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Elizabeth Sandifer

Elizabeth Sandifer created Eruditorum Press. She’s not really sure why she did that, and she apologizes for the inconvenience. She currently writes Last War in Albion, a history of the magical war between Alan Moore and Grant Morrison. She used to write TARDIS Eruditorum, a history of Britain told through the lens of a ropey sci-fi series. She also wrote Neoreaction a Basilisk, writes comics these days, and has ADHD so will probably just randomly write some other shit sooner or later. Support Elizabeth on Patreon.

20 Comments

  1. James Sommerville
    December 18, 2018 @ 2:38 pm

    I never thought that I’d say this, and it is absolutely Chibnall’s fault, but I’m happy to not be reading about Doctor Who on this blog.

    Thank you!!

    Reply

  2. Sean Dillon
    December 18, 2018 @ 5:13 pm

    “Moore, on the other hand, for all his ambitions of elevating pornography to art (or even just writing about sex in an artistic context) often ends up presenting sex in such a reverential way that even when it’s bracingly explicit as in Lost Girls it feels strangely sanitized and defanged, as though in the course of elevating it to art he’s had to chloroform it and pin it beneath glass for display.”

    Along with the line, “His heart is also clearly not in the underlying equivocating of sex and violence, which requires him to take violence seriously as a substitute for sex as opposed to the primary failure mode of sexual repression,” this highlights to some extent Moore’s failures when it comes to rape. Specifically, Moore seems to view the act of rape as a failure mode of sex. The point where sex itself becomes violent.

    Indeed, for all his horrifying depictions of people being raped, he tends to shy away from depicting the trauma that comes with being a rape survivor. The only one I can think of is Mina Harker and Robert Black. But those are a minority where, at best, the subject is completely ignored as is the case of Tom Strong or, at worst, Janni Dakkar recreates Pirate Jenny like every other good man who goes to war.

    All of this to say great article and I look forward to consulting it as I write about The Mirror of Love for the book next year.

    Reply

  3. Ben
    December 18, 2018 @ 7:09 pm

    Hi – attempted to check the link in the intro to the previous chapter for the Amazon link to Book 1, but the link seems to be broken. Is there an alternative source? Thanks! (Figured this was more likely to be seen here than in that thread.)

    Reply

    • Elizabeth Sandifer
      December 19, 2018 @ 3:41 am

      It’s temporarily out of print while I reissue it in my new name.

      Reply

      • Daru
        December 30, 2018 @ 11:33 am

        Great! I look forwards to the book coming out in your new name and for sure will be getting a copy whenever it comes out. Good to know.

        Reply

      • Cat Mara
        January 4, 2019 @ 7:53 pm

        Possibly related if you’re tracking down online artefacts with your old name on them: I’m still subscribed to this old YouTube channel of yours: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtwOPjJtN5auSAuvTQ-9zGA

        Reply

        • Elizabeth Sandifer
          January 4, 2019 @ 8:25 pm

          I have absolutely no idea how to log into that account anymore.

          Reply

          • Cat Mara
            January 4, 2019 @ 9:08 pm

            It appears to be tied to a Google+ profile, if that’s any help: https://plus.google.com/111304286283757635822

            (Was that around the time Google was trying to force everyone to use Plus as their universal identity mechanism? My memory is hazy.) Seeing as how they’re shutting down Plus in a few months anyway, it might not be long for the world in any case.

  4. Ben Connolly
    December 18, 2018 @ 9:03 pm

    This was really, really great. It’s so good to have Last War in Albion back.

    Now, just to be pedantic. I only say this because I have an inexplicable, and virtually indefensible, love of Byrne’s Superman work and have read those books too many damn time. Big Barda and Superman didn’t actually shoot any pornos. Mister Miracle bursts into the scene and stops the production before any clothes are removed.

    Reply

    • liminal fruitbat
      December 21, 2018 @ 12:09 am

      Barda and Superman may not have, but Barda was forced to shoot something that Darkseid showed Scott Free and Oberon.

      (When Darkseid feels like a self-insert for the writer, something’s wrong.)

      Reply

  5. Daru
    December 18, 2018 @ 11:36 pm

    So glad to see the War back El! Very exciting. Still reading through but into the whole chapter being presented, really works well.

    Reply

  6. (Not That) Jack
    December 19, 2018 @ 12:30 am

    Welcome back to the War. You have, indeed, been missed.

    Reply

  7. Christopher Brown
    December 19, 2018 @ 3:51 am

    I forgot how much I needed this in my life. Very, very, very well done.

    You should devote an entire chapter in Albion to the work of Chris Chibnall.

    Reply

  8. Simon
    December 19, 2018 @ 4:57 pm

    “[A] look at the superhero material Moore did for Image and America’s Best Comics mostly suggests that his best moments in the genre were, by 1987, behind him.”

    Not much fondness for Top 10, I take it?

    Reply

    • AuntyJack
      December 19, 2018 @ 8:01 pm

      Promethea, anyone?

      Reply

      • Elizabeth Sandifer
        January 4, 2019 @ 8:25 pm

        “Mostly” is doing some work in that sentence.

        (Top 10 is fine.)

        Reply

  9. Daibhid C
    December 20, 2018 @ 11:02 pm

    Well, that was interesting. I followed the link back to Chapter Six, thought “Wow, how did I miss this content that is entirely new to me at the time?” and then discovered I’d already commented on it. Not only that, but once I saw the comment, I remembered making it, but this did not jog my memory of having read the actual chapter. Weird.

    Anyway … I’m surprised you didn’t mention another unfortunate moment in the Northstar mess, which was that between Byrne and Lobdell, there was Bill Mantlo, who wrote him as being sick, with the intent being that he was HIV positive. Not a great way of introducing a character’s sexuality in the first place, but when Shooter vetoed it again, Mantlo instead explained that Northstar’s illness came from being separated from his home in Alfheim, it having suddenly been retconned that his mother was an elf. (This got re-retconned by James Hudnell before Lobdell took over.)

    Nothing I’ve read on the subject is clear on whether Mantlo intended people to think of another word for “elf”, but it’s pretty dire either way.

    I have a deep affection for the story where Superman gets lectured by his costume and Clark’s suit, because I think it might be the first work of Moore’s I ever read, unless it was “I was Superman’s Double”.

    Reply

  10. Douglas Muir
    December 26, 2018 @ 3:00 pm

    I don’t recall: did you civer the Green Lantern shorts and the Phantom Stranger story? They’re all small, but they’re definitely part of the oeuvre worth at least glancing at.

    Doug M.

    Reply

    • Elizabeth Sandifer
      December 28, 2018 @ 6:03 pm

      They’re both covered, along with Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow, in the Swamp Thing chapter of volume 1.

      Reply

  11. Daru
    December 30, 2018 @ 11:40 am

    Again, so glad El to have The War back, and what a great read. I really got into the whole exploration of sexuality within Moore and interesting to have a little teaser of how Morrison covered that area. I have to be honest never read a lot of the Claremont X-Men era (or a lot of X-Men to be honest), so getting the exploration of Claremont and his frustrated attempts to bring in deeper and wider layers of sexuality into his work there was fascinating.

    Reply

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