The Fabler

-Interview by Kevin de Vlaming

From the somber reimagining of an H.G. Wells classic to post-apocalyptic landscapes roamed by human/animal hybrids, nobody could fault Ontario artist Jeff Lemire for a lack of creativity.

The wildly talented Lemire has built a name for himself in Canadian comic books as both a compelling storyteller and a uniquely expressive cartoonist. His Essex County Trilogy, a collection of volumes exploring the layered depths of humanity in small town Ontario, earned him vast critical praise for its subtle, heartfelt writing and powerful imagery.

In addition to being nominated for one Harvey and two Eisner Awards, it won Jeff a Shuster Award for Outstanding Canadian Comic Book Cartoonist and a Doug Wright Award for Canadian Cartooning’s Best Emerging Talent.

Jeff now has his sights set on reaching new audiences through DC’s Vertigo Comics, with an original graphic novel due out in July and his own monthly ongoing title beginning in September.

The Nobody, Jeff’s OGN, is a modern reinterpretation of H.G. Wells’ The Invisible Man. Set in a small rural town largely influenced by a Northern Ontario locale Jeff visited as a child, The Nobody explores themes of isolation, loneliness, and the darker side of small town life.

Lemire’s monthly series, which debuts its first issue in September with a promotional price tag of $1 US, is titled ‘Sweet Tooth’. The official Vertigo description of the title is below:

After being raised in total isolation, Gus – a boy born with deer-like antlers – is left to survive in an American landscape devastated a decade earlier by an inexplicable pandemic. Even more remarkable is that Gus is part of a rare new breed of human/animal hybrid children who have emerged in its wake, all apparently immune to the infection.

Jeff managed to make some time in his hectic schedule to answer a few questions for the Fabler. He talks about The Nobody, Sweet Tooth, and the influence of Canadian landscapes and David Lynch on his work to date. The transcript is below.

KD: This is quite a busy summer for you. Between the release of your graphic novel The Nobody in July, the release of the Collected Essex County Trilogy in August, and your debut monthly title Sweet Tooth in September, that first sentence might actually be an understatement. Do you find yourself with any free time at all these days?

JL: You can add a new baby to that list as well, so no, I don’t have much free time, and very little sleep. But, at the same time, I’m doing exactly what I want to do with my life and I’m really happy, so there are no complaints.

KD: I’m going to start with a few questions about The Nobody, since it’s the first release you have coming up on the horizon.  I read an article in Newsarama where you said that you’ve been a Vertigo fan for a very long time. How did you wind up publishing your own original graphic novel through them?

JL: Well, I always loved Vertigo comics; they are probably what kept me reading comics through my late teens and early twenties when the superhero stuff at the time was just terrible. I pitched a couple of ideas to then Vertigo editor Bob Schreck, who I heard through a mutual friend, was a fan of my Essex County books. He loved The Nobody and the rest is history.

KD: From what I’ve read, The Nobody is described as a contemporary take on the Invisible Man, taking place in a small town in the Canadian North. The Essex County trilogy very notably had an emphasis on Canadian landscape and identity. Is there a specific reason you wanted to write another graphic novel highlighting a uniquely Canadian locale?

JL: Well, The Nobody is not specifically set in Canada, although a small northern Ontario town I use to visit as a child influenced it. I think that I am more interested in exploring small towns and rural life than specifically Canadian small towns. I just happen to draw from my own life and the places I know, and as a result, I guess that they end up saying something about the Canadian experience. And, I do feel a sense of pride in my country, and feel it has a rich and vast well of stories to draw from.

KD: In the past, you’ve listed David Lynch as a huge influence on your work. When you talk about how The Nobody explores the darker side of small town life, right away Twin Peaks came to mind. Was that particular work by Lynch an influence with The Nobody, or did your appreciation for Lynch’s artistic perspective have any other impact on it?

JL: Yes, in a big, big way. I even pay homage to the iconic shot of the stoplight swaying in the wind from Peaks and use it in The Nobody. I am a massive Twin Peaks fan, it is probably my favorite single piece of fiction created in any medium, and the setting and themes for The Nobody is no doubt my love letter to Twin Peaks and Lynch, whose entire body of work is very important to me as an artist and storyteller.

KD: What was it like for you to adjust to the change in tone from writing vol. 3 of Essex County to writing The Nobody? Was there anything else you did in between?

JL: I think The Nobody was a direct reaction to working on Essex County for three years. Those books also explored small town life, but in many ways were the flip side of The Nobody, they illustrate how family and rural communities can be drawn together despite guilt, tragedy and time. The Nobody was my reaction to that, I wanted to flip it on its head and do something darker and a little more genre based. Show the close-mindedness that can sometimes pull isolated communities apart.

KD: Moving on to Sweet Tooth… You’ve already given a pretty thorough summary of the concept before, so I won’t trouble you to give me a Coles Notes version of what it’s about. I would like to know, however; how did you first come up with the idea for the comic?

JL: I think it came from a number of different influences, as well as a few ideas that kept popping up in my sketchbooks in various forms over the years. I was really into Jack Kirby’s KAMANDI when I was developing the idea. I was thinking about the kind of version of that I would do if I were to pitch a revamp to Vertigo. That didn’t come to pass, but the ideas of the last boy on earth, animal hybrids etc obviously stuck with me. I am also a huge fan of post-apocalyptic fiction, from Mad Max and Tim Truman’s Scout to The Road, Walking Dead and Corben and Ellison’s Boy and His Dog.  Also when working on The Nobody I reread a bunch of H.G. Welles’ other work including The Island of Dr. Moreau. All of this boiled down into it, and I brought a bunch of myself into it too and somehow Sweet Tooth popped up.

KD: What are some of the themes you plan on exploring with the title?

JL: It’s about fathers and sons, it’s about redemption, it’s about family, and it’s about the friendships that can form in even the darkest of places, and it’s about holding onto hope in a hopeless world.

KD: How are you approaching the art differently for Sweet Tooth than with previous projects?

JL: I think my art has jumped a big notch in Sweet Tooth. It’s  become tighter, cleaner and more detailed, hopefully without losing any of the spontaneity and expressiveness of my previous work. And obviously, it will be color, so I have to think about that when I’m drawing as well, I can leave some things “open” whereas I would add more texture and linework in my black and white work.

The biggest adjustment was writing for 22-page installments, which meant I needed to develop much more economical ways of laying out pages and communicating my ideas. As you know, if you’ve read my previous work, I tend to pace my stories very slowly and really let the panels and scenes breath. When you’re doing a graphic novel, you can do this, but I needed to find other ways of telling stories, hopefully without losing whatever that quality is that makes my stories “mine”, if that makes sense. I think I’ve succeeded and am learning with each issue I work on. I am also trying to fit more and more into each issue, compress the ideas a bit more.

KD: Now that you’re committing to write and illustrate a monthly ongoing title, is that going to be the sole focus of your efforts for the next little while or do you have any plans for anything else in the works?

JL: Oh, yeah. I’m also working on a new, as yet to be announced graphic novel for Top Shelf. I also have a few short pieces due out in various anthologies including Dark Horse’s NOIR and Image’s OUTLAW TERRITORY 2.   There are also a couple of other DC and Vertigo projects which will probably be announced later this summer. Luckily I draw pretty fast!