates the English language to be entirely present, with the most basic grammar. Very cleverly done.
The last chapter is of a writer trying to finish his book - presumably Moore himself. It is again in the present tense - a literary recurrence that reflects the other recurrences throughout the novel.

Watchmen

This is to me clearly the greatest comic book of all time (Maus as a second place, closely followed by V for Vendetta [Alan Moore] and The Dark Knight Returns). If you are going to start reading any comic book, it should be this.
Interesting presentation of the greater good and utilitarianism calculation on a massive scale. Makes you question consequentialist ethics. I certainly would never follow through with Ozymandias' plan, despite being something of a utilitarian. However, with it done, I would do what Nite Owl does, not Rorschach, and let the deception continue.
Despite this, Rorschach is one of the greatest characters ever.

V for Vendetta

A brilliant book opposing tyranny. An almost Orwellian dystopian novel with a revolutionary vigilante superhero planted into it. What an awesome concept. And brilliantly pulled off.
The figure of V has become a revolutionary figure, particularly his mask, which has been used by Anonymous. Shows what an impact these things can have.
There's a fantastic speech in the film, but I can't remember whether it is in the book. V first meets Evey and delivers a monologue that describes himself using 'v' alliteration ("Verily, this vichyssoise of verbiage veers most verbose"). It's a wonderful exploration of the English language that I learnt off by heart. I do not know, however, whether I can attribute it to Alan Moore.
"Ideas are bulletbroof"

I am not such a fan of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen as his other works.

Opinion on films
Personally, I think the films of Moore's works are pretty good. V for Vendetta and Watchmen are both great films. However, they do not rival the original comics, which justifies Alan Moore's attitude of immense dislike for the film adaptations of his work. I would take a more light-hearted approach, but I respect Moore  greatly.

Fahrenheit 451

This short dystopian novel by Ray Bradbury is an extremely well written and enjoyable read. A rather unsubtle warning about the dangerous of burning books. A society is depicted where all citizens are passive consumers of rubbish TV with meaningless lives. Firemen have a different role of causing fires, burning down homes that may have books in them. The political messages are incredibly blunt and unambiguous, but that is acceptable with a topic as unambiguous as the morality of book burning.

Essentially, as with a scary amount of dystopian fiction, it's now happening. Sure, we don't burn books, but we are reading fewer and fewer and in their place are consuming mindless television. This is an important book.

Another interpretation of the book is the role of mass media stultifying society and human relationships. In the late 1950s, Bradbury commented:
"In writing the short novel Fahrenheit 451 I thought I was describing a world that might evolve in four or five decades. But only a few weeks ago, in Beverly Hills one night, a husband and wife passed me, walking their dog. I stood staring after them, absolutely stunned. The woman held in one hand a small cigarette-package-sized radio, its antenna quivering. From this sprang tiny copper wires which ended in a dainty cone plugged into her right ear. There she was, oblivious to man and dog, listening to far winds and whispers and soap-opera cries, sleep-walking, helped up and down curbs by a husband who might just as well not have been there. This was not fiction."

There is a fantastic section where Beatty explains how society came to be the way it is where anything that opposes the status quo is destroyed. It was utterly gripping. I have rarely been enthralled by a book as much as that.
Interestingly, however, the book then reaches the end of Section 1 and I was rather unmotivated to continue reading and read something else, later returning to it and being once again drawn into the world. This shows the importance of cliffhangers.

-----


"Do you ever read any of the books you burn?"
He laughed. "That's against the law!"
"Oh. Of course."


"We must all be alike. Not everyone born free and equal, as the Constitution says, but everyone made equal. Each man the image of every other; then all are happy, for there are no mountains to make them cower, to judge themselves against."


"We have everything we need to be happy, but we aren't happy. Something's missing. I looked around. The only thing I positively knew was gone was the books I'd burned in ten or twelve years. So I thought books might help."