I posted Moore's essay on anarchy a few weeks back. While that was written over two decades later, it's clearly the underpinning of his earlier works, including V for Vendetta, his most explicitly anarchist book1. I re-read it earlier this week (I re-read most of Moore's stuff every few years), and had a few thoughts. This is just a random list, not an ordered essay of any sort.
- There's an argument that, to a degree, anarchy's an easy sell here given how absolutely awful the existing fascist society is, run with everything from constant surveillance to a white purity movement to camps where folks are experimented on. Moore took a look at Thatcher's government and basically turned the dial to 11, and gave us a world that anyone would want to see burn.
- Similarly, the books ends with anarchy starting. Will it succeed? It's implied, but that's like saying the romance novel that ends with a marriage precedes fifty years of wedded bliss. Where you end a story dictates the emotions you feel. In both cases, it's hope, but it can never be more than hope.
- Of course, the anarchy symbol, turned upside-down, is a V. And "V" -- as a letter or a roman numeral -- is everywhere in the book, not just the title character (who was imprisoned in Room Five), but in Evie's name (especially when said out loud), in chapter titles, in references to Beethoven's Fifth and Pynchon's V, hell, even beginning the name of Valerie, the prisoner whose letter Evie reads.
- In our world, there's at least a pretense that police have rules. In this world, that's out the window. Evie, desperate for money after the murder of her lover, resorts to prostitution, only to solicit an undercover cop. And as the cop explains, because of how serious an offense prostitution is, he and his buddies are legally allowed to decide whatever punishment they want. Even the veneer (another v word) of "protection" and "lawfulness" is removed from the police here.
- Finch, of course, is the exception, as his investigation of V leads to an anagnorisis. But even then, it's his killing of V (the person) that allows V (the figure) to be set free, as Evie now takes up the mantle, as Finch in turn walks away from the city.
- V's use of Enid Blyton's The Faraway Tree as his touchstone (a series I'd never heard of, growing up in the US) gives us his two possible views of how anarchy could go: The Land of Take-What-You-Want, and the Land of Do-As-You-Please. It's the latter that he considers the ideal, but he knows the former is a chaotic stage that has to be navigated through.
- Like Blyton, another reference I didn't get reading this growing up (and long after I'd grown up) was "Queen Zara." I assumed the figurehead royal in the book was just a random name, but she's actually Princess Anne's daughter. And was about one at the time the original book was being written.
- There a vein of criticism of V (the character and the book) that suggests that he had other options besides the violence he employees. Moore disagrees, and so do I. It's interesting that in his other two tentpole works of the '80s, Watchmen and Miracleman2, the worlds that needs to be subverted are much closer to (but still distinct from) our world, with the note that neither is told from the villain's POV, so the acts of violence impact us like they do the heroes3.
- Over 40 years later, this book still holds up. Moore and Lloyd built an amazing world, but it's driven by the characters within it (and let's be clear: Even the range of banal and evil villains all scan as actual people, not just single personality traits). Like his other works, it's dense, sometimes uncomfortable, and benefits from multiple re-reads.
Footnotes
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Note that this is about the book and only the book. While the Guy Fawkes mask from the movie has become associated with anarchy, the film itself really doesn't embrace it (or even go as far with the fascism it opposes). Also, while I tend to refer to Moore here, he co-created this with David Lloyd, and Lloyd's art is vital to the story being told. ↩
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I'm in no way dismissing his Swamp Thing, but the nature of its place in the DC Universe means that it doesn't quite have the same opportunities. And his other '80s work, from Killing Joke to Halo Jones, is all fantastic as well, just not a part of this cycle of political works. ↩
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This is more of an issue in Watchmen, of course. In Miracleman, which I may write about later, there's no doubt that Johnny Bates is a monster, and the change instigated by his violence stems from Miracleman recognizing an opportunity. ↩