h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

You did a great job on that one. I've just in the last month and a half gotten seriously hooked on Neil Gaiman's work and am in the process of methodically reading everything he's written. So far I've read "Stardust", "Neverwhere", the very first Sandman anthology "Preludes", and have just finished both "Death" anthologies. Unfortunately, my public library system does not have the entire series of Sandman books. They are missing about 4 of the middle ones. Hey here's a question for ya, you being the H2G2 expert on the Sandman: do you have to read the Sandman anthologies in order? I've requested my library do a search for the books for me, and it's not very likely they'll find them in proper order. Do the Sandman anthologies make up a linear story? Or can each of them be enjoyed on their own? I'll keep checking this forum for your answer. Thanks in advance.

Uhm... in answer to your question: YES. Can you read them out of order? Yes. Should you read them in the order they were published? Yes. Actually, I recommend you do both.

It's rather hard to explain. The Sandman series is purposefully and ingeniously designed by Neil Gaiman to operate like a jewel giftwrapped inside a music box wrapped up inside a wickerbasket of flowers that is presented inside an ornate antique trunk which arrives at your home's driveway via an immaculate horse-drawn carriage.

Let me attempt to explain what I mean.

The original series consists of seventy-five 'issues' or separate comic books. There is one 'story arc' that is occurring throughout the seventy-five issues. That story is of Dream himself and the Endless. It is a tragedy of sorts about an entity who believed nothing could change him, until he is trapped by a mere mortal for over seventy years. Once released, he slowly begins to learn the experience has in fact changed him. He thought once he escaped the manmade prison, he would be free. However, he learns that his existence has merely been like a songbird in a gilded cage. It is a tale that shows the complexities of predeterminism combined with freewill. Do our actions matter? Do we each make a difference in this reality? In some ways, yes. In others, no.

This tragic tale encompasses the entire seventy-five issue series. Now, you can break this tale up into ten "acts," which is what makes up the Sandman Library. The ten graphic novels are each one of the acts. Preludes and Nocturnes is where the tale begins. Then there's The Doll House, Dream Country, Season of Mists, A Game of You, Brief Lives, Fables and Reflections, Worlds' End, The Kindly Ones, and finally The Wake in which the overall arc is concluded.

You can read the series of graphic novels in that order. Or you can take any one of those ten graphic novels and read that one piece in its entirety front to back. Each of those ten graphic novels have a beginning, middle and end of its own, and thus constitute a separate story in and of its own right.

Now, the average graphic novel runs about seven to nine issues long. Some have more and others have less. In most cases, each of these issues also have a beginning, middle and end to them. Since the original series was published one issue at a time on a monthly basis, Neil Gaiman did endeavour to make each issue stand alone. In some cases this is more obvious than in others.

It is my opinion that a person reading the series for the first time would be just as 'in the dark' the first time they read issue one as if they started reading at issue 32. Technically, the series starts in the middle of the action, and we never really learn where Dream was at the moment he was trapped by Burgess in the first issue. Allegedly, he was on his way back to The Dreaming, after having returned from a particularly weakening battle on the other side of the universe. I have gleaned that information from other parts of the story. It's a hypothesis, but we never really know.

So it doesn't REALLY matter where you start when you read the series, so long as eventually you can read all 75 parts.

Some issues stand alone better than others. Doll's House Part Four: "Men of Good Fortune" is a perfect example of a standalone issue. In fact it doesn't have much to do directly with the rest of the Doll House issue. It is a pleasantly surprising interlude between the Brute and Glob plotline of part three and the Corinthian Convention of Part Five. It also ties the events of Preludes and Nocturnes together with Doll's House rather nicely, showing you a bit of what Dream was like before his capture, and helping us to understand his actions now, after his capture and release from Burgess.

Clues. Questions and answers to riddles that are revealed along the way. Each issue is like that. Pieces of the puzzle, but each piece is a marvel in and of itself.

And also, inside most of the issues, there are still stories inside stories. In part three of The Kindly Ones, Loki tells Puck (and us in tandem) a true lie about a prank he claims to have once played on his adversary Thor. It only takes two or three pages of that issue, but in later issues the true lie does resurface and we question whether or not it is in fact a true lie.

Fables and Reflections is stories within stories within stories. The tale of Emperor Norton has many separate scenes featuring the only emperor of the United States (and is by the way historically accurate to a degree). However, it's driving force is the Endless. Despair and Desire are dragging Dream into one of their little games with humanity, and Dream teaches them a lesson. So the driving arc of the entire series strongly effects the weaving of that story, and the scenes within it which are each separate stories unto themselves.

The issue "Hunt" shows us an old man and his modern-minded granddaughter. The old man tells her a story he recalls from his youth, and as he tells it we learn an entirely different story brought to us deceptively that features the granddaughter herself. Gaiman allows us to fill in the holes of that one, but the tale of old mirrors the modern uncertainties.

"Soft places" introduces us to three completely different individuals, each of which comes to a desert from the middle of their own stories, and they leave after a brief respite to continue on in other tales.

If the Sandman series were a physically tangible sculpture, it would take up several museums and branch out through practically every window and door. It would have colors more vibrant than any other statue known to Man, and it would look like thousands of different things simultaneously while remaining enigmatic in appearance, making you question its very existence; or even your own.

It's just a comic book though. Its existence is humble in scope, until you open the cover. Appearances are very decieving.

You can get lost in this series, which is one of many things that make it a landmark artwork of the late 20th century.

So to sum up, There is one 75 issue Story-Arc that is made up of ten separate Acts. Each Act is comprised of seven to nine Issues a piece, and inside each Issue is not only one main story but also often smaller tales told in any given Scene. And each story is a small piece of the puzzle that tells the larger stories.

Arc - Act - Issue - Scene

Universe - Galaxy - System - Planet

Does that answer your question?

Another interesting thing to note. There is a 'Shakespearean' arc as an undertone to the rest of the series. Mentioned in "Men of Good Fortune" as well as other places like in an issue from "Dream Country" and the last issue of "The Wake," Dream makes a pact with William Shakespeare, commissioning him to write two plays in return for a boon of talent. Shakespeare does so, and this elusive part of the overall arc is told in bits and pieces through the course of the overall work.

There's other undertones as well. Many characters are supporting roles in one tale while becoming very prominent later on in the series, or characters that were helpful at one time return to throw a cog in the works elsewhere. A character is merely mentioned offhand in one story, and then thirty issues later you learn more about them. Or someone who died at one point of the tale is reborn in a story that happens to be told later, but is about events of the past. Things like that.

You find yourself asking things like: Wasn't she the Vortex? Where did Destruction go? Where have I seen Gadling before? Okay so is Eve really *the* Eve or not and where the heck is Adam? Did that person just mention being friends with someone who died ten issues ago? What's Desire really after? There were ravens before Matthew?

And the questions are just as fascinating as the answers. Sometimes you don't want an answer because the possibilities alone are just incredible.

The way this tale is weaved looks random and confusing when you first glance at it, but is actually an intricately and lovingly woven tapestry consisting of endless beginnings, middles and ends. The use of the Hecateae throughout the series echoes this weaving storytelling; operating as a symbolic representation of the very craft Gaiman is using to such perfection.

Peachy keen!

The key to Neils ability to put so many threads into the stories relates to the crucial link of Morpheus=Dreams=stories. Therefore anything that ever happened, or might have happened or was told in a story is part of his realm. This opens up the whole tapestry of human existence, real and imagined to play with. It also gave him the excuse to plagiarise extensively. In this regard I consider Neil one of the most successful plagiarists in modern literature. Successful financiallly, but also in the work itself, it uses others ideas and builds upon them effortlessly until the end result is one which others see as a whole and works as a self contained unit. (ie plagiarism as in Led Zeppelin, and not Jeffrey Archer).
The most intersesting (not nescessarilly fun all the time)writers in comics (IMHO) are Dave Sim, Eddie Campbell, Alan Moore and NG. In that order. They also know each other reasonably well and they have featured fictionalised versions of each other in their output. Have a look at King Bacchus by Eddie Campbell. It contains cameo appearances by Neil Gaimen (Taking the mickey out of his writing and dress sense), Alan Moore (summoning demons) and Dave Sim (effortlessly upsetting women and then getting beaten up for it).

Just wanted to thank Zachsmind for answering my questions. Since I posted my initial query my library has managed to find about 5 of the books for me and they're all due by July 25. So I'm going to be completely immersing myself in the Sandman stories over the next couple weeks. Can't wait. Thanks again.

Its certainly not impossible that as a former big fan of dna, Neil Gaiman may visit this site.
If so I've 3 things to say.
1) Hi Mr Gaiman.
2) Sign up as a researcher.
3) Stop reading articles about yourself, it's very narcissistic.

I just thought I'd throw out some thoughts on this and see if anybody here has anything to add. I'm about halfway through the Sandman series now (just finished "Game of You", starting "Brief Lives") and I'm just blown away at how many characters keep popping up from other stories. It's like everybody's connected to everybody else in one way or another. (I finished the Death series before I got to "Game of You" so I already knew what was going to happen to Foxglove and Hazel.) This by far is one of the best Fantasy stories I've had the pleasure to read. Now I find myself hoping that eventually there will be a story explaining the past of Dream's helper crow, Matthew. I want to know who he was before he died and how he came to be Dream's messenger.
Speaking of which, does anybody know what the symbolism of the Crow is? I know it must mean something in some cultural mythology somewhere because it seems to pop up in lot of similar stories. I know of several stories that use the crow for similar purposes, usually as a messenger, as a supernatural spy, or as the deliverer of lost souls. Does anybody remember the old comic series back in the 70's called "The Rook". I loved that story. I'm convinced that that series had some influence on Stephen King when he wrote his "Gunslinger" series. The crow and interdimensional traveling cowboy/seeker are so similar it's almost the same character. The Rook was a gunslinger that travelled around these strange wild west deserts and towns searching for his enemy, and the crow served as his messenger and spy. He would send the crow out to recon or search and it would return and tell him what he saw. Very similar to the Gunslinger character. And then of course there's the "Crow" movies and the spin-off series, which I'm not too fond of. The first movie was pretty good. And now I'm finding the crow again, playing a similar role, as Dreams assistant. Does anybody reading this forum know of anymore examples of the Crow or Raven playing similar roles in traditional myths or stories?

I was in Tintagel, Cornwall with my son. There is a sea cave there from which on the right days, a ghoulish mist emerges. This has been named Merlin's cave, so I sat down on a cliif edge and started telling my son stories. I told him about Merlin and how he would change himself into a raven and spy on people in this form. When we stood up, on the next ledge down, looking straight back at me was the largest raven I have ever seen. He paused long enough to make his point then flew off.

I've recently written a piece about what I call "coincidental insignificance" that may or may not shed light on your experience with the raven who appeared at just the right time. Coincidences happen too much in this reality to be completely random if you ask me. However, attempts to uncover rational reasons as to why such things happen tends to drive people mad so I recommend just enjoying them when they happen and not trying to read too much into it.

igpajo, everything i could think of regarding your question about blackbirds I put in a separate conversation cuz it just got real big. LOL! I have such a motormouth!