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Showing posts from August, 2009

"Puppets who can see the strings"

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  Following the promising premise of Preludes and Nocturnes , this second volume became one of my favorite installments. I believe this is the book of The Sandman series that captured not only my heart but my imagination in varying ways I did not expect it could. This is also the first time that Gaiman explored the vitality and freshness of his material and the result was a provocative examination of the unconscious and often catastrophic desires of human beings that are caught up in fulfilling such dangerous things. Before the actual central story begins, the volume opens with Tales of the Sand , a short narrative pertaining to an African queen Nada who falls in love with the Dream king himself. It was considered unlawful for mortals to develop a romantic affiliation with an Endless so she was punished for it. This story able to cast a light on the nature of Nada's significance to Dream (she was first seen in Preludes , trapped in Hell because Dream was unable to forg

"Dream A Little Dream of Me"

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Back in 2009, it was my second time to be a freshman in college (and my third course at that). To ensure that I stayed focused, I joined the student paper and there I met the associate editor who became my mentor in many ways than one; and he introduced me to Neil Gaiman's The Sandman series. I felt his excitement when he started to share this piece of literature with me, and I was greatly touched. I then ventured on with the knowledge that this is the first time I will ever consume the medium in a graphic novel form (that being collected into a single edition as oppose to monthly individual issues which I was more accustomed with in high school--I read a lot of X-Men back then). I have a pretty limited view of comic books before this; my doses of the medium are all about superheroes. So when I encountered this first volume of The Sandman , I was not expecting to find a delectable juxtaposition of gothic elements, cultural folklore, and historical fiction. But it's exactly