V for Vendetta - Alan Moore & David Lloyd (with Steve Whitaker and Siobhan Dodds) (1982 - 1989)

V for Vendetta, like many other feature-length comic and graphic novels, is not an easy thing to review.  The easiest point of comparison is Watchmen, since they are probably Alan Moore's two most famous works.  From this perspective it is easy to sum up my feelings: while it is a very good story, it is just no Watchmen.  That said I still think it is worth reading and I am looking forward to seeing the film, even though Moore disavows it.  For some reason I think it will be better than the Watchmen adaptation, though I have read that the film portrays the protagonist as a "freedom fighter," which makes sense for Hollywood, but which is also the wrong move.  I suppose I should explain the plot.

The story opens with a young girl who is trying to prostitute herself for the first time.  She doesn't really know what she is doing, and the man she solicits quickly tries to take advantage of her.  He is joined by other men who are part of "The Finger," which is the police force of the totalitarian British society in 1997.  They surround the girl (whose name is Evey) and she is rescued by a figure in a mask.  The men are killed, and Evey and her savior go to a rooftop where they watch the Houses of Parliament explode.  Then there are fireworks in the sky.  The savior says, "I did that."

It would get way too tedious to explain everything that happens, but after this scene Evey is taken to a secret hideaway and her savior explains that his (her?) name is "V."  V never takes off the mask, which is a Guy Fawkes mask.

Now I think the most interesting way to write this review is to write about the mask and the Occupy movement and Anonymous.  But before we get to that, what is my criticism?

Basically, this is a very good story.  The writing is sharp, and the political situation that the novel (I'm just going to call it a graphic novel because that's the form it was in when I read it) describes is just creative enough to be unique.  It certainly bears similarity to Nazi Germany, or Orwell's 1984, but it is Moore's England of the late 90's.  Like Watchmen with its dystopian New York City in 1985, the depiction does not seem all that far from reality, though underneath it is obviously very unsettling.

I couldn't pin down what the problem was with this book until I read the Wikipedia page.  Now, I had a pretty good idea of everything that happened in the story, but about midway through, I started to get lost.  The problem with this story is that there are too many characters and it is way too hard to keep track of everything that is happening to them.  This issue becomes most pronounced around pages 142 and 143, where a woman hides in an alley to shoot a man who killed her lover.  I basically had no idea what was happening for the next forty pages.

But then it does become clear, eventually, and by the end of the book the reader should have a pretty good idea of what's happened.  But in order to fully to understand every nuance, you need to pay very close attention.  You might even need to take notes to keep track of all the characters.  I don't think normal people take notes to understand books they read, so there is my criticism.  If you read the Wikipedia page, that should clarify the storyline a great deal, but it will also highlight what I didn't realize about the book until finishing it: this is not really V's story.

This is really the story of everyone that is working in the British government.  Sure, it is V's story too (you find out about V's past), but seriously that seems to account for about 10-15% of the content.   Much of this is Evey's story, but much of it is also Eric Finch's story.  Finch is probably the most sympathetic character that works for the government, but he also plays an antagonistic role in the climax of the story.  In this sense, he is ambiguous.

But so is V.  Portraying V as a "freedom fighter" in the film really simplifies how the audience should react to the character.  V is, in fact, a terrorist.  But a terrorist against a totalitarian society.  He is not evil, but the things he does to Evey sometimes cross the line into torture.  So it is really Evey that is the "conscience" of the book--the protagonist that seems to have a clearly humanistic view of what is right and wrong.  Her description of the way that England came to be is also one of the high points of the book (Kennedy is also oddly President as in Red Son):

"I was only seven, but I remember when the news came over the radio.  Dad kept telling Mum not to worry.  He was scared to death...It was about Poland and the Russians, wasn't it?  And President Kennedy said he'd use the bomb if they didn't get out.  That's what Dad told me...It was horrible.  Nobody knew if Britain would get bombed out or not.  I remember Mum saying 'Africa's not there anymore!'  That's all she said...I though about all the lions and elephants being dead.  It made me cry.  I was only seven....But Britain didn't get bombed.  Not that it made much difference.  All the bombs and things had done something to the weather.  Something bad...I remember one day Dad called Mum and me into the back bedroom.  He said he wanted to show us something...We could see right across London from the bedroom window.  It was nearly all under water.  The Thames Barrier had burst....The sky was all yellow and black.  I've never seen a sky like it.  Dad said London was finished and he wanted to take Mum and me to the country...Mum wouldn't go.  Just as well, I suppose.  It turned out that the countryside was worse than the towns.  The weather had destroyed all the crops, see?  And there was no food coming from Europe, because Europe had gone.  Like Africa...I-I didn't like to think about the next four years.  We'd got together with some neighbours in a protection committee.  It didn't help much....There was no food.  And the sewers were flooded and everybody got sick.  Mum died in 1991.  Dad wouldn't let me see her...There were riots, and people with guns.  Nobody knew what was going on.  Everyone was waiting for the government to do something...But there wasn't any government anymore.  Just lots of little gangs, all trying to take over.  And then in 1992, somebody finally did...It was all the fascist groups, the right-wingers.  They'd all got together and with some of the big corporations that had survived.  'Norsefire' they called themselves...I remember when they marched into London.  They had a flag with their symbol on.  Everyone was cheering.  I thought they were scary.  They soon got things under control.  But then they started taking people away...All the black people and the Pakistanis...White people, too.  All the radicals and the men who, you know, liked other men, the homosexuals.  I don't know what they did with them all...Dad had been in a Socialist group when he was younger.  They came for him one September morning in 1993...It was my birthday.  I was twelve.  I never saw him again....They made me go and work in a factory with a lot of other kids.  We were putting matches into boxes...I lived in a hostel.  It was cold and dirty and I just used to cry all the time.  I wanted my dad....That's how it was for four years...Not enough food, not enough money.  Some of the older girls made money going with men.  That's what I was going to do, last night.  But they were Fingermen.  Thy were going...They were g-going to...They were going to ruh...ruh...ruh..." (27-28)

There is also a very funny panel on page 64 where V is reading V by Thomas Pynchon.  V is obsessed with the letter and Moore does an excellent job of incorporating this motif into the book.

One of the other high points comes when V takes over the television network that appears to be the only option for people to watch.  Another comes when he turns London into "the land of do as you please" where anarchy is now the rule:

"Good evening, London.  This is the voice of fate.  Almost four hundred years ago tonight, a great citizen made a most significant contribution to our common culture.  It was a contribution forged in stealth and silence and secrecy, although it is best remembered in noise and bright light. To commemorate this most glorious of evenings, her Majesty's government is pleased to return the rights of secrecy and privacy to you, its loyal subjects.  For three days, your movements will not be watched...Your conversations will not be listened to...And 'do what though wilt' shall be the whole of the law.  God bless you...and goodnight." (186-187)

Ultimately there is a reasonably satisfying climax to the story, but I couldn't fully appreciate it because I still didn't really understand it all until I read the Wikipedia page.  Again, V for Vendetta is just not as good as Watchmen, so don't go into it with such high expectations.  Regardless, it is a quality read, and if you pay really close attention you might get more out of it than I did.  I have the film on hold at the Chicago Public Library and I have been waiting for its delivery for more than two weeks now.  I'm not expecting a lot out of it, but I still think the source material is good enough to make for a special movie.

But yes, let's be honest here, V for Vendetta is not famous for its story anymore so much as the Guy Fawkes mask.  Alan Moore and David Lloyd have said that they are happy that the mask has become associated with modern protest movements, but what intrigues me is, why has it been adopted?  Is it because of V for Vendetta, or is it because of the original Guy Fawkes?  Of course, I think it is because the film adaptation (sad as it is) put it back in the public consciousness.

The 5th of November is now, actually, a day I will look forward to as perhaps if there is going to be a revolution, it will happen then.  Ironically, Amazon and Time Warner have made a ton of money off this mask, as it it the top-selling mask in their inventory, and as Time Warner owns the rights to it and is paid a commission on each one sold.  So really, it is not the best way to lead an anarchist revolution.  It's just commercial like everything else.  But people know what it means, basically, and the fact that it communicates a message is valuable.

We don't live in an outwardly totalitarian society run by Norsefire, but we are certainly watched.  I remember when I worked at City of Chicago Department of Law and they told us that if you walked around the Loop for about thirty minutes, your face would be on enough cameras that they can run facial recognition software on you and identify you in thirty seconds.  Sadly, they do not have cameras on sidestreets in Logan Square where just last week someone smashed a car window and stole something.  It would be nice if surveillance were used to catch thieves and not make everyone paranoid that they need to be "acting normally" at all times that they may be on camera.  It would also be nice if there were greater transparency in the job search process when we live in an era of economic desperation.  But we don't live in the land of do-as-you-please.  My hope is that someday soon we'll come closer to that, though.

(Warren in 2016!)

Points of Rebellion - William O. Douglas

Justice Douglas is my favorite Supreme Court justice.  Law school is extremely boring at times, but any class that features Supreme Court opinions from 1939-1975 holds the potential for excitement: Douglas is likely to dissent in many cases, and there is almost always a sentence or two of pure brilliance and disgust.  Points of Rebellion, then, is a 97 page dissent against America as she stood in 1969.  It is a fantastic book and I highly recommend it.

In college, I majored in Writing and Politics at the Gallatin School of Individualized Study at New York University.  We were required to state our concentration and present a colloquium on the topic.  I chose "Political Rebellion in Literature."  My presentation (delivered to my academic adviser, as well as two other faculty members) was mostly a mess.  We had to talk about 30 books.  Some of my books were Utopia (Sir Thomas More), Hamlet, The Rebel (Albert Camus), The Flowers of Evil (Charles Baudelaire), The Origins of Totalitarianism (Hannah Arendt), One-Dimensional Man (Herbert Marcuse), White Noise (Don DeLillo), Something Happened (Joseph Heller), Anti-Intellectualism in American Life (Richard Hofstadter), The Trial (Kafka), Discourse on Method (Descartes), Bend Sinister (Vladimir Nabokov), and others...

My basic argument was that the different forms of rebellion had been squashed by the majority in American society.  I could not make this argument anywhere nearly as well as I could today.

Points of Rebellion would have been THE PERFECT BOOK for this colloquium, and I am sorry that I did not know anything about the law, or the Court, when I was 21 and designing my project.

Were I to give this presentation today, the so-called "Occupy movement" would no doubt move heavily to the forefront of the conversation.  Last year when the police arrested protesters on the Brooklyn Bridge and raided Zuccotti Park, I wrote on Facebook that it had taken 7 years, but I had finally been proven wrong: the flowers of rebellion still bloom today.

But I would like you, one day, to look at Google Analytics (I find it from my finance page) and look at Domestic Trends and see the last ten years in various industries.  You will be able to see some remnants of the Great Recession, but more notable is the continued dominance of the credit card industry.

While the "Occupy movement" may have brought like-minded individuals together and fostered a stronger public consciousness of the ways in which the financial industry has siphoned off economic growth from 99% of the population, it is hard to say that they have made a serious impact.  Elizabeth Warren has made a much stronger impact in terms of formulating the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and she is but one person.  It is far too early to talk about 2016, but other people are already whispering that Hillary Clinton will be running on the Democratic ticket--but I am convinced that the only way we can enter into a "golden age" is with Warren as President.  Many people are saying that we will continue to live with high unemployment rates for the rest of our lives, but if more people read Points of Rebellion, one would realize that rapid and radical change is, in fact, possible.

To be sure, Douglas's vision of an American utopia is improbable.  It is quite easy to counter Douglas's statements or claim that he asks too much out of people.  Indeed, many of his statements ignore the psychological tendencies of people to organize themselves in "the Establishment" that Douglas faced in his lifetime, and that we still face today.

First, Points of Rebellion was written in 1970--but it might as well have been written yesterday because nothing has changed (excepting some of the statements about foreign affairs):

"The advances of technology present the problem of increasing disemployment in the private sector.  We brag about our present low unemployment.  But that is due to Vietnam.  Without Vietnam we would have 15 per cent or more unemployment.  Must we fight wars to have full employment?
Technology is in the saddle and displaces manpower.  The old problem of unemployment has become the new problem of disemployment.  How many of the present eighteen-year-old men and women will be permanently disemployed?  Thoughts such as these fill the hearts of the young with dismay." (66)

Douglas does, at one point, flex his literary experimentation to hilarious effect:

"A number of federal agencies also use personality tests.  One included the following choices:--my father was a good man, I am very seldom troubled by constipation, my sex life is satisfactory, evil spirits possess me at times, at times I feel like swearing, I have had very peculiar and strange experiences, I have never been in trouble because of my sex behavior, during one period when I was a youngster I engaged in petty thievery, my sleep is fitful and disturbed, I do not always tell the truth, as a youngster I was suspended from school one or more times for cutting up, everything is turning out just like the prophets of the Bible said it would.
The experts are at odds about these personality tests.  These tests commonly grade a person by eight, nine, or ten traits while twenty-five thousand traits might approximate an accurate personality portrayal.  Moreover, the creator of the test fashions his own neurotic world as, for example, to daydream is neurotic--the thesis that is present in one personality test." (25)

Most people know nothing of Justice Douglas.  Law students may hear the gossip that he was married four times and that he was an early advocate of environmental protection.  His passion for the environment is present throughout Points of Rebellion.  Sometimes his love for it is so innocent and genuine that one cannot help but be moved:

"I remember an alpine meadow in Wyoming where willows lined a clear, cold brook.  Moose browsed the willow.  Beaver came and made a dam which in time created a lovely pond which produced eastern brook trout up to five pounds.  A cattle baron said that sagebrush was killing the grass.  So the Forest Service sprayed the entire area.  It killed the sagebrush and the willow too.  The moose disappeared and so did the beaver.  In time the dam washed out and the pond was drained.  Ten years later some of the willow was still killed out; the beaver never returned; nor did the moose." (83)

Notably, Justice Douglas does not write as you would expect a Supreme Court justice to write--and it is refreshing as hell:

"In April, 1968, only 3.5 per cent of the general population was unemployed, while for those in the slum areas it was 7 per cent, with 5.7 per cent for whites and 8.7 per cent for Negroes.
The national white unemployment rate has been about 3.1 per cent and the national Negro unemployment rate 6.7 per cent.
Police practices are anti-Negro.
Employment practices are anti-Negro.
Housing allocation is anti-Negro.
Education is anti-Negro.
The federal government, with its hundreds of federally-financed public road contracts, and its thousands of procurement contracts negotiated each year by the Pentagon and other agencies to purchase munitions, towels, stationery, pens, automobiles and the like, is admonished by Congress to make sure that the contractors for these goods make jobs available without discrimination.  President Johnson gave hardly more than lip service to that mandate." (45-46)

When a Supreme Court justice can write the way Douglas does, one feels more secure in their love for their country.  However, there have not been many like him.  Points of Rebellion predates the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency, and one supposes that Douglas would think that agency a step in the right direction.  However it is more likely that he would find much to hate about it too.  His distaste for the administrative state is eloquently stated in another passage that could be written yesterday:

"Corporate interests, as well as poor people--unemployed people as well as the average member of affluent society--are affected by these broad generalized grants of authority to administrative agencies.  The corporate interests have been largely taken care of by highly qualified lawyers acting in individual cases and by Bar Associations proposing procedural reforms that define, for example, the 'aggrieved' persons who have standing to object to agency orders or decisions. [One wishes Douglas was on the Court when Lujan v. National Wildlife Federation came down...] But the voices of the mass of people are not heard; and the administrative agencies largely have their own way.
Moreover, the Establishment controls those agencies.  That control does not come from corrupt practices or from venality.  It results from close alliances made out of working relations, from memberships in the same or similar clubs, from the warp and woof of social relations, and from the prospects offered the administrator for work in the ranks of the Establishment, if he is the right and proper man.  The administrative office is indeed the staging ground where men are trained and culled and finally chosen to the high salaried posts in the Establishment that carry many desirable fringe benefits.  The New Dealers mostly ended up there.  Under Lyndon Johnson there was lively competition for administrative men who would in two years have made a million working for the Establishment.  That is a powerful influence among many agencies; and it results in those who have agency discretion exercising it for the benefit of those who run the corporation state.  And those people are by and large the exploiters." (79-80)

Like a law review article, this book ends with suggestions for reform.  President Obama should read this book (or at least indicate to me that he has read this book) and so should Elizabeth Warren.  They are the only ones out there right now that can make any of this change happen.  Of course, Congress will likely stand in their way, but if lawmakers are truly servants of the public, then they must listen to reason rather than self-interest.  Douglas nicely summarizes his vision at the end:

"There are only two choices: A police state in which all dissent is suppressed or rigidly controlled; or a society where law is responsive to human needs.
If society is to be responsive to human needs, a vast restructuring of our laws is essential.
Realization of this need means adults must awaken to the urgency of the young people's unrest--in other words there must be created an adult unrest against the inequities and injustices in the present system.  If the government is in jeopardy, it is not because we are unable to cope with revolutionary situations.  Jeopardy means that either the leaders or the people do not realize they have all the tools required to make the revolution come true.  The tools and the opportunity exist.  Only the moral imagination is missing.
If the budget of the Pentagon were reduced from 80 billion dollars to 20 billion it would still be over twice as large as that of any other agency of government.  Starting with vast reductions in its budget, we must make the Pentagon totally subordinate in our lives.
The poor and disadvantaged must have lawyers to represent them in normal civil problems that now haunt them.
Law must be revised so as to eliminate their present bias against the poor.  Neighborhood credit unions would be vastly superior to the finance companies with their record of anguished garnishments.
Hearings must be made available so that the important decisions of federal agencies may be exposed to public criticism before they are put into effect.
The food program must be drastically revised so that its primary purpose is to feed the hungry rather than to make the corporate farmer rich.
A public sector for employment must be created that extends to meaningful and valuable work.  It must include many arts and crafts, the theatre, industries; training of psychiatric and social workers, and specialists in the whole gamut of human interest." (92-94, emphasis mine)

Justice Douglas is most famous for introducing the word "penumbra" into the world of constitutional rights.  A lot of people criticize him for that.  People tend to forget that he was giving married couples the right to use contraceptives.

If Justice Douglas was mentioned in my U.S. History classes, I can't remember.  However, in my small and humble opinion, he was one of the greatest Americans to have lived.  Law school has been a long and painful process, but at the very least it allowed me to gain exposure to Douglas, and to find a view of the Constitution and American society at large with which I could agree and seek to propagate in my own life.

Points of Rebellion is an inspiration.  Some of the material may be dated, but those portions are at least entertaining.  It is a short little book.  If you care about radical politics, I highly recommend you check it out.  Then go out there, and try to build a more enlightened society.