The Official Clive Barker Resource - Revelations

Revelations : "A whole bunch, yeah! People have been really enthused by the opportunity to come and have a chat with you, albeit through an intermediary, and lots of them are people who've never contacted us before."

Clive Barker : "Marvellous! All the more reason then that we make sure that we're really giving people value for the trouble of asking the questions.
"I just wanted to say in summary here at the beginning, to thank people because the questions they've asked are so smart and I really think this is a methodology that I would really like us to see if we can't put into the structure of our year, whether we do it every four months or once every six months. I think it's a great way to have, you know, something which has been troubling them asked."

Revelations : "There's been a sizeable period without a forum like this, so there's this pent up demand for asking questions."

Clive Barker : "Of course. So maybe we'll do three times a year for at least the next couple of years. So let's jump into the questions."

Revelations : "First up, some scene-setters around the status of Scarlet Gospels and the progress of the paintings for the next three Abarat books... "

Clive Barker : "I am on the final draft of The Scarlet Gospels, with a huge final polish to do, simply because it's a huge book. If you want to know, I'm on page 2,298 of my handwritten draft and I'm averaging between twelve and fifteen pages a day - which is not quite where I would like to be but it's very dense writing. I mean, I'm in Hell, but this is not a Hell you've ever seen before and these are not places you'd expect to find in Hell; in other words, what I'm trying to do is deliver a Hell that is fresh and new in large measure. Obviously it's going to have demons and it's going to have pain and suffering, but I'm talking about topography and architecture and wildlife - all the other things that give texture to my other invented worlds, if you like, to Imajica, for instance. I'm trying to give some of that feeling to Hell so that it'll be Clive Barker's Hell. It's like writing a very, very, very dark fantasy book right now."

Revelations : "OK, so it's not like writing a roller-coaster; slash 'em and spread the blood around."

Clive Barker : "No, no, and though I think it'll be pretty scary; I think it goes in some very dark places, but it also... I'm not going to say anymore!! I'm excited and anxious at the same time. I live and breathe it, you know? I live and breathe it until 6 o'clock (moving swiftly on to question two!) - "

Revelations : " - there's a whole heap of people who are thinking, well you're having great fun writing this but when are we going to get to see it?"

Clive Barker : "Well, I have promised that I will deliver this at the turn of the year, so, HarperCollins are looking for an autumn of next year publication. And it'll be a big bugger, you know? It'll be a Great And Secret Show-sized book, so I think it'll be well worth the wait."

Clive Barker : "...and then at 6 o'clock I take a deep breath and I change my trousers from my regular writing jeans to my painting jeans and I go next-door and I paint. And because the writing is at present very demanding, it is not light writing and - just backing up to Scarlet Gospels but not to the general issue of writing the fantastic, I think when you're writing fantastic fiction you're really imagining from the ground up, you know? And it requires an immense sort of concentration - there's no free lunch there, there's no moment when you can say, 'Ah yes, I can do this scene in the deli I remember in New York,' you see what I mean?"

Revelations : "Nor can you expect the reader to say, 'OK, I know where you are, I know what you're doing here.' "

Clive Barker : "In fact, I think you go to a more important point, Sarah, which is exactly that, that my responsibility is to evoke, but without a great reliance upon adjectival weight, à la Lovecraft, to evoke a world. And I've always said I want my readers to be co-creators - I believe they are - this Hell will also require of them as much imagination as Weaveworld or Imajica does and yes, there are some ghastly and horrible things in it but that is not the overall tone of the book - the overall tone of the book is an apocalyptic facing-off of good and evil... or not..!"

"So I'm painting - less into the night than I used to, which is why I just went back to explain that. In the old days I would paint from 6 to 9:30, 10 o'clock at night and sometimes I would delay getting to my desk so as to get a good night's sleep 'til about 10 or 10:30 the following day. Now, this morning I was at my desk at 8:45 and that's pretty much the rhythm of it and that's because of the demands of the book. It's partly the fact that I'm coming towards the end of a third draft; coming up to 9,000 hand-written pages and it has its own momentum, its demands and the painting must, necessarily, take a backseat to that. And so I do perhaps two hours of painting, whereas before I would do four hours. Still, am I painting? Sure, absolutely! And I've finished a round canvas, a six-foot round canvas for Abarat which I think people are going to like a lot - it's like a rose window; my inspiration is my favourite rose window, which of course is Chartres. And the painting of the Tarot cards is going very well - I've decided (this is going to strike you as masochism!) to put a poem on the back of each one! So, there'll be another eighty poems there or whatever."

Revelations : "Questions from a number of people, including Jimmie Vigil, Zachi Panigel and Mike Fudakowski around likely timings on movies such as Plague, Midnight Train, Thief of Always, Weaveworld and Tortured Souls."

Clive Barker : "I've stepped a little back from the flow of the films, just because I'm so deeply engrossed in the novel right now. But, I do know that Midnight Meat Train and Pig Blood Blues are scheduled to go in the next few months. We have a lead actor for Midnight Meat Train on board so we are waiting til next week when the guys get back from Cannes, having made the foreign sales, to see just how much money we're going to actually have to play with.
"Plague - to be perfectly honest, I'm not exactly sure where that is.
"Thief of Always - I know Kelly is working on what we hope is the final draft. Huge enthusiasm still over at Fox to make this movie. It's just taking its time and that's where it is."

Revelations : "We've just seen - we love IMDb because you never know what to trust and what not to trust - but someone pointed out to us that a cast list has just gone up for Thief, with Melanie Griffith, Dennis Quaid, Ving Rhaimes and others..."

Clive Barker : "Oh my God - I don't know, I have no idea where that comes from... I've never heard such a list, I've never seen such a list... It's possible...They are keeping me out of things deliberately so that I can get on and it's possible they've created a list, as a wish list - "

Clive Barker : "Yeah, exactly right - I think that's plausible...
"Tortured Souls is on hold right now because there is just too much going on and I know we have another - Universal has [just granted] us another six months to play with it and hopefully somewhere in that time we will get it out into the world. But you're talking to a man who is so focussed on his novel and very much upon the paintings as well, but the movie stuff is sort of happening to left and right of me right now - I'm a blinkered horse, a wilfully blinkered horse and one of the reasons why I love Joe and Anthony is - I came up with an idea for a movie this week and I called Anthony and pitched it to him, and we're developing it. So, these things have a way of getting out, but once I've let an idea flow from me to the next piece of the jigsaw, as it were, I then step back to where I need to be right now. And I think - you know me well enough, I'm certain you know the crazy process enough, to know that when you're eight and a half thousand handwritten pages into a book, over obviously several drafts, putting aside all the reading and the research and all the note-taking and stuff, that the emotional investment in the material at this point is huge. And I learnt a bitter lesson with my fucked-up first version of Abarat II and I told myself I would never, ever do that again - never not have my eye on the ball, or be too smug or whatever it was - probably a combination of things frankly - other calls on my attention. And it's one of the reasons why I'm not incredibly illuminating about the movies right now, to be perfectly honest, because I've said to the guys, 'I love this book,' (talking about The Scarlet Gospels, now) 'and I need to give it everything - so unless you need me, just get on with things.' "

Revelations : "We also get a sense from listening through the audio commentary that you did for the Saint Sinner DVD that you seem to be taking an enormous amount of pride and pleasure in seeing what someone else does with your treatments."

Clive Barker : "Always, always - that's always been the case, Phil. I never understand people getting snotty about that. If another creator comes in and takes something which you've crafted and then takes it in some direction, to me you have the joy of, it's a sort of lovemaking through an idea. It's joyful! I mean, God, there's nothing more lovely than creativity and to be able to share creativity with somebody is wonderful."

Revelations : "And movies lend themselves much more to that collaborative spirit than anything else."

Clive Barker : "Well, absolutely, more than anything. My golden boys, as I call then - Joe and Anthony - are... I love them and I trust them and with people you love and trust you're able to say, 'Go to it! I have something I need to do now, go to it,' and that's what I've done."

Revelations : "Next, comic book projects - particularly whether further adaptations from IDW are currently planned?"

Clive Barker : "Nothing more for IDW right now, and that's not for want of trying but we're trying to figure out what it's going to be. I'm loving what they've achieved so far, what Chris and his artist have achieved so far on The Great and Secret Show. And I think it's going to be a beautiful collection when it's finished and obviously I'd love us to do Everville - we talked about that - and eventually, somewhere down the line, finish the trilogy when I finish the trilogy!"

IDW's Great and Secret Show - issue 3, incentive cover

Revelations : "Has it been interesting to see your old sketches from the limited edition Great and Secret Show come out as well?"

Clive Barker : "Well, that was sort of fun, and I think more of that down the line too. Chris is an absolutely first-rate guy - not only is he a fine creator he's also just very straightforward and when we feared that we were going to have to go from twelve issues to six issues on Great and Secret Show because IDW had some financial concerns, I said, 'I'll throw my money into the pot and we'll just do it anyway... God... if that doesn't convince them (because that would take a lot of the sting out of the stuff)' and it did and we got the twelve issues, which was great. And we've become fast friends because now we know both of our hearts are in the same place, which is getting the work out there in the best possible form."

Revelations : "We've got a few questions about things that need quick confirmation answers, we think, followed by some longer questions... Where are the next Jump Tribe plushies, what are the chances of art exhibitions outside of Los Angeles, will Demonik still become a movie now the video game has been cancelled, just where is that missing footage for a director's' cut of Nightbreed and will we still get an edition of your uncollected short fiction? (variously from Camden Natysin, Ryan Danhauser, Michael Parks, Paul Burton, John "Jmc", Lisa Flippin and Steven Cook."

Clive Barker : "I can't tell you about the Jump Tribe stuff right now because something is happening and I can't talk about it, but something exciting is happening.
"There will be art exhibitions outside Los Angeles and we're very strongly looking at a London exhibition right now - it'll probably be three years down the line - it just takes a long time to set up. But Bert Green has been fantastic in his support of this so, yes, the answer is yes, we are actively looking to make that happen.
"There will one day be a director's cut of Nightbreed, but I'll probably have to storm the fort of Fox to actually... the best possible chance of it happening is this: (I don't know whether I should be saying this.... Yes, I should!) If and when they make Thief of Always, I'm sure I will build a relationship with somebody there who says, 'Is there anything I can do for you while we're making this big movie?' and I'll say, 'Yes! Take me and help me find this stuff." I think that's the honest answer.
"I think Demonik is dead in the water - movies, everything else; I think it's over."

Clive Barker : "Yes, the uncollected short stories will be put together into a single volume. I think it's most important right now, however, that I unleash this big thing and then Jane Johnson and I will talk about how we collect the short stories."

Revelations : "So they're not something that someone like Jane could take off and do on their own to give people something in the meantime, before Scarlet Gospels comes out, given the advanced state of the stories?"

The Manners Of A Crow, 1990, brush and ink

Clive Barker : "Well, no, I think it's more about this: it's more about needing to say to my adult audience, 'I'm still in the big novel business,' which I am, very much. Just last night, the title for what will be my second Imajica-sized fantasy came to me and I wrote it down on the pad beside my bed so, even though I won't get to that for another seven, eight years probably, this is my favourite form of all. I mean, if I had two favourite forms, Sarah, it would be a sumi-e brush, loaded with black sumi-e ink and a big old white piece of paper and a few marks made that describe a face or an animal or a something - in other words almost the shortest possible form; the visual equivalent of a Haiku. And, at the other end, the monstrously large novel - always a man of extremes!
"Now, let me just read through this..."

Christopher Monfette : "As a lifelong fan of your work - for all its imagery, its poetry, its narrative musicality - I'm often left looking ahead toward future chapters of stories in progress, namely The Art, The Abarat, Galilee, etc. While I certainly won't ask when to expect those works, I am often curious about how you choose to balance the nascent creative impulse against the responsibility to your readers (if, indeed, there is such a thing) to continue their favourite stories in a timely manner? I often love that you involve yourself in so many mediums and projects, but equally often wonder if those involvements aren't delaying your inevitable future masterpieces and, selfishly, my enjoyment of them!"

Clive Barker : "Christopher, this is the big problem! I am but myself! If God had been smarter, He'd have given me clones!
"I was talking to somebody (actually Robert, who's joined us in place of Kurt) who's a man who does a lot with matters of the spirit, which is very nice and I was talking to him about how frustrating it sometimes is to feel as though the jug, the vessel that I am is constantly being filled to brimming, and that it doesn't matter how hard I work to pour it out, it's up there again. Now there's a part of me that - don't get me wrong - is fucking grateful for that, but Christopher's question is completely valid and the truth is how do I make the choice? I make the choice by instinct only. I cannot intellectualise it; it would have been incredibly convenient if The Scarlet Gospels had indeed been 30,000 words long, the way it had planned to be. Truth is, it's going to be 230,000 words long and that's what it needs to be. I have been, from the beginning of my career, somebody who just follows his nose without any, without trying to outhink myself. I try and get out of my own way, I guess would be part of my answer to Christopher. I don't want to overthink things, I don't want to overanalyse things, I certainly don't want to say, 'Well, I've got to do this now because the contract says so...' What I'm trying to do, constantly, is accommodate people's needs to have a story completed, you know, a trilogy. I mean the obvious thing which is outstanding... - the thing which frustrates me, frankly, is the Third Book of The Art because it's huge and it's in my head! But then, so are Book Three and Four, and now, developing at an unearthly rate, Book Five of Abarat.
Abarat - just one of many files of notes...

Abarat - just one of many files of notes...

"I had a fellow, a guy called John, start to order the notes that I've made for Abarat 3, 4 and now 5 and I made a pile that was a little over two feet tall! And those are the notes I've made - God, I've been painting, you know, and I've stopped because the painting's suggested an idea and, 'Oh, OK, that's where that goes...', another pice of the jigsaw. Or sometimes - often, actually - it'll be something that comes when you're quiet, in a moment of]meditation. And I acutely feel the responsibility to complete everything that I've begun, but it has to be done right and, to me, that means I have to follow my instincts; I have to follow my gut because that's the only true compass I have. I've never listened to anyone from an outside system. And God bless Jane Johnson and Joanna Cotler, who are amazing because they have never, at any point, ever said, 'Please do this now,' and I think part of it is that I love both those ladies very much, and I don't use the word 'love' lightly. And I think that's reciprocated and I think they know that nothing is more important to me in my life than making work which will be of value and use and entertainment and delight to my readers and my viewers, and the only way to do that usefully, as they say, is to simply trust my inner feeling."

Revelations : "And that instinctual way of dealing with priorities goes back all the way through your creative career, doesn't it? Through the early years of the plays that we've been researching with you and into the choices you've made in your publishing career..."

Clive Barker : "Yes, and the other piece of it, that is my reluctance to obey instruction, goes back to, 'You can't publish In The Hills, The Cities...'"

We broke the interview there, coming back the following day and starting with some time on the Scarlet Gospels plot that we unfortunately can't yet share but we'll add back into this interview when Scarlet Gospels is published. We then covered questions concerning upcoming signing tours from people, including Veronica in Sweden, Scott Rodgie in Scotland and David Lynton in Australia, as well as tackling the final longer written questions we'd left with Clive.

You Called, He Came...