Growing up in Scotland, Eddie Campbell had two ambitions: to be a cowboy and to work in the circus. After neither of those panned out, he shifted his sights to comics, gaining renown for his down-to-earth depictions of the Jack the Ripper slayings in Alan Moore's From Hell. More recently, Campbell has partnered with publisher First Second on the more experimental books The Fate of the Artist and The Black Diamond Detective Agency. This summer marks the third partnership between Campbell and First Second, as the publisher releases The Amazing Remarkable Monsieur Leotard in August (it's coauthored by Dan Best). From his home in Australia, Campbell spoke with PW Comics Week by e-mail about Leotard, which is set in the 19th century and follows the bizarre life of a man who stumbles into becoming a trapeze artist for a traveling circus.
PWCW: The books you've published with First Second have all been experimental both in art and story. Did you decide to move toward that sort of book and then develop the relationship with First Second, or did the editors there encourage you in that direction?
Eddie Campbell: Mark Siegel, editorial director at First Second, has been very good at coaxing me out of natural conservatism; he's good like that with most of his young authors and he's building a really good stable of creative people. So after years of playing it straight, working in the coal mines of the comic books, I'm having an exciting time standing in the spotlight and trying new things. [My last three books] are the first times I've ever painted, for instance, as opposed to doing the coloring by computer, so I'm having a lot of fun with it. It was Mark's idea to try it that way; he's an illustrator in his own right and has done a couple of children's books, and he knows about stuff like that. I'm not sure if many people know he's an artist, too.
PWCW: The Amazing Remarkable Monsieur Leotard seems a natural progression from The Black Diamond Detective Agency, as it further pushes beyond the conventions of art, design and storytelling. Do you see your work as moving in that direction, or in any specific direction from book to book?
EC: Actually, I think I went too far with my experimentation as I'm not actually working on a new book after Leotard, I just can't seem to find a publisher who wants to work with me. I'm dearly hoping that the success of The Amazing Remarkable Monsieur Leotard will change their minds on that account and make them realize I can be a bankable author.
PWCW: You've also, with Black Diamond and Monsieur Leotard, focused on the late 19th and early 20th century, though each has been set in a very different locale. Is that a conscientious effort on your part to explore that era?
EC: I'm very curious about olden times, and I thought it would be interesting to get myself into the mindset of a person living back then. When you read about it in old books, it always seems so much more interesting than the present day, though you wonder how they got by without all the stuff we take for granted, like pop-up toasters and electric hair curlers. I'll tell you what, though, horses are even more difficult to draw than motor cars. All that sinew and muscle. It's a challenge, I can tell you. But I always wanted to be a cowboy, so I got the chance to play out the fantasy in The Black Diamond Detective Agency. Cowboys are not too popular these days, so I was surprised the publisher let me have my way with that one.
PWCW: How did you come upon the circus and a trapeze artist specifically as the focus for this book?
EC: After I wanted to be a cowboy, which my mom talked me out of because we lived in a big industrial city and she thought it was an unreasonable ambition, I decided I wanted to run away and work in a circus, so this is me playing out another one of my great all-time fantasies, because I never really got to do that either. After leaving school I went and worked in an office for nine years, interviewing people for welfare benefits. I used to stare out the window at the hills far away and wonder what would have happened if I'd had the courage and just gone and done it. After making too many overpayments I was asked to leave that job. I walked out the door and came back in on the other side of the counter. It was then that I finally found my true calling in life and decided to become an artist.
PWCW: The story in Leotard is very simple, on one hand, following Leotard as he ages, but it is also very surprising in the ways it progresses through the episodes (particularly the stark transition of the episode of sleeping). How much plotting did you do before starting the book?
EC: The book was well worked out in advance because Dan Best, my coauthor, and I pitched a very detailed synopsis around several publishers before we found one willing to take a chance on it. And they'll all be sorry, I can tell ya (except for First Second, I mean). But then, on the other hand, it was considerably improvised because I changed everything as I went along, much to the consternation of Dan. At one point I found I'd used up all of his plot material, but we still had 10 years to fill, historically speaking, so I had Leotard go to bed and sleep for 10 years like Rip Van Winkle.
PWCW: Artistically, was there anything new you tried with this book that you hadn't done previously?
EC: Well, I've never drawn the sinking of the Titanic before. That was a hell of a challenge.
PWCW: Any particular panels/sections that you were especially happy with how they turned out?
EC: The page where the Ti-lion eats all the midgets was a good moment. I didn't think the publisher would let me get away with that one.
PWCW: What are you working on now?
EC: I'm working on a book titled The Playwright, which is about the sex life of a celibate middle-aged man. Six publishers have rejected it so far, but I'm clinging to hope like Leotard clung to that wooden door after the ship went down, after filling his capacious trousers with oxygen.
