Rage of poseidon
A wise and funny collection of modern-day parables about the ties between humans and their gods
Imagine you are Poseidon at the dawn of the twenty-first century. The oceans are dying and sailors have long since stopped paying tribute. They just don't need you anymore. What do you do? Perhaps, seeking answers, you go exploring. Maybe you end up in Wisconsin and discover the pleasures of the iced latte. And then, perhaps, everything goes wrong. Anders Nilsen, the author of Big Questions and Don't Go Where I Can't Follow, explores questions like these in his newest work, a darkly funny meditation on religion and faith with a modern twist. Rage of Poseidon brings all the philosophical depth of Nilsen's earlier work to bear on contemporary society, asking how a twenty-first-century child might respond to being sacrificed on a mountaintop, and probing the role gods like Venus and Bacchus might have in the world of today. Nilsen works in a unique style for these short stories, distilling individual moments in black silhouette on a spare white background. Above all, though, he immerses us seamlessly in a world where gods and humans are more alike than not, forcing us to recognize the humor in our (and their) desperation. Rage of Poseidon is devastating, insightful, and beautifully hewn; it's a wry triumph in an all-new style from a masterful artist. Published by Drawn & Quarterly in 2013.
$29.95
Rage of Poseidon is a collection of seven short stories drawing from the stories of Greek and Christian mythology set in various versions of the contemporary world. A darkly funny meditation on religion and faith with a modern twist, bringing all the philosophical depth of Nilsen's earlier work to bear on contemporary society.
The book continues Nilsen's experimentation with the book form, being an accordion book, which is a single 50 foot long sheet of paper if pulled all the way out of the cover.
Hardcover, 80 pages.
“Whether writing through birds or gods, the mundane or the divine, Nilsen’s true subject matter remains much the same: explorations of metaphysical and existential concerns, here more directly concerned with faith and religion than elsewhere... the stories and their surface content, the writing and the illustration make this perhaps Nilsen’s most readily accessible work to date. ”
— ROBOT 6 - COMIC BOOK RESOURCES
“The artist uses mythic figures to inquire into the peculiarities of human behavior. Nilsen culls his cast of characters from Greco-Roman and Judeo-Christian traditions, but he endows these deities and patriarchs with all-too-human failings, and thrusts them into the contemporary world. So in these stories, Poseidon rages, God sulks, and Athena goes on a bender, while Jesus drives a pick-up and Bacchus holds court in Vegas. ”
— THE COMICS JOURNAL
“Whether writing through birds or gods, the mundane or the divine, Nilsen’s true subject matter remains much the same: explorations of metaphysical and existential concerns, here more directly concerned with faith and religion than elsewhere... the stories and their surface content, the writing and the illustration make this perhaps Nilsen’s most readily accessible work to date. ”
“The artist uses mythic figures to inquire into the peculiarities of human behavior. Nilsen culls his cast of characters from Greco-Roman and Judeo-Christian traditions, but he endows these deities and patriarchs with all-too-human failings, and thrusts them into the contemporary world. So in these stories, Poseidon rages, God sulks, and Athena goes on a bender, while Jesus drives a pick-up and Bacchus holds court in Vegas. ”