In an interview for Warrior magazine, Alan Moore revealed the sources of inspiration that led him and David Lloyd to create one of the most important graphic novels in history, V for Vendetta
One of the most influential works towards the end of the 20th century is V for Vendetta, the series of 10 chapters that the British writer Alan Moore and the artist David Lloyd gave us between 1982 and 1988, which has served as inspiration for social movements and works such as the 2006 film of the same name.
You can also read: Alan Moore thought of this name before renaming his work V for Vendetta
One of the questions that revolve around this work is the inspiration of Alan Moore to tell the story of V, the lone vigilante who fights against a totalitarian state in 1997, taking into account that this comic started its deliveries in 1982, three decades before the indicated date.
In the month of October 1983, Alan Moore revealed the secrets behind V for Vendetta in an interview for Warrior magazine, which in issue #17 included a talk between Moore and the magazine’s editor, as well as an essay by the author. British, titled Behind the Painted Smile.
From Harlan Ellison to Batman and Robin Hood
Moore confessed that seeing David Lloyd’s strokes he saw great potential in the story that was developed originally in Warrior magazine, but he did not find the strip very well organized, so Moore adapted aspects of other comics, movies, television series, art and writing of which he was a fan.
“Orwell. Huxley. Thomas Disch. Judge Dredd. Harlan Ellison’s Repent, Harlequin! Said the Ticktockman, Catman and The Prowler in the City at the Edge of the World by the same author. Vincent Price’s Dr. Phibes and Theater of Blood. David Bowie. The shadow. Night Raven. Batman. Fahrenheit 451. The writings of the New World school of science fiction. Max Ernst’s painting ‘Europe after the rain’. Thomas Pynchon. The atmosphere of British films of the Second World War. The prisoner. Robin Hood. Dick Turpin”.
Moore jokingly admitted that “the scope of his plagiarism was wide”, and what the author and David Lloyd intertwined based on their influences was one of the aspects that captured the readers of Warrior.
(Fun fact: Years later Moore wrote one of the most acclaimed Batman stories, The Killing Joke, which you can find in our online store.)
V for Vendetta was originally published within Warrior magazine in England between 1982 and 1985, when the publication abruptly closed. In 1988 DC Comics took up V for Vendetta to publish it in 10 volumes, which allowed this story to be fully told.
This graphic novel was one of the first publications of the Vertigo line in the 1990s, and is now republished under the DC Black Label imprint.
You can also read: Before V for Vendetta…
Source: DC Comics
Meet V for Vendetta one of the most important graphic novels in history with DC Black Label and SMASH
Set in an imagined future England that has surrendered to fascism, this groundbreaking story captures both the suffocating nature of life within an authoritarian state and the redemptive power of the human spirit that rises up against it.
Constructed with brilliant clarity and intelligence, V for Vendetta it presents unmatched depth to its characters and believability in its uncompromising account of oppression and resistance.
SMASH Y DC Black they have for you V for Vendettathe unmissable graphic novel by Alan Moore Y David Lloyd in a special issue on its 30th anniversary.
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