The Paper Curtain X: The Thought Wars

Installment 10
THE THOUGHT WARS
By Patrick Neighly

What if you discovered your dreams were actually portals to another world? What if all your friends were there in this other world, too? What if no one could remember the nights spent together in this alternate dimension – except you? What if the possibilities for our reality were limited only by your ability to ask “what if?”

This is the central puzzle of Club Zero-G, the debut graphic novel by New York Times-syndicated columnist and best-selling author Douglas Rushkoff, best known for his revolutionary books Cyberia and Ecstasy Club. Rushkoff is well known to futurists, media pundits and college students; his theories on the impact of collective perception on reality have impacted everything from The X-Files to The Invisibles. In the mainstream publishing world, a writer of Rushkoff’s stature turning his hand to graphic novels is a Big Deal. But such is the peculiar nature of the comic industry that Club Zero-G is likely to fly under the radar of most retailers – and therefore most readers. Sometimes, the Paper Curtain hides some surprisingly big books.

As the editor of Club Zero-G – published by popular “underground” brand The Disinformation Co. – I decided to ask Rushkoff about his early experiences with comics and the appeal of the last truly independent medium. Some portions of this interview first appeared in last year’s Mad Yak Press Convention Special.

SHARED MEMORIES

“I’m a little ashamed to say I was more of a DC kid than a Marvel Universe kid,” says Rushkoff, speaking of his early contact with comics. “I was into Detective Comics – regular old Superman, and Detective Comics Batman (at least, not that sillier Batman/Batboy stuff). I only discovered The Eternals and other completely crazy ____ when I was in college. That was right before the big revival in comics, brought on by folks like Miller and Moore: Dark Knight, Ronin, Watchmen. I used to like a comic called Omega Men, too.

“But when the comics revival happened, I veered off into the indie comics stuff. I became a big fan of Harvey Pekar and even directed a play based on the first four or five books,” he notes. “I stopped reading comics for a while after that, because I was working on my own books – like Cyberia and Ecstasy Club – which are pretty comic-trippy-nonlinear all by themselves.”

How did Rushkoff return to comics, like so many lapsed readers before him? “A friend from San Francisco told me that I had been quoted in Grant Morrison’s The Invisibles. I started reading him after that, and we eventually met up and confessed we were each other’s fan. My friendship with Grant is probably most responsible for getting me interested in actually writing for this medium.”

How did Rushkoff return to comics, like so many lapsed readers before him? “A friend from San Francisco told me that I had been quoted in Grant Morrison’s The Invisibles. I started reading him after that, and we eventually met up and confessed we were each other’s fan. My friendship with Grant is probably most responsible for getting me interested in actually writing for this medium.”

So what can readers expect from Club Zero-G, his first foray into the form? “I guess what they can expect is an argument for open source reality; for the idea that we are creating the reality we are living in. I see comics as a safe haven for mythic constructs – for stories in which we can create allegories for really big ideas. They’re our society’s equivalent of the Bible, really, or of shamanic storytelling. It’s a freeflowing dreamspace, where very iconic and symbolic things can take place. So I’ve ended up using the medium to tell a story about reality as a dreamspace,” he says. “Which I honestly think it is, anyway.”

But why comics, when his novels have achieved mainstream success? “Well, you do it in a comic book and you’re safe,” he says. “People don’t take graphic novels too seriously, so you are free to tell the truth about stuff you can’t tell the truth about in, say, a New York Times OpEd, or even a regular novel. The novel, as a form, has been pretty well locked down by the keepers of Western Civilization to tell certain kinds of stories. A guy whacking off in a meatloaf is about as radical as things are going to get. Novels can get situationally naughty, but not really ideologically naughty.”

“A graphic novel confines me as far as word count, but opens something else up,” Rushkoff continues. “I get to draw with broad strokes so that people can recognize themselves more easily. These are really deep mythic sorts of memories I’m trying to revive – a novel can get too specific for that to happen. It’s more like a chronicle, and less like a dream.”

“The hardest part is that I can’t tell anything,” he says. “I have to show it. I suppose I could create captions that explain the action, but that always feels like cheating. So my only real tool is dialogue. And I can’t even write out whole conversations because the space is so damn limited, and the style that we’ve chosen for the art is really broad-stroked, as well. So the biggest hurdle is that I’ve got to explain a whole lot with very few words and images.”

“The benefit is that it forces me to adopt a more mythic style of storytelling. I’ve got to convey things through sequence, juxtaposition. It’s like trying to talk to someone while you’re tripping. It’s really hard until you accept the fact that the other person is tripping, too.”

“So it’s a great discipline for me, and it also keeps me honest,” he says. “Here I am claiming that reality is some sort of collaborative lucid dream, right? Now I have to write for a medium in which this is the case.”

Earlier, Rushkoff described the book’s visual style as “broad-stroked.” How did he partner with underground Canadian artist Steph Dumais, who brings an art commix style to a book with everything from breakfast cereal to spaceships?

“I happened to mention on my mailing list that I was hoping to embark on a serialized comic, and Steph Dumais emailed to say he’d be interested in doing the art. I looked at a bunch of other people’s work, but they were a bit too addicted to the anime/manga style. I love that stuff, and Club Zero-G has a lot of manga to it, but I was hoping for this book to me more of the West’s answer to manga rather than an imitation of it.”

“When I saw Steph’s sketches of a couple of the characters, I felt like I knew them better than I did before. And that’s a weird feeling for a creator. But it’s what made me realize he was the guy. He says a lot in a very few lines, too, which I like for this story.”

So what’s up next for Rushkoff, who recently encountered mainstream controversy for a book on Judaism? More comics. “This is just the beginning,” he says. “I’m hoping to do something with much less plot next time. I want to keep breaking my own and the reader’s expectations – see how much we really need to do in order for the thing to hold together. Comics seem to be one of the only places where were can really say, ‘You see what I mean?’”

Douglas Rushkoff will be signing copies of Club Zero-G on Saturday at San Diego Comic Con.

SHAMELESS

Some advance copies of my new full-color graphic novel Texarkana arrived from the printer earlier this week. It’s an absolutely gorgeous physical object, with glossy paper stock and a textured cover that puts many DC and Marvel trade paperbacks to shame. Hopefully readers will feel the content lives up to the packaging! But I’m so proud of this book – and all of the creators involved – that I want to make an open offer to all readers. For the remainder of 2004, every single person to approach me at a convention and show me a copy of Texarkana (purchased from their favorite retailer) will receive a free comic. That’s it. Show me your book, and I’ll give you a full-length comic book, absolutely free. No catch. Give your retailer Diamond order code JUN42655 to order the book. I’ll be exhibiting at San Diego, SPX and Wizard Worlds Chicago and Texas.

Recommended reading:
Club Zero-G
By Douglas Rushkoff and Steph Dumais
144 color pages
ISBN 0-9729529-3-4
$19.95