Fictional Fiction

Why does Gail Carriger get a manga-ka to do steampunk art for her and I don't?

Well, if you are one of the half dozen people who have read my blog and compared it to Gail Carriger's body of work, you know the answer to that question. “Soulless” is being produced as a serialized manga starting this month and if I had been paying attention I would have recognized it long before now and would have commented on it, not because I have any real expectation of having my work turned into a marketable product as she has but I would like to be able to come up with something.

To explain, permit me to wind back to the very beginning. . .

When I started in steampunk, I was the only one in the Pittsburgh area (or so it seemed). I would go to local comic conventions and people would ask who I was. Dress as a stormtrooper, a pirate, some comic book or anime character and people will recognize you for what you are but, at the time, they didn't know about steampunk.

But they thought they did.

Many people would walk up to me with puzzled looked on their faces, trying to place where they had seen my character before. They were sure I was from some movie that they just couldn't remember.

So, since I hated just saying that I was “a steampunk”, I started giving them the answer they wanted.

“Zebulon Vitruvius Pike. Gentleman adventurer and hero of a series of late 19th century dime novels. You probably never saw the 1937 Republic film based on one of those novels called “City of the Sun” but that story about a hidden city of gold under Mount Rushmore became the backstory for the otherwise unremarkable movie “National Treasure 2.” Also, a number of the stories were retooled into episodes of the “Wild Wild West” TV series in the 60s, with a minor character from the novels elevated to to role of star.”

It was all a lie, of course, even though some people nodded their heads and said “Yea, I thought I remembered that.”

The fiction became less necessary as steampunk became more ubiquitous, but I didn't abandon the story. Instead, I expanded on it. If I were to be cosplaying a hero of dime novels, those novels should have names. “Vitruvius Pike and the Ironclad Titan”, “The Chrotronic Sphere”, “The Galvanic Assassins”, “The Saurian Labyrinth”, “The Selenite Invasion.” I didn't think much about the plots or details of the stories, just chose titles that were conceptualized as being the inspirations of later, more identifiable stories. “Vitruvius Pike and the Antipodal Columbiad” was the Victorian inspiration for “The Guns of Navarone.” “The Antediluvian Valley” became “The Valley of Gwangi.” I have been wanting to adapt period dime novel covers to be Vitruvius Pike artifacts, much like Paul Guinan did with “Boilerplate.”

Listening to Emilie Autumn's “Chambermaid” for the first time, I suddenly thought of the title “Vitruvius Pike and the Clockwork Chambermaid” and a cascade of thoughts fell into place. I had, at the time, also been reading about a number of American dime novels that had been adapted into Japanese and the fit was natural. A Japanese author would have translated the Pike story and simultaneously founded the Japanese fascination both with English maids and with androids. And android maids. And android battle maids. I very quickly roughed out a story wherein Pike returns from some adventure to a home in London that had been owned by his great uncle. Having left after the home had been ransacked and returning injured, a friend of his hires a maid to clean up and take care of while he heals. And what with the Orientalism movement under full swing, it seemed an interesting twist to have the young maid to be Japanese in ethnicity but, having been raised in England, to be otherwise a proper English maid.

Aimi Somerton.

I envisioned her filling the role of Watson in Conan-Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories, told more from her perspective so that Pike's thinking can be a mystery until he explains. Then I thought of her more like Holmes with an exacting and deliberative mind. She would be more of a partner to Pike who, while intelligent, is prone to punching, shooting and otherwise breaking his way through to a solution (as is common for dime novel heroes). Aimi would be a moderating influence.

But then I thought of her more like Mrs. Peel from “The Avengers” She would need to be compitant. More than just a maid, but not quite as kick-ass as Diana Rigg.  The story plot continued as the clockwork chambermaid of the story would initially be the fully mechanical product of a base villain. Aimi would become injured and have her arm replaced by a clockwork mechanism derived from the villain's technology, thus she would become the title character.

And in working this story out I realized that such a story would have to become a manga at some point,.

Whereupon we reach the present.

More and more as I think of Vitruvius Pike stories, my mind's eye paints them as manga or anime rather than the woodcut illustrations of period dime novels. And just as I want to adapt period dime novel illustrations into Vitruvius Pike “artifacts”, I also want to have some character sketches from the 1970 manga or from the undeveloped “Clockwork Chambermaid” anime. Having seen the work that Rem is doing for Gail Carriger has restarted my interest in developing that thread.

For that, I'll need an artist. Actually I need two artists. The first, a real artist who would actually produce some art.

I have little expectation of finding such a person. I had found someone online and had commissioned her to produce some art but she failed to deliver, apparently forgetting about what I had paid her for. When she finally made good on the art, it wasn't quite the look I wanted. I may yet find someone but I'm not holding my breath and my own drawing skills are nowhere near up to the task.

The second required artist would be fictional. A manga-ka who's work was serialized sporadically in Shūkan Manga Akushon ("Weekly Manga Action") from 1967 to 1970 (or something like that). Does anyone out there know enough Japanese to help? I would be looking for a name that, to a Westerner, might sound familiar but to someone who is Japanese or knows the industry would be recognized as a fiction. Name wise, sort of a Japanese version of J. Edward Runcible.

In the meantime, I will read the latest book in the Parasol Protectorate series and quietly lament my not having quite that level of talent or the connections to make what talent I do have pay off.