This is Page One. I’m thinking my opening sentence lacks flavor—too 21st-century. That sentence isn’t doing its job. I need to sweep my audience into the mid-1500s from the get-go.
I like Gothic-style architecture. When it’s uncoupled from religious purposes, it lends itself well to this kind of sinister setting.
I cut a stencil out of sketch paper and dabbed ink on it with a sea-sponge and flicked ink off of a toothbrush. Still needs work, of course.
I’m still plugging along, working on the new & improved version of Gloriana. One of the benefits of expanding to a 160-page graphic novel is that I have more room to include things that didn’t fit into the previously-planned 48-page comic book.
Dr Johanne Faustus is the villain in this tale. He’s a character from mediaeval morality plays and puppet shows, then became the title character in Christopher Marlowe’s play. Here the demon Mephistopheles shows Faustus the Seven Deadly Sins, with which they can corrupt mortal beings. This little clip shows 2 pages drawn in blue pencil. I’ll ink them soon.
Lady Elizabeth escapes her kidnapers and makes her way to Portsmouth on the southern shore of England. I continue world-building—here are sketches of a mediaeval town gate and an old street (neither of them are Portsmouth, actually). I’m mimicking on a very small scale what animation studios do. I want to have assembled sketches of all the locations and backgrounds I need before drawing the comic.
Elizabeth’s nemesis, Doctor Faustus, needs to get to sea so he can capture her. He’s without any kind of boat, so the demon Mephistopheles summons the abominable carack Nine Circles from the briny deep. Here’s my sketch. Of course, she will be crewed by devils.
Here’s the pirate captain, Master Abbot. Side note: ship captains were called ‘masters’ back in those days.
The story called for a malevolent pirate captain, but this guy’s backstory took on a life of its own. Abbot became a way to point up the social upheaval of the time. He was the abbot of a monastery. That changed when King Henry VIII had a disagreement with the pope, declared the Church of England his kingdom’s new Christianity and dissolved the old Catholic monasteries. Abbot’s world was shattered. He decided to wage war on all mankind; he became a pirate.
Abbot is partially inspired by Captain Ahab who was obsessed with Moby Dick, the great white whale. Another inspiration is John Charity Spring, the demented Latin-master-turned-slave-ship-captain from the Flashman novels. I’m thinking about having Abbot speak in Latin Bible verses (King Henry replaced the vulgate Latin bibles with English ones).
I’m still fiddling with this design. He may be too skinny. I need to fix some drawing errors.
Henry VIII banished his daughter, Elizabeth, from court. I can’t discover why, except that Elizabeth did something to upset him or they had an argument. I don’t know if she were under house arrest or sent away. For my plot, I need Elizabeth to be banished to somewhere so bad guys can kidnap her.
In history, in real life, Katherine Ashley was Elizabeth’s governess. I decided to monkey with the truth and make Kat the headmistress of a school for young ladies, say half-a-day’s ride from Hampton. Now I have a destination for Elizabeth.
https://thetudorenthusiast.weebly.com/blog/the-life-and-death-of-kat-ashley
https://www.sparknotes.com/biography/elizabeth/section1/
Thank you, Weavabird, for re-posting some of our story on England’s History.
glorianacomic 