Whatever else anybody might say about it (and most people who’ve written about it so far seem pretty confused and startled by the damn thing), Eddie Campbell’s The Fate of the Artist is indisputably a major new work by one of the most important figures on the graphic novel scene (probably best known to casual graphic novel readers as the illustrator of Alan Moore’s From Hell, which itself is finally back in print from Top Shelf, by the way). I’ve read Campbell’s strange new, um, post-autobiographical (?) tale twice now, if “reading” is the right word, but haven’t yet come up with any clear thoughts about it myself, one way or another. Don’t take that as a bad sign — it isn’t, necessarily. I expect I will figure out what I think about it at some point, and will write a review here. I pretty much have to. It cannot be ignored. It’s that kind of book. In the meantime, here’s some of the more interesting first reactions from around the web:

Mark Fossen (Focused Totality):

But is [The Fate of the Artist], the standard bearer for the Great March To Acceptance, even a graphic novel?

I don’t know that it is … I don’t know that it isn’t.

I don’t know that I care … read more

Christopher Butcher (Comics212.net):

The weight of Campbell’s publishing efforts, his art, and his life in comix, is felt on every page. It’s felt on the very first page in fact, on which the artist tells us to “all go to fuck,” sick of comics and himself and you too … read more

Rob Salkowitz (Emphasis Added):

You don’t get the sense that [Campbell is] trying to impress anyone with mere formalism or keep his audience coldly at a distance, as in the arch and constipated work of someone like Chris Ware. He’s not trying to appear Artistically Serious by asking Important Questions in Difficult and Challenging Ways – or at least, that’s not all he’s doing … read more

Campbell himself attempts to explain what he was doing, in characteristically self-effacing fashion, in this interview conducted by Jen Contino at Comicon Pulse:

“On the surface I was trying to wrestle with the terrors I experienced after becoming a too-visible person in the world,” Campbell said. “While I certainly was never anywhere near famous or anything like that, after the From Hell experience, with the movie and the colossal success of the book, I came to feel very vulnerable and exposed. Taking an introspective look at myself is what I was doing all along remember. It’s just that I had always done it safe in the knowledge that nobody would ever read the damn things. Now I learned to the contrary. It must be worse for my kids. My daughter started working in a DVD store a while ago and somebody there was familiar with the page I drew way back in 1988 on the subject of her toilet training. That must have a worrying effect on a young lady. So in Fate, I’ve given her the microphone to talk about me for a change.” … read more

Title: The Fate of the Artist Creator: Eddie Campbell Publisher: First Second

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