Of Gods and Men: An Interview with George O'Connor
We first met George O’Connor when he did the startling bare and raw (yet achingly beautiful) artwork for Adam Rapp’s graphic-novel debut, Ball Peen Hammer. That was only a few short months ago, but already O’Connor has followed that book up with one of his own: the beginning of a new series focusing on the gods of myth. For this, O’Connor is both writing and illustrating, but he took some time out from his busy schedule to answer our questions.
What fascinates you about Greek mythology?
This was a deceptively tricky question—I had to think long and hard to try and figure out what it was exactly that made Greek mythology so fascinating to me. I eventually came up with, well, everything. On some real basic primal level, I just enjoy the hell out of these types of stories. One thing I do particularly enjoy is finding the reflections of these gods and stories in today’s society all around us—the American eagle as a reflection of Zeus, or Father Time as a reflection of Kronos. Or maybe it’s the monsters.
Is there something about Greek mythology that people would be surprised to learn about? Is there any part of our general perception about the mythology that most of the public gets wrong or is unaware of?
A lot of the gods have image problems in today’s society. I’ve gotten a lot of feedback from people who are surprised to see Zeus as this young, fun-loving guy as opposed to a stoic greybeard, but if you read the original myths, he’s really an eternal child. Hades, also, gets conflated with the Christian Devil, but he’s a much more benevolent figure; at worst, he’s a bit morose. And I’m hard at work on Book 3, The Glory of Hera, or as I call it, the Hera Reclamation Project. People tend to think of her as a jealous, domineering shrew, but there’s a whole body of myth that shows otherwise. Plus, she’s married to the king of all philanders—I think she’s entitled to some acting out.
What’s the most difficult thing about doing this series for young adults—since a lot of the stories about the Greek gods are really violent and adult in nature at times?
Well, I have to admit that there have been a few stories that I wanted to tell that I just haven’t been able to—look up Tiresias in Google, for one—but for the most part, all it takes is a little extra care to make the bulk of these stories all-ages friendly. I like to use as an example the scene from Zeus when Kronos castrates his father Ouranos, the Sky. That might be a difficult scene to depict in any comic, all ages or otherwise. But I show Kronos literally cutting open the sky—there’s nothing anthropomorphized about Ouranos—and it has the accompanying caption, “ Ouranos was wounded and rendered impotent. His powers seeped away into his sons.” Adults know what happened, and the tricky stuff goes over the head of kids. It’s unfortunate, I think, the way so much of comics today, particularly superheroes, have moved away from being suitable for children. Back in the day, it was much more common to see things being written on two levels.
What makes the Olympians perfect to adapt to comics?
Pretty much everything that makes superhero comics so popular was present in the Greek myths thousands of years earlier. Muscley heroes, beautiful women, fights to the death, tragic love stories, evil villains, scary monsters… it’s all in there. So much of Western Literature has its roots in Greek mythology, and comics in particular have borrowed liberally from it. Wonder Woman is an Amazon. Captain Marvel has the powers of Zeus, Athena, and Mercury, among others. Superman is Hercules. The Flash is totally Hermes, as is Namor—I could go on and on. My original pitch to First Second contained the line “The Greek Gods were the first superheroes,” and what better medium to tell their stories than the medium most associated with superheroes?
What are your overall plans for the books?
We hope to do 12 books in total, one for each Olympian. Twelve is kind of the canonical number for the Great Gods, but really, there were more, so I’ll be cheating a little. Book 4 is Hades: The Wealthy One, and in addition to the Lord of the Dead, I’ll also be covering Demeter and Persephone in that volume. And the projected final book in the series will be about Dionysos, the last Olympian. He’ll share bookspace with Hestia, the first born of the Olympians. Religiously speaking, she was an incredibly important figure to the ancient Greeks, but she has almost no role in myth. One of her few myths had her ceding her throne to Dionysos upon his ascension to Olympus, so it made sense to combine them both into one book. If the series were to take off in an epic fashion, I have an idea for a sort of spinoff book with Heroes, but there’s nothing really to talk about yet.
You’re both writing and illustrating this series, but in the past you’ve drawn works that others have written (most recently in Ball Peen Hammer). Which is more difficult—bringing your own artistic vision to life on the page or collaborating with someone else?
Even though it’s more rewarding, I’d have to say writing my own is the more difficult. A good collaboration makes your job easier—someone else to help shoulder the weight. Working with Adam Rapp (the author of Ball Peen), who’s such a tremendous writer, his descriptions and dialogue helped so much to set that tone for the book. Still, even though I’m writing Olympians, I’m still drawing on the works of ancient writers, so in a sense I’m not totally flying solo. They provide the wire framework I build my stories on.
Do you remember your first comic book? If so, what was it and what effect did it have on you?
Cool question. I remember a few, for different reasons. We had a hardcover collection of Golden and Silver Age Superman stories that I still own, and I used to love poring through that, especially the Bizarro stories. I had an issue of Savage Sword of Conan that was pretty exciting because it had topless ladies in it— guess nobody looked too closely at that one before buying it. And then there was one day I was home sick from school, and someone gave me an issue of Walt Simonson’s Thor—holy cow. I spent hours looking at that thing, trying to decide if I loved it or hated it. I ultimately came down on the love side.
After the dark and often brutal work in Ball Peen Hammer, your art on Zeus seems lighter and more colorful. How did you adapt your art style for this book, or did you?
Well, for Ball Peen, I spent months drawing some of the ugliest stuff imaginable—child killers, every possible bodily fluid, general death and destruction, all topped off with open sores. With Olympians, it’s a similar drawing style, technically, but the subject matter is vastly different. I’m literally drawing gods, so I get to draw a lot of beautiful things. Even the monsters, like the Cyclopes, while they’re certainly not beautiful, they’re not horrific to look at either.
What was the most fun thing about writing about the king of the gods?
As far as supreme deities go, Zeus is pretty relatable. He might even be fun to hang around with, but you’d probably want to keep him away from your younger sister. He’s the central figure of the whole series (maybe obviously), and you’ll really get to see him go through some serious character arcs.
Which of the gods are you most looking forward to working on?
The god I’m most looking forward to telling the stories of is Hermes—that’s why I’ve put his book off until number 10. It gives me something to look forward to.
Are there any stories in the pantheon that you particularly identify with?
Well, that changes all the time. It’s incredible how modern these characters can seem in stories that were first recorded thousands of years ago. Currently I’ve been working on the story of the Twelve Labors of Heracles, and my depiction of Heracles evolved from this kind of dim-witted oaf to a long suffering and very sympathetic character. Y’know, like a cartoonist.
-- John Hogan
