Most of us would agree that deciding on which genre will really click in the graphic novel medium takes a lot of thought and redefining classic literature into this format can be extremely difficult, especially when you have to keep in mind the taste of today’s readers. But, Campfire Graphic Novels manage to do this again and again, bringing out a whole library of gripping reads with the very latest one being William Shakespeare’s ‘Julius Caesar’, a 112 page graphic novel.
The book witnessed a big launch in the presence of comic lovers at Comic Con Bangalore this June. The publisher’s previous launch was their graphic biography ‘Mother Teresa Angel of the Slums’ which was released at Comic Con Delhi.
The action in ‘Julius Caesar’ takes place just after Julius returns victorious to Rome after fighting a civil war against Pompey the Great. Now he has become a dictator and many people in government fear that this will be the end of the Republic. Some are moved by jealousy, others by a genuine love of their country. A conspiracy takes place to assassinate Caesar, led by several senate members including Caesar’s great friend Brutus. Brutus loves Caesar but he loves Rome more and fears that absolute power will corrupt Caesar and turn him into a tyrant. After the murder, Caesar’s right hand man Mark Antony pretends he sympathises with the plotters, so that they will allow him to speak at Caesar’s funeral and it is here that we are treated to one of Shakespeare’s most powerful speeches; “Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your ears…” His countrymen do lend him their ears and he turns the people against the plotters. Together with Caesar’s heir, Octavius, he sets about hunting down the plotters and a mighty battle takes place between the forces of Brutus and those of Antony and Octavius. Julius Caesar might be set in ancient Rome but really it is a timeless political thriller, full of action and adventure.
The book is adapted by Dan Whitehead and edited by Parama Majumder, Aadithyan Mohan and Jason Quinn and is published by Campfire itself.
Speaking to AnimationXpress.com’s Zeenia Boatwala about the graphic novel, Jason Quinn, Head of Creative Content at Campfire Graphic Novels shares, “Adaptations of the classics are one of our most popular lines. We want to make these great books and plays accessible to readers and encourage them to try the real thing. You don’t get more classic than William Shakespeare and yet so many people are scared of Shakespearean language. Our books aim to make it clear, just like watching the play or the movie. In short, with Caesar and every book we adapt it’s our aim to make these adaptations ‘classics’ in themselves. You should approach it as you would a movie based on a great book. The difference being that this is even better than a movie.”
Campfire began work on this book back in October last year and initially the graphic novel was to be presented in modern English language, but Jason had other views to this and he shares his perspective with us by saying, “There have been many popular movies made from Shakespeare’s plays and they haven’t changed Shakespeare’s words, so why should we?”
The team then had to go back to the original play and decide carefully which scenes to prune and which to leave in their entirety. Jason points out one prime challenge in this by saying, “The challenges when adapting Shakespeare are that every line is good, so when you start pruning you are losing some great stuff but in the interests of flow, pace and time you have to think of the best moment to cut a scene.”
While researching ‘Julius Caesar, the team went through countless films and books on Rome and Jason’s favorite amongst these books is ‘Rubicon’ by Tom Holland, which deals extensively with Caesar and the final years of the Roman Republic.
Campfire’s Julius Caesar uses Shakespeare’s own words and if you sit back and turn the pages, it is easy to compare it to a historical Hollywood movie, for which the credit has to go to illustrator Naresh Kumar and colourists Vijay Sharma and Pradeep Sherawat. The cover art presents a super-heroic Julius Caesar vividly rendered by one of Campfire’s top artists, Lalit Kumar Sharma.
Giving the vintage look and feel to any classical story brings with it creative challenges, but Naresh Kumar, illustrator of the book was determined to give the book a big budget look and feel. Naresh says, “The beauty of graphic novels is that there is no constraint on your budget as far as set building goes. When illustrating Caesar, I kept thinking of the old movies that I love so much. As far as creating a new look for Caesar and the others I wanted the audience to feel they were watching actors in a play. I wanted my characters to look and feel real. In that way, it is much easier for an audience to empathize with your characters.”
Colourists Vijay Sharma and Pradeep Sherawat also speak their mind by saying, “While coloring, we wanted to bear in mind the theatrical heritage of the original and give the book a theatrical feel with the colors. The backgrounds in the book should appear as a cross between cinematic Technicolor and a brilliantly designed and painted theatre set.”
So if you’ve fallen in love with ‘Julius Caesar’, you can grab your copy from any of the leading book stores at a price of INR 230.