Three things you could buy

Jouni Koponen is a Finnish artist who, every now and again, goes off and illustrates something of mine for his own pleasure. Sometimes the things he does become actual things you can hold in your hand -- he did the illustrated Shoggoth's Old Peculiar chapbook, for example.

Over on his blog, he tells the story of how he...

...fell in love with Neil Gaiman's poem "The Day the Saucers Came" and I got the idea of having this one picture in the beginning, and then just "zooming out" of it so that there's more and more stuff visible. I did couple of pictures and sent them to Neil and he really liked them. Then I did the rest of the pictures and was really happy with myself... and then Neil asked me what are we going to DO with the illustrations... and I had no idea.

We went back and forth with various ideas (basically anything and everything between... let's say from set of postcards to T-shirt printing to illustrated picturebook)... and then Neil was busy with stuff... and then I was busy with some other stuff... and then we forgot the whole damn thing for a little while... and then we remembered it again.

Now, at some point we added Cat Mihos from NeverWear to the "brainstorm" and we came up with an idea of a poster. So, I did a background image and put the illustrations on it... and that was it. Everybody was happy.

Click on it to see it larger. It's lovely.



It's being printed on card stock. I'm taking some of the print run to be my Hullo It's 2009 and I Seem To Have Missed Christmas Again thingummy for my friends, and Cat Mihos is going to be selling the rest of them through her Neverwear site. There are 500 for sale in all, numbered. Tomorrow and henceforth she will be selling them for $45 each. Today, and only today, and only because they went up on the site this morning with a typo which she is honouring, she's selling them for $25. (Here's the direct link.)

(This is the Neverwear blog. Scroll down for a great photo of Ms. Amanda F. Palmer modelling a Graveyard Book tee shirt for Cat.)

Earlier this year I gave the first Julie Schwartz Memorial Lecture at MIT, mostly about, if memory serves, the relationship between hardcore pornography and stage musicals, and how you could use this relationship to illuminate the nature of genre literature, and after the lecture I was interviewed by MIT media genius Henry Jenkins: the event was filmed and is available now on DVD. http://cms.mit.edu/news/2008/12/neil_gaiman_dvd_available_dec.php is a link to a page with a clip from the interview bit of the evening, and here's the pre-ordering information.

The DVD might make a very nice Mithrastide gift for someone, and sales of the DVDs go to fund things like airfare and food for the next speaker. (One day the Memorial Lecture will be rich enough to do actual speaker's fees, but not yet.) It'll go on sale on the 17th.

And finally, the new Rain Taxi magazine has a sort of a Sandman special, with a Dave McKean cover, in which, amongst other things, Lemony Snicket (or possibly Daniel Handler) promises (or possibly threatens) to kiss me with tongue in joyous Sandman celebration. You can buy it here.

Labels: shamelessly commercial plugs for things by other people mostly

buy now! etc

In a little over a year Stephin Merritt's CORALINE Musical will see its premiere in New York. According to http://www.mcctheater.com/season0809.html:

World Premiere
May 6-June 20, 2009
Coraline
Music and Lyrics by Book by
Stephin Merritt David Greenspan
Based on the Novel by
Neil Gaiman
Directed by Leigh Silverman

Poor bored Coraline. She’s left to rattle round her perpetually distracted parents’ house all by her lonesome. Then one day, her dreams of a better reality are answered as she steps through an old oak doorway and passes into a perfected replica of her own world. Greeted there by a vastly loving Other Mother and kindly Other Father, she’s thrilled! But, as the saying goes: Be careful what you wish for…

A musical like no other, Coraline sprang from the minds of three of the most wildly popular cult heroes of our time. Adapted from the truly terrifying children’s book by Neil Gaiman (author of the international sensation Sandman), this tale of menace and mayhem is set to music and lyrics by smart-rock iconoclast Stephin Merritt (of The Magnetic Fields), and boasts a book by celebrated downtown actor-cum-auteur, David Greenspan, who serves double-duty as the villain, Coraline’s suspiciously nurturing Other Mother.

“Critics sometimes compare Stephin Merritt with Cole Porter because Porter is shorthand for the kind of smart, urbane lyrics Merritt writes.” –NY Times “David Greenspan is probably all-round the most talented theater artist of my generation.” –Tony Kushner

I've heard about 3/4 of the songs, sung by Stephin himself, and they're wonderful, although that's all I know about it at this stage. If you're interested, the season is very short, and the theatre seats just fewer than 300 people, so it might be a good idea to get tickets as soon as you can -- right now you can subscribe to the season of three plays: Save up to 40% off the regular ticket price and choose your seats before they go on sale to the general public. Details at http://www.mcctheater.com/subscribe.html

And changing the subject a bit, more pictures of people in tee shirts at Kitty's Neverwear Blog -- http://kittysneverwear.blogspot.com/ -- and if you have a good photo of you in one of her tee shirts, you should send it to her and it will make her happy. She's on tour with Duran Duran right now... and her website is http://neverwear.net
which I mention because there isn't a link to it from the blog. I also gave Kitty the Cassette editions of CORALINE and TWO PLAYS FOR VOICES and some ANANSI BOYS MP3s, so if you are looking for them, she has them there.

My friend Larry Marder is bringing back Beanworld, and blogging it -- http://larrymarder.blogspot.com/. Thrilled to see that Dark Horse will be republishing Beanworld and bringing the new ones out. It's been too long.

The terrifyingly talented former Web Elf has her own web site up at www.olganunes.com, while Thea Gilmore has a new CD coming out, a UK tour, and widget. Of these, I am putting up the widget.

and finally, the first review I've seen of The Dangerous Alphabet. He's right -- Gris Grimly is a star...

Labels: shamelessly commercial plugs for things by other people mostly