Watchmen and More!

I’ve announced this elsewhere, but I’m still so chuffed that it’s worth repeating: I’m busy working on Annotated Watchmen for DC Entertainment. This came about because, when we were wrapping Annotated Sandman, I happened to say that my other dream project would be to take a similar approach to Watchmen, one of the great works of art of the 20th century. My editor said, “Well, send us a proposal,” and to my great shock and delight, after six months of hearing nothing, I was told, “Let’s go ahead!”

Watchmen (like Sandman) has been annotated before, with notes posted on the Internet by various fans. None have taken the same approach that I’m planning. The existing notes are interesting, primarily consisting of pointing out to readers little artistic touches or motifs that appear throughout the story, but that isn’t what I intend. Rather, as I’ve done with Sandman and my other books, I hope to expand the reader’s understanding of the cultural/historical/literary background of the book. Moore & Gibbons assumed literate readers who would have the context of the material at their fingertips, but as the mid-1980’s recede far into the taillights (Watchmen came out THIRTY YEARS ago!), there’s more and more that needs explaining. So plan on a trip back to those wonder years when Vietnam and nuclear war were on the minds of everyone, and comic books were supposed to be just entertainment…

DC plans to publish the book in the fall of 2017, and I’ll fill you in on details as I learn them. Meanwhile, Laura Caldwell and I are working with Liveright/W. W. Norton to edit Anatomy of Innocence (which we’ve tentatively subtitled “A Collaboration of Best-Selling Authors and Exonerees to Tell the Truth about Wrongful Convictions”) for publication in February, and I promise you that it will break your heart. Liveright/Norton and I are in the pre-production phase of New Annotated Frankenstein for publication in August 2017, and New Annotated H. P. Lovecraft: Beyond the Mythos is coming along nicely.

Next week I’m off to Comicpalooza in Houston, delighted to be a guest of honor, and I hope to see many friends there! I’ll report back here!

1 Comment

  1. Gustavo on March 16, 2017 at 1:19 pm

    Hi, there! I’m really interested in this project. How can I get any updates? Is there a newsletter or something?

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