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Author Paulo Coelho has made a series of videos on writing. Here's the first one:
January 29, 2012
January 28, 2012
How I Wrote It: Alec Wilkinson, "The Ice Balloon"
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"Before the twentieth century, more than a thousand people tried to reach the (north) pole," Alec Wilkinson writes in his wiry new book, The Ice Balloon. The odds of actually reaching the pole were terrible. About three-fourths of those explorers died. But a one-in-four chance of success didn't deter Swedish explorer S.A. Andree, who in 1897 attempted the most unlikely means of reaching the North Pole: by hydrogen balloon.
What makes this more than another adventure story is Wilkinson's exploration of mankind's compulsion to reach the extreme points of the Earth, despite all the absurd and obvious risks. Wilkinson, a writer for The New Yorker, chronicles other horrifically failed efforts to reach the North Pole--some of which devolved into cannibalism.
We asked Wilkinson what drew him to Andree, a dreamy and enthusiastic explorer, who, when his balloon began to lose gas and bounce past polar bears along the Arctic ice, wrote in his diary that he and his two companions remained "dominated by a feeling of pride."
"We think we can face death well having done what we have done."
You've previously written about a man who crossed the Atlantic in a raft made of trash and, over the years, have profiled other eccentric and/or quixotic characters. Are you drawn to subjects who seem compelled to risk their lives for seemingly idiosyncratic goals, or at least pursue an uncommon lifestyle?
The most interesting people for me are the outcasts and the visionaries and the ones who have the resources of mind and character to challenge failure. I don't want to emulate them necessarily---I'm not sure I have the nerve---but I admire their vitality and their lives are often thrilling and instructing, even if, sometimes, in a cautionary way.
I think that the same feelings that drew me to those pursuits drew me to writing and then to looking around in the world for subjects that appealed to me. I was very lucky to have been a policeman. It broadened me to meet people who were so different from me, and it gave me a subject. I don't think I would have become a writer without having had that experience at an impressionable age. Also, of course, I am only one writer in a line of writers at The New Yorker who respected eccentricity. Joseph Mitchell and A.J. Liebling established the genre, working from centuries old forms in British and American newspapers and from Shakespeare and the Canterbury Tales before them.
As I began reading The Ice Balloon, I couldn't help thinking: how could Andree not know his adventure would not end well? Do you think he was a bit nuts? A fanatic?
Andree was an engineer, a formidable, big-thinking, and somewhat literal minded man who believed that science was a sacred tool. He was also a futurist, a pioneer who, having noted that all other means of approach had failed for centuries, was using unconventional and untried means to make the most daring Arctic assault ever made, in fact one of the most daring expeditions ever. Perhaps only Columbus had sailed off with as much uncertainty. Should Andree have known better? Was he nuts? Well, if Orville Wright had crashed and died, would people have said, 'How could he possibly have imagined that such an ungainly craft could have flown?' The disadvantage for Andree of being a pioneer was that the explorers who had left for the Pole before him had the example of all the other failures to adapt their own methods from. Andree had none, since no one had flown through the Arctic and above the ice before. Nothing anyone had done was helpful to him, unless he came down on the ice. Ironically, the Pole, when it was finally seen for certain, was seen in 1926 from the deck of an airship, from exactly the vantage, in other words, that would have been Andree's nearly thirty years earlier.
This book began as a New Yorker article. It seems many of your magazine stories cry out for book-length treatment. What is it about Andree's story that compelled you to expand on it?
In addition to Andree and his basketmates and their lives and the genesis and unfolding of their mission, the book describes the other explorers whose lives were intimately involved with Andree and his task---the American Greely who had so severely and patronizingly criticized Andree's plan, and the Norwegian Fridjtof Nansen, who was a rival. I was very pleased to be able to write the magazine piece, but knew that there was simply not sufficient room to portray these people and what happened to them and the world that they and Andree lived in, or to make apparent the depth of his feeling for his mission and his bravery in undertaking it. Andree is a heroic figure. He left on an expedition of grave purpose, and when it failed, he rose to meet all the fearsome challenges of traveling over the ice through "the realm of death," as another explorer described it.
If you could've asked Andree one question, what would it be?
With 20/20 hindsight, I guess it would be, 'What if the clouds descend and don't lift?' Meaning, what happens if you sail into the worst conditions? If I could meet him in the afterlife, I guess it would be, 'How did the three of you actually die?'
For your research, did you visit the Arctic or fly in a balloon? In addition to relying on Andree's diary, how did you get into his head?
I went to Sweden, to Andree's hometown and to the museum that has the relics. As for getting into Andree's head, I hope I did, but if I did, I don't know how. I found the diaries so compelling that I couldn't stop reading them. Unintentionally, I committed parts to memory, simply by reading them so often. Also, I think it probably doesn't require much of the imagination to understand the feelings of someone obsessed with a calling, a purpose that gives shape and resonance to a life. We all hope for such a thing, after all, whether in the form of a task or a cause.
Where did you write the bulk of the book "“ home, New Yorker office? - and what did you keep near your desk (books, photos) to help you convey the frigid, barren beauty of the Arctic?
I guess I wrote most of the book at home, and the only constant prop I had was a postcard of Andree's balloon leaving the harbor, on July 11, 1897, which my wife found for me. When inspiration failed me, I'd pick up the diaries and read, or look at the expedition photographs, which are so strange and haunting. Nothing like them, so far as I know, exists elsewhere in the annals of exploration. The visual record of a group of lost men, brought to light years after they died.
Were you reading (or listening to) anything in particular while writing the book? Something or someone to get you in the mood of the unforgiving Artic ice and snow?
I didn't read or listen to anything specific to the work, really, although of course I did to prepare. I read mostly fiction anyway. I assume that most of the processes of writing are unconscious, and that reading helps engage them. Also listening to music such as jazz and classical music, any music that involves deeper purposes than mere entertianment. I once heard Jimmy Garrison, the bass player for the John Coltraine Quartet, say about music: first you have to learn all about your horn, then you have to learn all about music, then you have to forget it all and learn how to play. It is a saying that adapts nicely to the practical purposes of writing. In this case, of course, I had to learn everything I could about Andree, everything I could about the Arctic, then I had to forget it all and hope that my preparation had been such that I would produce a book that would, what, have some value, I guess, be worth a reader's time and attention.
(Further reading: An Empire of Ice, by Edward J. Larson; Into the Silence, by Wade Davis)
Guest Post: Lev A.C. Rosen on Steampunk, the Importance of Being Earnest, and "Men of Genius"
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An intriguing Steampunk release from earlier in the year was first-time novelist Lev A.C. Rosen's All Men of Genius, which seems to have absorbed the lessons of classic Steampunk but also be fully aware of the modern variety. It's aware of a need to be entertaining and of using the subgenre as social commentary, but also of creating compelling characters and situations. In the book, the budding genius-level inventor Violet Adams wants to attend the prestigious but all-male Illyria College, founded by the late Duke Illyria, the greatest scientist of the Victorian Age. So what does Violet Adams do? She disguises herself as her twin brother, Ashton, and gains entry. What follows is part farce, part adventure, and fun on a lot of different levels"”including killer automata, deadly legacies, and a lot of plot twists and complications.
Omnivoracious asked Rosen if he'd give us his take on Steampunk and how it relates to All Men of Genius. This is what he came up with"¦
Steampunk: Lev A.C. Rosen's View
What is Steampunk? The question gets asked a lot by people just coming to the genre. Those familiar with steampunk tend to take a "I know it when I see it" approach, and that's because like many developing genres (although the term has been around since the 80s at least, I think of it as a genre still in flux), it's still drawing inspiration from and blending with other genres. Many books, films, and video games have steampunk elements. Does that make them steampunk? I think it depends on what steampunk means to the viewer.
To me, steampunk is a postmodern re-imagining of classical Victorian science fiction, the kind written by Verne and Wells. It's someone from the modern time period looking back and saying "okay, if I were living in the 1800s, and were writing sci-fi, how would I do it?" Of course, the modernity of a contemporary writer can't be erased, and most classic Victorian literature would be considered too dense by the average reader today, so that lens of "what would it look like?" is colored by a modern sensibility. This sensibility can be tongue in cheek, and a little funny, or it can be serious and commentating. I tried to do both while writing All Men of Genius.
All Men of Genius is inspired by two classical comedies: Shakespeare's Twelfth Night and Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest. That isn't to say it's a mash-up--at least 95 percent of the words are my own. But steampunk, as a genre, has a postmodern sensibility of combining the old and the new, of patchwork metal and fusing apparently disparate elements, and I was really thinking of writing as my steampunk act--not because of the nature of what I was writing, but because I was cobbling together plays from two different time periods, plus many references to classical science fiction, all while trying to make it a whole new work.
Steampunk elements have crept into many facets of culture, including fashion, art, popular television, and even books that weren't written by me. I think its appeal can be attributed to the aesthetic of the machine. The idea that today, with tiny microchips powering everything, it's difficult to get a grasp on how things work, whereas if you see a giant machine with moving parts, you can quite literally see how they work, and that makes the technology more human.
Also, everything is so visible today --the process of creating a new wonderful machine or breakthrough happens in a thousand tiny steps, not in one giant one like it used to. I think that as a culture we miss that one giant step--that huge reveal--the lack of knowledge that made science seem magic. I discuss this in the book as well, but I think the popularity in steampunk comes from that--a desire to find science less real and more magical.
Some say that the cleanliness of much of science fiction makes it alien to them, whereas steampunk, with its rust and dirt seems a more human sort of science fiction. And that's part of the appeal, too, I think. I tried extremely hard to make every character in my book completely human--I gave them all a history that got them to where they were, even the more minor characters. I think that the humanity of the characters gives the book, and the steampunk flavor, a rougher feel, one where every tiny piece is its own gear, spinning in its own way--or a better metaphor might be a Rube Goldberg machine. Each piece doing its own thing while setting off something else. You might not need every part of the machine for the final end, but the getting there feels like more of an experience.
I've been told steampunk is fetishization of gears (which I think was meant to sound like a bad thing, but I do like gears), or goth with more brown, and I think it can be that for those who want nothing more. And if it makes them happy, then more power to them. But for others, steampunk is a complex exploration of nostalgia and modernity, of wanting to stride bravely into the future without losing sight of the past. I think it's an ideal, in many ways. A way of having everything the way you want it. And gears, too.
January 27, 2012
Graphic Novel Friday: X-Man vs. X-Man
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As if the title weren't enough of a clue, X-Men: Schism spotlights a pivotal moment in X-Men history: a rift in ideology from its two biggest guns--Cyclops and Wolverine. In the wake of a mutant extinction-level event, perennial team leader and wet blanket, Cyclops, rallies the X-Men to an island dubbed "Utopia" in order to establish a sense of community. His plan, however, doesn't account for any villain who might want to wipe out mutantkind in one fell swoop and who possesses enough skill to hit a target the size of a giant island. And that's exactly what happens in Schism.
As danger looms, Cyclops sends the usual heavy-hitters across the globe to stop various enemies, leaving the island's defense up to him, Wolverine, and the latest batch of young mutants who came to Uptopia to train to be X-Men. Therein lies the issue: Cyclops declares the new recruits fit for battle, while Wolverine declares the very idea to be ludicrous. Writer Jason Aaron presents both sides of the argument with equal footing, but it's still difficult to take Wolverine's position seriously. This is Wolverine, after all"”the hot-tempered Canuck with the beserker rage and fangs; he's the runt who's always spoiling for a fight. Yet, here he tells Cyclops that maybe the better idea is to evacuate the island, because someone needs to think of the children. Really, it's all an excuse to get Cyclops and Wolverine to clash, and Schism definitely delivers. This isn't a shoving match or a harsh exchange of words soon mended by standing against a common enemy (although there are plenty of verbal barbs, especially on the subject of Jean Grey). No, here are two classic X-Men at each other's throats. It's an extended, bloody fight that ends a friendship and divides an entire race.
If that weren't reason enough to get fans in the ring, the chapters are each illustrated by marquee names: Alan Davis, Frank Cho, Adam Kubert, Carlos Pacheo, Billy Tan, and Daniel Acuña. Cho's depiction of Wolverine is reminiscent of the mid-to-late 1980s (before the films influenced his look). He's hunched, hairy, and his perpetual scowl leaves grooves in his face that even his healing factor cannot fix. Acuna's pages are stylized and flashy (if not a little stiff), while Davis does what Davis does best, which is everything.
The hardcover collection is oversized, giving readers an opportunity to sit front-row at a title bout, and with artists of this caliber it's very much worth this grand scale. Two variant covers, a promotional pinup, and a team roster by Frank Cho (from pencils to finished page) comprise the supplemental material. It's a package that gives fans a believable answer to "Who would win in a fight..?" and X-Men: Schism certainly lives up to its title.
--Alex
January 26, 2012
"Control Point" by Myke Cole: Black Hawk Down Meets the X-Men
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Ever wondered what "Black Hawk Down meets the X-Men" might look like? According to bestselling author Peter V. Brett, that's exactly what readers get in Myke Cole's debut novel Control Point the first in his Shadow Ops series from Ace. The praise doesn't end there, with another bestseller, Ann Aguirre, calling Control Point "hands down the best military fantasy I've ever read."
In Cole's novel, people are waking up with magical talents"”- storm-summoning, raising the dead, and fire-starting"”- and creating chaos because of it. Army officer Oscar Britton, a member of the military's Supernatural Operations Corps, is tasked with bringing order "to a world gone mad." But when he suddenly manifests a rare magical power, Britton must go on the run from his former bosses. As Britton evades capture and learns more about the world of magic, the stakes rise exponentially. Cole's career seems almost as exciting (and perilous) as the events in Control Point. As a security contractor, government civilian and military officer, Cole has been involved in everything from counterterrorism efforts to cyber warfare and federal law enforcement. After three tours in Iraq, Cole was recalled to serve during the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
With that career background, readers may be surprised to learn that Cole, as he told Omni in an exclusive interview, "grew up with solid nerd roots: from Dungeons & Dragons to comic books to mass-market fantasy. You should be seeing the Terry Brooks, Tolkien and D&D in Control Point every bit as much as you see the Black Hawk Down."
Cole started writing as a kid, with fantasy a big influence: "My first 'book' consisted of transcribing the vinyl recording of Ralph Bakshi's old Lord of the Rings animated film when I had just learned to write competently. I never stopped writing from that point on. I got serious about writing for publication in roughly 1998."
Beyond the geek influences, "My fiction is an absolute product of my professional life," Cole said. "I'd be surprised if readers of Control Point don't see the Pentagon's military bureaucracy and Iraq's firefights in the pages. [But] my life as a writer has also informed my work, because it has taught me the value of digging in and persisting in the face of seemingly impossible odds. There's so much in common between the military life and the writing life that I'm surprised more people haven't drawn the comparison."
The idea for the Shadow Ops series came to Cole while working for the Pentagon in the late 1990s. "The Pentagon is regulation-central. Everything has a rule and a manual to look it up in"¦Well, add geek to that. I kept wondering 'What if Army Materiel Command was having to requisition magic wands? What if the contractors working here were gnomes? What would the regs say then?' Would there be a department set up to handle magic? How would the senate appropriate funds for that?" These kinds of questions drove Cole to write Control Point "as the only way to answer them."
Still, Cole acknowledged that it's his main character, Oscar Britton, who actually drives the novel. "This guy fascinates me"¦[he's] completely unmoored from any sense of home or sanctuary. He's stripped away from both his families (his real one, and the army). He's unfairly hounded and persecuted. He has every reason to throw up his hands and retreat into self-pity or frozen-despair." But, in the tradition of great heroes in fiction, "He faces the situation squarely and tackles it. He ignores how incredibly massive the problems facing him are. He puts one foot in front of the other. There's no guarantee he won't fail, and he accepts that."
"That, to my mind, is the very best of what military officers do," Cole said. "They often face the real possibility of being cashiered because of their decisions, but they make them anyway, because they've been trained to the point where making tough calls is instinctive. I admire the hell out of Oscar Britton (though I wouldn't want to be in his shoes). He is based on the very best I've seen from many officers, both in Iraq and stateside."
As might be expected, Cole also offers readers a variety of pulse-pounding action scenes. The obvious question is whether his military experience influenced those scenes. But Cole was quick to point out that while stationed in Iraq he wasn't "engaged in house-to-house firefights. Most of my experience was with 'indirect fire" (mortar, rocket or grenade attacks), much of which was 'danger close' (close enough that there's a real chance of being hit). I did experience inbound small-arms fire, but found the indirect attacks to be much more affecting.
The real influence of experience came from depicting garrison life in the novel and trying "really hard to capture the muddy, boom-fly-out-of-your-chair reality of sudden indirect attacks that I experienced in Iraq. Of course, the indirect in the novel is coming from sorcerous lightning or flame strikes."
Cole also wanted to avoid some of the mistakes he finds some writers make when depicting violence. "I find they oversell it in one direction or the other. Either the violence is completely white-washed (glorious, bloodless) or it's overly bloody and senseless. The truth, as always, is far more complex. Violence in war can be senseless and destructive. It can also be noble and judicious. Polarity serves fiction well, but I think the difference between good war stories and great war stories is the willingness to embrace complexity."
While Control Point focuses mostly on the U.S. military, Cole plans to open up the Shadow Ops series going forward. "Magic affects the entire world in the series. I was fascinated by what foreign militaries might be doing with it, and got to explore that a bit in the later books. [The follow-up] Fortress Frontier will give a fairly close look at how the army of the Republic of India uses magic, and I am hoping to explore that a bit further in [the third book] Breach Zone. I also have some ideas for looking at magic in the US Coast Guard in the Shadow Ops universe. I find that fascinating because the Coast Guard is the military, but is also federal law enforcement, so there's a whole host of laws and responsibilities that would impact how they use magic domestically."
A likeable and dynamic speaker, Cole will make an appearance at the USMC base in Quantico, Virginia, on February 15. You can also catch him at the Boskone convention February 17 through 19, and Balticon in May.
January 25, 2012
What Question Would You Ask John Green?
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On Monday, January 30th, John Green is coming to Amazon for an interview. Needless to say, we're excited to talk to him-- but we've been talking amongst ourselves, and he's got such a vibrant and involved fan base, we thought we'd ask our readers a question first: what question would you like to ask John Green?
So feel free to leave questions in the comments box below. We'll collect them and ask as many as we can. Then we'll put the video up on Omnivoracious a week or so later. Please, don't be shy. How many chances do you get to interact with a bestselling, beloved author?
YA Wednesday: More Young Adult Award Winners
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Earlier this week, the winners of the American Library Association (ALA)'s top children's and teens awards were announced at their annual midwinter conference. It's the most exciting day of the year for those of us who love kid's lit as the Caldecott, Printz, and Newbery are akin to the film industry's Oscars®.
However above and beyond these three awards, the ALA also recognizes a number of other authors/titles for their recent contributions to the young adult genre. While perhaps less recognizable they're no less important. These honors include:
The Stonewall Book Award recognizes English-language children's and young adult books of exceptional merit relating to the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender experience. One winner and four Honor books were announced:
- Winner: Putting Makeup on the Fat Boy by Bil Wright
- a + e 4everby Ilike Merey
- Money Boyby Paul Yee
- Pinkby Lili Wilkinson
- With or Without Youby Brian Farrey
The William C. Morris Award is given to exceptional debuts by first-time authors writing for teens. One winner and four finalists were announced:
- Winner: Where Things Come Backby John Corey Whaley (al
so won the Printz Award!)
- The Girl of Fire and Thornsby Rae Carson
- Paper Covers Rockby Jenny Hubbard
- Under the Mesquite by Guadalupe Garcia Mccall
- Between Shades of Grayby Ruta Sepetys
The YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults honors the best nonfiction book published for young adults between the ages of 12 and 18. One winner and four finalists were announced:
- Winner: The Notorious Benedict Arnold: A True Story of Adventure, Heroism & Treachery by Steve Sheinkin
- Sugar Changed the World: A Story of Magic, Spice, Slavery, Freedom, and Scienceby Marc Aronson and Marina Budhos
- Bootleg: Murder, Moonshine, and the Lawless Years of Prohibition by Karen Blumenthal
- Wheels of Change: How Women Rode the Bicycle to Freedom (With a Few Flat Tires Along the Way)by Sue Macy
- Music Was It: Young Leonard Bernstein by Susan Goldman Rubin
Last but certainly not least, Susan Cooper, author of the Dark is Rising sequence, received the Margaret A. Edwards award for lifetime achievement in writing for young adults.
Thanks to all for their amazing contributions to young adult literature and, of course, congratulations!
The Demi-Monde: A High Concept Sci Fi Thriller for Fans of Neal Stephenson
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The just-released The Demi-Monde: Winter by Rod Rees comes complete with a frothing blurbalicious frenzy courtesy of Book Reporter: "A brilliant, high concept series that blends science fiction and thriller, Steampunk and dystopian vision. If Neil Gaiman, Neal Stephenson, James Rollins, and Clive Cussler participated in Suzanne Collins's The Hunger Games, the result might be something akin to [this novel's] dark and ingenious madness."
While that description may be over the top, The Demi-Monde: Winter does seem destined to be one of January's more original reads. The Demi-Monde< of the title is a sophisticated U.S. military computer simulation designed to provide a virtual training ground for urban combat. Thus, the world of the Demi-Monde is gripped by perpetual civil war. Stocked with infamous tyrants much as a trout pond is stocked with, erm, trout, the Demi-Monde features cyber-duplicates of Shaka Zulu, Ivan the Terrible, and even Aleister Crowley. (Poor Crowley"”he's so misunderstood.) The author has spent his life traveling the world, living for a time in Qatar, Tehran, and Moscow, and the novel reflects this experience. He's also created his own religions for the Demi-Monde, including Unfundementalism, HerEticalism, HimPerialism, RaTionalism, and Confusionism.
As might be expected, things go terribly wrong and the President's daughter winds up trapped in the Demi-Monde by two diabolical villains. A young jazz singer must then attempt a rescue before devastating consequences affect the real world.
There's more than a hint of camp and the theatrical to The Demi-Monde, to go along with the action and twists and turn of plot. It should satisfy a lot of readers looking for an exciting, thick read this month.
January 24, 2012
The Books Behind the 2012 Academy Awards
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The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences should tack a couple more words onto that mildly pretentious name of theirs... The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and books. This morning, the Academy announced their nominees for the Oscars, and books were well-represented. In fact, many of the nominated movies started out as books.
Take a look at the Best Picture category alone. Here's the full list of Best Picture nominees - movies that started out as books are in bold.
"The Artist"
"The Descendants"
"Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close"
"The Help"
"Hugo"
"Midnight in Paris"
"Moneyball"
"The Tree of Life"
"War Horse"
That's 6 out of 9, a whopping two-thirds. And that's just for Best Picture. Below is a full tally of Oscar-nominated movies that came from books (links to the books provided; let me know in the comments if I missed anything). And these books are drawing A-level talent-- George Clooney, Meryl Streep, Brad Pitt and Martin Scorcese to name a few. Book lovers, be proud!
Best Picture
Actor in a Leading Role (George Clooney)
Directing
Film Editing
Writing (Adapted screenplay)
Best Picture
Actor in a Leading Role (Brad Pitt)
Actor in a Supporting Role (Jonah Hill)
Film Editing
Actor in a Leading Role (Gary Oldman)
Music (original score)
Writing (Adapted screenplay)
Actress in a Leading Role (Michelle Williams)
Actor in a Supporting Role (Kenneth Branagh)
Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close
Best Picture
Actor in a Supporting Role (Max von Sydow)
Actress in a Leading Role (Glenn Close)
Actress in a Supporting Role (Janet McTeer)
Makeup
Best Picture
Actress in a Leading Role (Viola Davis)
Actress in a Supporting Role (Jessica Chastain and Octavia Spencer)
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
Actress in a Leading Role (Rooney Mara)
Cinematography
Film Editing
Sound Editing
Sound Mixing
The Iron Lady
There have been many books written about Margaret Thatcher, but screenplay writer Abi Morgan doesn't seem to have called out any one in particular. So I'm linking to writer Morgan's earlier plays. If you're interested in Margaret Thatcher, you shouldn't have trouble finding books about her here.
Actress in a Leading Role (Meryl Streep)
Makeup
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2
Art Direction
Makeup
Visual Effects
Best Picture
Directing
Film Editing
Art Direction
Cinematography
Costume Design
Music (Original score)
Sound Editing
Sound Mixing
Visual Effects
Writing (Adapted screenplay)
Best Picture
Art Direction
Cinematography
Music (Original score)
Sound Editing
Sound Mixing
Anonymous
The movie questions whether Shakespeare was the author of his plays, putting forth the oft-contested theory that Edward De Vere, Earl of Oxford was the true source behind the brilliance. There's no book directly linked to the film, but James Shapiro's Contested Will provides good further reading on the subject.
Costume Design
Costume Design
Music (Original Score)
Sound Editing
Visual Effects
Animated Feature Film
