Beautiful Book of the Month: May

The Rime of the Modern Mariner By Nick Hayes

Published April 2011
ISBN:  9780224090254
Format: Hardback
Jonathan Cape
www.capegraphicnovels.co.uk


I know I'm late again writing my Beautiful Book of the Month article, about 4 months late to be precise, but I promise you I picked an absolute beauty for this long overdue post.

Over the years I have amassed an admirable assortment of enticing literary tomes, but even among the two bookcases designated to house my most beloved books there are a few titles that still manage to shine a little bit brighter than the rest in my eyes. My favourites among my favourites. While my shelves have seen many new additions and have undergone many bouts of shuffling, Nick Haye's The Rime of the Modern Mariner has always held its lofty position; clearly visible and easily accessible, and in my overflowing library that is the highest possible honour I can bestow upon any book.

It’s rare today to come across something so remarkably well crafted. The illustrated matte cover is combined with a luxurious wrap around cloth spine and polished off with elaborately etched silver lettering. The addition of the quirky “handwritten” typeface and whimsical wave patterned end pages add to the character of this charming illustrated novel.


Hayes uses a limited colour palette for his illustrations, sticking only to subtle hue variations of pastel blue and black. It is truly amazing to see how much detail and depth can be achieved using so few colours. I think also by restricting the range of shades, it gives the piece a sense of uniformity and forces the viewer to pay closer attention to how the images interact on the page with one another.

Each page is laid out with impeccable precision, creating a visual language all of its own that flows naturally and fluidly from page to page, mirroring the natural rhythm that emerges from the poem’s rhyme. No two pages are arranged in quite the same way.

But beneath this stunning visual feast, there lurks a compelling and haunting moral fable. This beautiful graphic novel reinvents Samuel Taylor Coleridge's longest and arguably his most famous poem, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. First published in 1798, the original tale relates the experiences of a weary sailor who has returned from a long sea voyage. He stops a man who is on the way to a wedding ceremony and begins to weave a harrowing story of sin and reparation spurred by the senseless killing of an albatross.

It’s a tremendous challenge to rework a classic, especially since the work will inevitably be compared to its reference material no matter how drastically altered or original it may be. Nick Hayes takes on the enormous task of constructing his own original verse for his narrative tale and has created something that is not only lyrically melodic, but visually striking.

The Rime of the Modern Mariner is a cautionary tale of environmental disaster created by humankind’s excessive consumption and our indifference to the consequences on the world around us. By updating the synopsis of the story, Hayes devises something that is more accessible than the original; more relevant to our time and in a way, conveys a stronger message that grows more necessary to impart with each passing year.  

There are several clever twists made to the initial tale. Hayes modernises Coleridge's wedding guest, a bright young man inexplicably transfixed by the sailor’s every word, into a jaded divorced office-worker who listens half-heartedly to the tale to pass time on his lunch break. Instead of imparting a sense of a hard lesson won, learned and imparted to a new generation, Hayes protagonist is left astonished and sitting alone as the city dweller declares the tale as an amusing “nursery rhyme” and goes back to his life with an untainted conscience. While it is a down hearted ending, it does ask the viewer the uncomfortable question of how much the novel has affected them. Will they too go back to their previous wasteful ways? Or perceive the world in a new light and make some amends for their past negligence?  

The Rime of the Modern Mariner is a provocative piece of work that proves that literary graphic novels can impress, inflame and inspire people just as well as their unillustrated counterparts.

I admire Random House and Jonathan Cape’s commendable attention to detail in the design of this visual novel. They’re one of my favourite publishers, not only because of their continued support for indie comic artists, but also for the exceptional quality and respectful care they put into creating suitable formats tailored for each unique art style and story.
Last year, I reviewed another graphic novel, Building Stories by Chris Ware (also published by Jonathan Cape) and I found myself continuously impressed with the production quality. I was surprised that such a gorgeous product was printed by a large publisher since it seemed like such an indulgent risk to produce. I honestly believe that there aren't many publishers willing to undertake such a tremendous task to create a book that not only does justice to the artwork found inside its pages, but can be considered a piece of art itself.

Beautiful Book of the Month: January

Apologies for the lateness of this post. I seem to be getting more forgetful and leaving this post later and later each month. The practical side of me is tsking myself and saying I should just skip this month and move this one to the next since February is a only a week away, but I know if I use that flimsy excuse for this month I'll use it again without guilt in the future. Without that "healthy" sense of guilt this blog wouldn't exist in the first place.

To Kill a Mockingbird By Harper Lee

Published June 2010
ISBN:  9780434020485
Format: Special Edition Clothbound Hardback
William Heinemann


An elegant celebratory clothbound edition marking the fiftieth anniversary of an unforgettable classic. My very thoughtful boyfriend bought me this wonderful book as a Christmas gift and I was absolutely thrilled when I opened my present. I left my well worn copy back in Canada and I'm glad I finally have it back in my library.

I've wanted to purchase this hardback since its initial release 2 years ago, but I always found the cover image both immensely stunning and saddening. It's hard for me not to look at it and instantly have the quote "Shoot all the blue jays you want, if you can hit ‘em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird" pop into my head. The decorative red and black flowers and vines that weave themselves along the spine and flow onto both the front and back covers is one of my favourite touches in this design. The symbolic mockingbird is delicately silkscreened onto the fabric preserving the fine detailing work in the claws, beak and tail feathers.

There are certain books that you come across in life that not only profoundly change the way you view the world, but how you view literature and the power that a storyteller wields over readers. As a child and young teenager, I would lose myself in tales of sword swinging fantasy, chilling mysteries and goosebump inducing horrors. For countless wonderful hours, I'd wander the streets, forests, caves and dungeons of these imaginary worlds, but as much as I loved inhibiting these universes they weren't my reality; they weren't my world. Because they were so easily distinguishable, the events, the horrors and the injustice found in between the pages of these books never effected me very much. It was the way of that world, but not the ways of my own.

Mockingbird detail

That all changed during my first year of high school when the curriculum for my English class had us reading Lord of the Flies, 1984 and To Kill a Mockingbird. I never quite got over the feelings of shock, anger and shame those books invoked in me. I developed a new respect for books after reading those 3 novels. Not all books are meant as sheer entertainment, they could be used as effective tools to broaden minds and be powerful enough to change the world.      

Front Cover

This book is one that stays with you. It lingers on in your memory. It was the first book that I read that dealt with racism. I have to confess that I had lived a relatively sheltered life up to that point. I knew that racism existed, but I never had to deal with the harsh realities of it. I was fortunate to have grown up in Toronto, which is an extremely multicultural city surrounded by people from all walks of life so it hit me hard when I read about how people could form such horrible ideas about each other just by appearance.

When Atticus talks with Jem and Scout, he treats them like adults; honestly answering any questions they had about intolerance and discrimination and explaining why the world is sometimes unfair and unkind. To me, he was a literary surrogate father explaining away all the injustice in the world and while he couldn't change the way things worked magically overnight, he made others question themselves and their own misguided beliefs and that was his victory for morality and reason.

The reason I'm telling you all this personal history in this beautiful book feature is because I want to emphasize that this is not only a beautiful book because of its intricate binding or the elaborately adorned cover design, but it's also a beautifully composed narrative full of tragedy, courage and hope. There has been debate over keeping To Kill a Mockingbird as a recommended key text in schools. Some people claim that it's dated; the time period is too far removed from our current, Atticus' stance is too timid and not strong enough and that the liberal use of a harsh racial slur is uncomfortable to the sensibilities of readers today, but I disagree. The messages found in this book are timeless and are no less profound with the passage of time. If anything, the limitations of that era lends to its potency. We may seem to have come a long way, but it's always important to remember the harsh lessons that many had to suffer through to get to where we are today. It's those small building blocks, those small seeds of change planted in people's minds that will continue to improve the world that we live in. I hope that it'll continue to find a large and wide readership, because any book that has the ability to still resonate with its reader nearly two decades on, is something that needs to be preserved and passed on to future generations.      

Flower detail on cover and spine

"I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It's when you know you're licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what. You rarely win, but sometimes you do."

- Atticus Finch