Kibbles ‘n’ Bits, 11/10/09

David Mamet and Werner Herzog are the Apollo and Dionysis of movie-making. Forgive me, I’m pitting them against each other partially because they’ve each created works I adore, but also because Mamet himself has in essence already done so.

After helping run King Con, I have to admit that even though we were faced with many skeptical individuals, I think we ran a fantastic first show. Yes, we hit a few speed bumps along the way, but everyone helping us put the event together (which was the first time most of them had been exposed to running a show like this) brought in the elevated energy to make it a success. We weren’t trying to one-up any other con or be the biggest con in NYC, but rather just run a great show filled with all the talented comic and animation folk that are passionate about their work. I don’t blame some for being skeptical, but it’s definitely the optimists that made the show have such a great vibe!

Steampunk fiction is a sub-genre of science-fiction and fantasy. Stories generally take place during Victorian times (hence the “steam”) and contain fictional technological advancements (such as steam-powered robots, laser rays, battle dirigibles, etc.) or technology that was created at a much later date (such as the computer). Because of the inclusion of futuristic technology, alternate history is also a large part of most steampunk fiction. The works of H.G. Wells and Jules Verne are prime examples of steampunk fiction, as are the novels “The Anubis Gates” by Tim Powers and “The Difference Engine” by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling, and the classic television show “The Wild, Wild West.”

Eddie Campbell has lost his bag. He looks agitated, all the valuables are in it. The audience is worried: How could this happen? What can we do? He’s telling us that he just told his wife that the bag is gone. She replied that he gave her the bag 10 minutes ago. Proceedings aren’t even under-way yet and we’re already being treated to a story from Campbell, one that touches upon family life, ageing and failing memory, and perhaps the reluctance of the artist to be fully engaged with the mundane reality of bag location. Neatly encapsulating many of the topics tonight’s conversation will touch upon. And he delivered it in far less time than it’s taken me to describe it.

1999’s Bread & Wine, a 44 pp., squarebound 10″ X 8″ autobio comic written by black, gay science-fiction writer, professor and theorist Samuel R. Delany and drawn by artist /martial arts instructor Mia Wolff, is difficult to write critically about; I’m afraid I’m going to lapse into mere rhapsodic description. (In all fairness, I think that Alan Moore, who wrote the intro, occasionally struggles with this impulse too; at times, his habitual purple prose goes positively eggplant.) Which is too bad: Bread & Wine: An Erotic Tale of New York —the story, told in flashback, of how Delany became a couple with a homeless man, Dennis — is a rich text deserving informed analysis and a sense of how it fits into Delany’s larger body of work.