2007-02-20 a wonderful journey into strangeness

I've been aware of the depth and breadth of the mind of Peter Blegvad for many years now, through his musical endeavors (with Slapp Happy, as well as his solo work) - his creations have always been stimulating, bringing with them smiles and incentives for further thought and intellectual and contemplative explorations. I had heard about his comic strip `Leviathan' (which appeared regularly in THE INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY in the U.K.), but until I purchased a copy of this collection, I had never actually experienced it firsthand. I'm sorry I waited so long - this is a treasure.
Matt Groening (creator of `The Simpsons' and `Life in Hell') is widely recognized as a purveyor of twisted and useful reflections of real life, is quoted on the back of this volume: `Peter Blegvad's comic strip is one of the greatest, weirdest things I've ever stared at.' I heartily concur. Blegvad combines his senses of humor and irony with his intellectual strengths and his amazing artistic abilities into `Leviathan', giving his readers an opportunity to take one of the wildest rides they're liable to experience. The episodes in this book range from purely humorous takes on a baby's view of the world he inhabits to visual illustrations of puns to hallucinogenic explorations of the conscious and subconscious to sublime meditations on everything from the most seemingly insignificant daily occurrences to the meaning of life and death. Quite a range, right? Blegvad pulls it off beautifully. Perhaps I'm a little prejudiced by already being a huge fan of his music, but none of his outings collected here come across as shallow or pretentious in any way. The subtleties are many, the layers of wit are as innumerable as those in a chunk of mica - each reading reveals something missed the time before.

Leviathan himself - `Levi', as he is called - is a visual as well as a philosophical enigma. He's drawn without facial features, which allows the reader to project his/her own personality/outlook more readily onto the narrator. His parents and his older sister appear in some episodes, but for the most part he's accompanied and guided through the mazes of life (in all its dimensions) by the family cat, who gently imparts wisdom while at times openly expressing amazement that humans manage to survive without caretakers. The artist's hand appears from time to time, allowing him to more directly interact with the characters and events depicted in the strip - and on a couple of occasions, the characters themselves make attempts to escape the bounds of the graphic territory.

I read this book in a couple of sittings - but I've revisited it often and at great length and leisure, with new rewards each time. In his introduction, Rafi Zabor admits that he has encountered a few `intelligent, literate, artistically sophisticated people' who just don't get it - and I suppose that's inevitable in any artistic undertaking. It resonated within me at the deepest level - I can't recommend it highly enough.