Prometheus has long been a symbol of rebellion. After all, he gave humanity the gift of fire, in defiance of the gods, and was punished with eternal torment for his trouble.
It’s a myth that has inspired countless retelling and reworkings, including, most famously, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Or, to use its full name, Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus.
Now author and artist Anders Nilsen is putting his own spin on this Greek myth with his new graphic novel Tongues, Volume 1 (hardcover, Kindle), which moves this story to modern times and the middle east.
In the following email interview, Nilson explains why he decided to do his own version of Prometheus, as well as what else influenced both the text and the art.
Let’s start with the text. What is Tongues about and when and where is it set?
The basic elevator pitch is that it’s a retelling of the myth of Prometheus, set in the present day, more or less, in the middle east.
There are a few other characters and plot threads that weave in and out of that basic structure, though. There’s a kind of adventure story that follows an east African girl on a quest, and there’s a young American man who gets kidnapped by a Russian mercenary. And there’s a monkey. And a magic box.
Did you set out to put your own spin on the myth of Prometheus, and Tongues is what you came up with, or did you have the idea for Tongues and then realize it would work better as a reworking of the Prometheus myth?
A bit of both I guess. I had a few different unrelated ideas in my head, some of them just visual ideas. One clear intention was to play with Prometheus and his relationship with the eagle that comes to devour his liver every day, one was to play with the idea of him as the creator of humanity, which is one of his roles in classical Greek mythology. And one was to return to an idea I had about the main character from my first published book, Dogs And Water. I decided to just drop all of these things into a story together and see what would happen.
So, why did you want to do your own version of Prometheus, and why specifically a version set in modern times and in the middle east — Central Asia, specifically — as opposed to, say, in San Francisco in the 1960s or, conversely, on a distant planet 500 years from now?
I’d done a short story a few years before about Prometheus (in Rage Of Poseidon), in a slightly more traditional vein that touched on the idea of his “eternal” punishment continuing — as it presumably would — into the present, and was instantly interested in the relationship with the eagle. So I wanted to explore that more. And his role as creator of humanity would allow me to play with ideas about human evolution and the development of language, which is sort of a pet interest of mine.
The setting in Central Asia was dictated by the return to the Dogs And Water character. Also, I like a good blank, open landscape. Which that version of the middle east offered. Drawing 1960s San Francisco would force me to draw a bunch of architecture and do a kind of research I’m not especially suited to. It would also probably mean including my parents as characters. Which…that would be a very different book.
The myth of Prometheus as we know it is the first part of a trilogy, though the other two parts have been lost to history….
As I understand it it’s not actually even known for certain whether Prometheus Bound was the first, second or third play in the trilogy. Though it doesn’t seem to me be the third, as it doesn’t have a very conclusive ending.
Interesting…
Anyway, does Tongues just cover the known part, or are you doing a complete version of the story?
I’m not really following the classical version very closely. I’m changing things here and there, and muddying the waters a bit. The Eagle is not a real character in the classical version, for example. But I do use Zeus’s henchmen, Might and Violence, which are unique to the play as far as I know. And the complicated relationship Prometheus has with Zeus is also key in my version. I pick and choose at will. So it’s the same story, more or less, but made stranger.
It sounds like Tongues is telling a fantasy story, though one that’s more mythological than, say, The Lord Of The Rings or Harry Potter….
It is a kind of fantasy, I suppose. And an adventure story. But It’s also recognizably our world. I’m interested in commenting a bit on real life, just using gods and monsters to do it. I was a fan of The X-Men during the Chris Claremont days in the ’80s, as well as Alan Moore and Frank Miller’s work from that time, and I probably absorbed some of their style of using superhero tropes to comment on real life. I remember a storyline where Magneto is brought before the International Criminal court at the Hague in one story. And he was, of course, a victim of the holocaust. Moore obviously dealt with the Cold War and the threat of nuclear conflict, among other things. The Lord Of The Rings arguably deals with geo-politics, too, and big moral questions, though much more obliquely than the above comics. I’d probably put myself roughly in that comics tradition. World-spanning soap operas with superpowers.
So, aside from the books you just mentioned, and the original Greek myth, are there any other stories that you think had a big influence on Tongues? And I don’t just mean in books, either.
That’s hard to say. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis definitely swim around in my head, Chester Brown’s Ed The Happy Clown, movies like Repo Man that mix a gritty, slightly goofy realism with transcendent mystery. There’s a movie called A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night that I love in that way. It’s a vampire movie set in Iran. There’s another Iranian movie I think about sometimes, A Modest Proposal, which is sort of a realist / mysterious road movie. It’s a bit dreamlike. Charles Burns comics are definitely an influence. Herge.
I think the first season of True Detective came out around the time I was starting Tongues. I appreciated that show’s attempts at big philosophizing, mixed with genre detective fiction.
I mentioned human evolution and language. Dean Falk is an anthropologist who has ideas about language origins that I find interesting, and I reference her work in the book. Tecumseh Fitch is another theorist I drew from with ideas about the origins of language. Jared Diamond’s work, and Frans De Waal were both influential in my thinking about human evolution and the sweep of history. Steven Pinker’s work, especially his book The Better Angels Of Our Nature, on violence and history has been influential to me.
Which brings us to the art. How would you describe the art in Tongues and why was this the best style and medium for this book? Because Leela Corman [Victory Parade] said it “at times recalls Moebius, but is utterly Nilsen’s own.”
Yeah, Moebius is a pretty big influence on the way Tongues is drawn and colored. Herge is an influence, too. Tongues is the first long-form full-color book I’ve done, and so I had to figure out how to handle that. I come from black & white comics, and a kind of clear-line style. So I didn’t want the color to overwhelm the drawing. A lot of the color is pretty light for that reason. I still want the drawing to shine.
Any other artists have a big influence on Tongues?
Moebius, Geof Darrow, Dave Gibbons are all artists that live in my head. David Mazzuchelli’s work on Daredevil and Batman: Year One. I actually made some tests for coloring the comics using gouache. I love the art of Geneviève Castrée and C.F., who both use watercolor and gouache. But I’m too much of a control-freak, I guess. Maybe for another project.
Now, the cover of Tongues says it’s “Vol. 1,” and as I understand it, it’s the first of two. Do you know when the second volume will be out?
A few years. I have about 20 pages of the next issue drawn, and the full story is about 90% scripted and thumbnailed. So hopefully I’ll pick up the pace a bit. But no definite release dates at the moment.
As you know, Hollywood likes adapting graphic novels into movies and TV shows. Do you think Tongues could work as a movie or show?
I’d be happy to see it filmed. Though I wonder if it’s too weird for Hollywood. I wouldn’t want to have to condense all the plot threads into a two-hour feature, so probably a limited series show would make more sense. And live action, not animation.
And if that did happen, do you have any casting suggestions?
As for actors to play Prometheus…I don’t know. Tom Hiddleston [Loki]? My wife says Harris Dickinson [Babygirl], which could work. It would have to be someone who can be both vicious and vulnerable, warm and calculating, and feel ageless and a little gender fluid at times. Kind of a tough brief. But I’d be happy to sit in on auditions.
So, is there anything else you think potential buyers might need to know about Tongues?
I was pretty happy that Pantheon let me do some fold-outs and inserts in the hardcover. That stuff was a big part of the reason I self-published the serialization. I want the book to feel like an unfolding object, not just a container for a story.
Finally, if someone enjoys Tongues, which of your previous graphic novels would you suggest they check out?
That depends. If they like it because it’s long and draws you in and it’s basically traditional comics form, then probably Big Questions would be the best follow-up. It also has themes of divinity and mortality.
But if they especially like the reinterpretation of mythology, Rage Of Poseidon would probably be a good choice. It’s just not a normal comic book format, it’s all silhouettes and text. It’s more prose-ish.
