riverrun

In addition to the definition of zero hour as used in the Joyce quote, zero hour is also “the time at which a military operation is scheduled to begin.” That time is depicted repeatedly in this comic. The scene also contains the classroom from the first Abecedary comic, proving that the illustrator has heard of books.

Thank you to everyone who has liked and shared these comics as I have worked on this project for six (six!!) years. The Abecedary is be finished for the foreseeable future. However, market research says I should pivot to video. Se please enjoy the following timelapse video of me drawing the final Abecedary comic:

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“Methought..I heard at zero hour as ‘twere the peal of vixen’s laughter among midnight’s chimes.”

— James Joyce, 'Finnegans wake' (1939)

zero hour, n. 3. The hour from which a new cycle of time is measured; spec. midnight, as the beginning of the day.

Fire no guns, shed no tears

This comic is an an attempt to study the style, if not content, of cartoonist Eli Valley. I’d take the company of pyromaniacal pirates over the real-life ghouls Eli sends up with unparalleled skill in his work.

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“This yo hope of heaving up the Anchor, was a needless trouble, when they design’d to burn the Ship”

— Charles Johnson, 'A general history of the robberies and murders of the most notorious pirates, and also their policies, discipline and government, from their first rise and settlement in the island of Providence in 1717, to the present year 1724 : with the remarkable actions and adventures of the two female pyrates, Mary Read and Anne Bonny : to which is prefix'd an account of the famous Captain Avery and his companions ... : to which is added, a short abstract of the statute and civil law, in relation to pyracy' (1724)

yo-hope, n. (and int.) Nautical. Now hist. and rare. A task regulated by a chant or song of the type used by sailors when hauling ropes or performing other strenuous, rhythmically repetitive tasks; the chant so used. Also as int. Cf. yo-ho int. and n., yo-heave-ho int. and n.

The Spot

I conceived of this comic as a memento mori, but in circular time. It ended up including a vignette into Hell. It also includes terrible disasters happening in the distance, which, looking back on my work the last few years including the Abecedary, is a recurring theme I hadn’t really been aware of before.

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“Keep clear of Broomsticks, Old Nick, and three XXX’s.”

— Richard Harris Barham, 'Lay St. Dunstan’ in ‘Ingoldsby Legends' (1840)

x n. II. Symbolic uses. 4. In designations of brands of ale, stout, or porter, XX or double X denotes a medium quality, XXX or treble X the strongest quality. Also in the marking of qualities of tin-plate.

Who's Dewey?!!!!!

I don’t have much to say about this one except that drawing out two different perspective grids on one sheet of paper was a real pain. I chose this word because I was hunting though the dictionary for quotes by authors I like. I wasn’t able to do that when I started this project, as I was using a physical dictionary. But after switching to the public library’s online OED access I was able to harness the power of Advanced Search, at zero cost. They got Consumer Reports on there too.

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“In human affairs, individual world lines form a thick tangle, curling out of the darkness of prehistory and stretching through time.”

— Kim Stanley Robinson, 'Red Mars' (1993)

world line  n.  [after German Weltlinie (H. Minkowski 1909, in Physikalische Zeitschr.)] Physics
a line in space-time comprising the successive points occupied by a particle, celestial object, etc., throughout its history; also in extended use.

Perkin’s Metallic Tractors

The interesting word in this definition isn’t vampirism, but instead ‘tractors’. Perkin’s metallic tractors were originally the name of a device consisting of a pair of pointed rods of different metals, such as brass and steel, which were believed to relieve rheumatic or other pain by being drawn or rubbed over the skin. This is where the term tractor came into the English language. Tractor became of more general term for something which is pulled, before eventually being used to describe a new type of engine. This is where the modern usage of the term for farm equipment comes from. Anyways, this comic is about industrialization.

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“The supposed existence..of witchcraft, vampyrism, animal magnetism and American tractors.”

— Erasmus Darwin, ‘Zoonomia; or, The laws of organic life’ (1794)

vampirism, n. The collective facts or ideas associated with the supposed existence and habits of vampires.

Maintenance of Empire

How many homicides are necessary on the periphery to ensure the free flow of wine to the center?

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“That I after the slaughter of so many enemies..might embrace..not an homicide but an Utricide.”

— Apuleius, 'Metamorphoses, The Golden Ass' (trans. William Adlington, 1566)

† utricide, n. Obsolete. One who stabs an inflated vessel of skin.

Imaginary Populations

I imagine unicorns are actually huge jerks who don’t respect other mythical creatures, especially other horned animals. The unicorns’ prejudice has driven them to create an extensive police state to target, surveil, and harass non-unicorns. They even go so far as to deny the existence of tri-corns and call them imaginary to rationalize their status as disposable non-people. Names, characters, and incidents portrayed in this comic are fictitious. No identification with actual persons (living or deceased), places, buildings, and products is intended or should be inferred.

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“These creatures were distinguished..by a lump on their heads,..supported by three small protuberances; from whence they were called Tri-corns.”

— W. Bristow, 'The Impostors Detected: Or, the Life of a Portuguese. In which the Artifices and Intrigues of Romish Priests are Humorously Displayed. The Whole Interspersed with Several Curious and Entertaining Anecdotes, Relating to Some of the Principal Personages of the Kingdom of Portugal. In Two Volumes.' (1760)

tricorn - B. n. 1. An (imaginary) creature with three horns.

Fabrication of Pseudo-Needs

This Abecedary was originally published on May Day, 2016 and was the final Abecedary shared when I first started this comic. It is also the last Abecedary I drew completely digitally. When I picked the project back up in earnest last year, I switched back to pen and paper.

‘Recuperation’ is a concept written about by the Situationists, where radical political ideas are diluted and rendered un-threatening to the powers that be, by being stripped of their revolutionary potential and commodified. For example, using the imagery of mass social protest to sell Pepsi, or appropriating the ideas of French anarchists to advance a personal brand. Teespring opening soon.

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“For the situationists, the bureaucratic system of industrial society has considerably increased the sum total of the exploitation and repression of man… The tremendous development of science and technology has led to the individual being completely taken over by the system; the individual is no more than a commodity‥. manipulated by the specialists in cultural repression: artists, psychiatrists,.. sociologists and ‘experts’ of all kinds. To fight against a ‘spectacular’ society, in which everything is treated as a commodity and in which creative energy spends itself in the fabrication of pseudo-needs, one must attack on all fronts simultaneously.”

— R. Gombin in D.E. Apter & J. Joll, 'Anarchism Today' (1971)

situationist - B. n. 1. Philosophy and Social Sciences. A person who believes in or advocates situationism; a proponent or adherent of situation ethics. 2. Usually with capital initial. A member of the Situationist International; an adherent of the Situationist movement.

Gotta Read My Shakespeare

Can’t make a comic about the English language and not include some William Shakespeare. Gotta have it.

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“Tybalt, you rat-catcher, will you walke?”

— William Shakespeare, 'Romeo and Juliet' (1597)

rat-catcher, 1. a. One whose business it is to catch rats. Also transf. and fig.

Quintessence

‘Quintessence’ is French for The Fifth Element (1997), directed by Luc Besson and starring Bruce Willis, Gary Oldman and Milla Jovovich.

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“It is a kind of Alchymical Quintessensing a heauen out of earth.”

— Thomas Nashe, 'Christs teares ouer Ierusalem' (1593)

quintessence, v. Now rare. 1. transitive. To extract the quintessence of or from (something). Usually in figurative context. †2. transitive. To take (out) of or from (something) as a quintessence. Obsolete.

Property, Bro

I drew this comic right after I started using a tablet to illustrate digitally, and was still learning how to use it. I considered re-doing this comic, but have decided to leave my crude copying of other’s intellectual property in place.

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“Whan that a riche, worthi king,… Wol axe and cleyme proprete In thing to which he hath no riht.”

— John Gower, 'Confessio Amantis' (1393)

property, n. 1. The condition of being owned by or belonging to some person or persons; hence the fact of owning a thing; the holding of something as one’s own; the right (esp. the exclusive right) to the possession, use or disposal of anything (usually a tangible material thing); ownership, proprietorship.

Global Wwoofing

The quote for this word’s comic refers to a story about St. Francis of Assisi. A wolf was terrorizing the citizens of the city of Gubbio, first destroying their livestock, and eventually preying directly upon the people. St. Francis entered the woods and brought the wolf to heel, then entered into a pact whereby it would no longer destroy or threaten the local people’s way of life.

Climate change is the most prominent threat to our current civilization. There is a clear need for humanity to cease causing irreparable damage to the planet through large-scale industrial extraction of the earth’s resources. This extraction is driven by the capitalist class preying on the homes and livelihoods of indigenous and disadvantaged peoples. When the Earth’s ecological inheritance is threatened, when a small group of humans jeopardize the habitability of the world, the question must be asked: Who are the real wolves?

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“An ovicidal wolf, being rebuked by this ecclesiastical Orpheus for his carnivorous deeds, placed his paw in the hand of his monitor in pledge of his future good behavior.”

— Sir James Stephen, 'Essays in Ecclesiastical Biography' (1850)

ovicide 1. Chiefly humorous. Now rare.  The killing of a sheep; sheep-slaughter. So ovicidal , adj. 1, sheep-killing.

Class One Probe

In 2004 the European Space Agency launched the Rosetta orbiter, and accompanying Philae lander, on a study of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. After a ten year journey, in November of 2014, Philae detached from the Rosetta. Philae attempted a soft landing on the nucleus of comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko. The craft bounced off the comet, and the landing gear malfunctioned. The lander ended up in the shade, unable to receive power from its solar panels. However, Philae was able to record and transmit data for about a day before entering safe mode. This comic is based on photos taken of the comet by the lander.

In June of 2015, as comet 67P continued to approach the sun, Philae began to intermittently receive and transmit signals for about a month. The lander’s location was photographed by Rosetta as it orbited closer to Churyumov-Gerasimenko in September of 2016. The orbiter ended its mission that month when it crashed into the comet nucleus.

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“The brighter part of the comet is called the head, or coma, and sometimes the head contains a brighter portion still, called the nucleus.”

— Joseph Norman Lockyer, 'Elementary lessons in astronomy' (1868)

nucleus, n. I. 1. Astronomy. a. The more condensed portion of the head of a comet.

Etymological Colonialism

The idea behind this comic came from more than just the excerpt in the Oxford English Dictionary. The full Chambers quotation goes on to say about Isaiah 16:17, “that it is not certain that the Hebrew word used by the prophet signifies a mouse, it is evident that it is not the divination by that animal, be it what it will, that is spoken of, but the eating it.” Earlier, Isaiah 16:15 states God “will come with fire, and with his chariots like a whirlwind, to render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of fire.” The idea of mice as a divination tool and a meal made me think of how cats will toy with their prey. Expanding the cast of animals led to the visual pun for the heavenly storm. The scene is depicted as a partially preserved fresco. Since the Abecedary is about unearthing forgotten words and carrying them off from their original contexts to re-purpose and put on display for my own ends, the ruin is displayed as if in a museum, with the encyclopedia quote serving as the informational plaque.

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“Some authors hold Myomancy one of the most ancient kinds of divination; and think it is on this account that Isaiah, lxvi. 17. reckons Mice among the abominable things of the Idolaters.”

— Ephraim Chambers, 'Cyclopædia, or, an Universal Dictionary of Arts and Sciences: Containing the Definitions of the Terms, and Accounts of the Things Signify'd Thereby, in the Several Arts, both Liberal and Mechanical, and the Several Sciences, Human and Divine: the Figures, Kinds, Properties, Productions, Preparations, and Uses, of Things Natural and Artificial; the Rise, Progress, and State of Things Ecclesiastical, Civil, Military, and Commercial: with the Several Systems, Sects, Opinions, etc; among Philosophers, Divines, Mathematicians, Physicians, Antiquaries, Criticks, etc.: The Whole Intended as a Course of Ancient and Modern Learning.' (1728)

† myomancy, n. Obsolete. rare. Divination by interpreting the behavior of mice.

Legerdemain

Navient, Great Lakes, The Daemon MOHELA, and other monsters bound in service to Sallie Mae can cast the spell Invisible Hand Legerdemain. The target of the spell is given an opportunity for jugglery and conjuring tricks. Following this, they are haunted by a Contractual elemental. The elemental will deduct d500 from the target’s monthly earnings, with an additional d100 at higher levels. The more conjuring tricks and jugglery tosses the target learns, the higher the elemental’s starting level.

The spell is dispersed when an amount, determined at the time of casting, is paid off. Targets may take a limited number of Deferral actions to counter the elemental, as well as the Forbearance bonus action. However, the Contractual elemental can itself cast the spell Interest which adds d5 to 2d8 percent of the dispersal amount to itself every round. There is no limit to the number of times Interest can be cast.

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“The professors of legerdemain at our village fairs, pull out ribbon after ribbon from their mouth.”

— Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 'Biographia literaria; or, Biographical sketches of my literary life and opinions' (1817)

legerdemain, n. sleight of hand; the performance of tricks which by nimble action deceive the eye; jugglery; conjuring tricks.

A Horse’s Ass

I had some fun with this one. It’s more stream of consciousness than a coherent narrative. Though it certainly seems to be insinuating something.

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“Have you seen the carsy? Just a bucket with a seat on top!”

— ''Till Death Us Do Part' J. Burke (1967)

karzy, n. slang. Also carsey, carsy, karsey, karzey. [Corruption of Italian casa, house]= Water closet.

DIRTY BIRDS CLEAN CLOACAE

How many bird gags can fit in one image? This is a good start, but uhh, I’m going to need you to go ahead and come in on Sunday, too. We need more suggestions for bird gags, mmkay? Thaaanks.

Fun fact: This is the only Abecedary where I used the golden rectangle to lay out the composition. It also inspired a companion piece.

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“With beast and bird the forest rings, Each in his jargon cries or sings.”

— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, 'Return of Spring' (1830)

jargon, n. 1. The inarticulate utterance of birds, or a vocal sound resembling it; twittering, chattering.

Dictating Clauses

In neofeudal—er, neoliberal America, the laws are drafted by the corporate aristocrats—uh, the corporate persons, and the natural persons who represent them. They’ve got the resources to buy the guns which bring home the resources. As long as the serfs—no, as long as the citizens are kept distracted, it’s just a matter of getting the pesky committee-havers and bill-passers to go along. Just sign on the line, Senator, and we’ll let you get back to your vassal duties, or call time.

When I drew this in early 2015 the dissenting lawmaker was just a generic white guy. Since then the number of voices in the legislature speaking out against imperialism, corruption and capital has grown more prominent. Appropriately they come from far more diverse backgrounds than in my original drawing. So I updated it to an Ilhan Omar-esque figure.

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“The insurgent barons dictated whatever clauses they deemed desirable.”

— John Campbell, 'The Lives of the Lord Chancellors and Keepers of the Great Seal of England, from the earliest times till the reign of King George IV' (1845)

insurgent, A. adj. 1. Rising in active revolt.

Through Being Cool

You ever fuck around and spend years assembling a collection of cultural artifacts, preferences and mannerisms that conform to a shifting, unwritten set of standards in pursuit of social acceptance, while occasionally breaking with consensus to look like an independent and unique person?

Nah, me neither.

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“As Norman Mailer would say, it’s ‘hip’ to use obscure terms and meaningless symbols.”

— 'The Listener’ (1961)

hip, n. slang (orig. U.S.) 1. The quality or condition of being hip; fashionable sophistication. adj. 2. More generally: fashionable, up-to-date; stylish, sophisticated; cool (sometimes in ironic use). Now the usual sense.

Recipe for Deviled Gallimaufry

A heaping of deviled gallimaufry big enough for the whole brood! Smokey, spicy, meaty and unrepentant, get ready to cook up a sinfully good dinner right in your corner of Hell! You can’t have too many family dinner recipes; and one that uses locally-sourced ingredients! There’s always room for that!

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Why a Gallimaufry?

One of the first routines to fall by the wayside when I’m being tormented for an eternity is family dinner, which is a shame, because I have bestial craving for it. It’s hard to justify the time spent catching popes, striking unspeakable deals, and making a reduction for dinner, when my clan’s hunger can never be sated. Still, I inevitably perk up and feel better when I make these things. They’re reminders that the varieties of suffering are endless. And there’s nothing like a hot meal on cold nights infinitely removed from God’s light, pure and simple.

My unholy spawn can’t get enough deviled gallimaufry. While I’m cooking, they can barely resist clawing and rending my body to pieces in their impatience. My big boy especially loves the pitch-soaked slabs of senator. His wretched probosci wetly funnel hocks of meat into a maw that never stops gnawing. His younger brother loves to settle on dinner like a putrid mist, rotting everything and causing great blooms of mold, just the way he likes it. My husband, the Deceiver, always breaks out in a vessel-popping rictus grin when I put this dish on the supper table, and our littlest one can’t wait to drag a steaming bowl of gallimaufry back to her cage. With her thousand mouths it’s a guarantee she’ll be rattling her chains for seconds soon enough!

Deviled Gallimaufry Ingredient List

• 1 gallon fetid water

• ½ cup extra virgin oil

• 2 cups pitch

• ½ cup boiled blood with extra pulp of tyrants

• 1 handful of maggots

• 1 cup soothsayer heads

• ½ pound flayed senator

• 3 simonious popes

• 1 avaricious cardinal

• 2 charbroiled heretics, entombed

• 3 ounces leprous scabs of an alchemist

• 1 head of frozen traitor

• 1 pound sodium

• 1 tablespoon mustard seed

• ¼ cup ground black pepper

• ¼ cup smoked hot paprika

• Sulfur sauce

Deviled Gallimaufry Preparation Instructions

1. Toss the sodium into a large pot of fetid water and bring to a rolling boil.

2. Whisk the extra virgin oil, pitch and boiled blood together, over medium high heat in a stained steel pan.

3. From the feet of uncommitted sinners, harvest 1 handful of maggots and mince until fine.

4. Soothsayer heads come attached to their body, twisted backwards in the packaging. Pop the heads off and discard the bodies, they are useless husks. Soothsayers tend to cry a lot, so poke out their eyes and rinse them of their lamentations. Bash their faces until bloody.

5. Add the maggots to the pan and whisk to dissolve, until aromatic. Then add the soothsayer heads and flayed senator to the pitch and oil along with the mustard, pepper and paprika. Reduce to low heat and cook until the deviling is coagulated.

6. Meanwhile, decapitate the simonious popes. This is easy as their heads come stuffed in a rock. The heads are bitter and disgusting, but their bodies are juicy and fat. Hold their feet to the fire until golden brown and demonic. Pro tip: use a simoniac rock to beat the soothsayers in step 4; just make sure all the pope has been removed first.

7. Un-entomb the heretics (careful: they are usually still on fire!) and hack them to pieces, along with the cardinal.

8. Mix together the popes, cardinals and heretics in a large bowl. Zest the leprous scabs into this mixture and then add everything to the boiling water.

9. Boil for 10,000 years, or until the wailing and gnashing of teeth subsides. Add the thawed traitor’s head and continue to simmer for 10,000 more years until whimpering.

10. Stir the deviled reduction into the gallimaufry and serve immediately. Add sulfur sauce to taste.

11. Enjoy!

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“The Devil mince me into a Galli-mafry, if I do not tremble for fear.”

— 'The third book of the works of Mr. Francis Rabelais, Doctor in Physick containing the heroick deeds of Pantagruel the son of Gargantua', François Rabelais, transl. Thomas Urquhart (1693)

gallimaufry, n. 1. A dish made by hashing up odds and ends of food; a hodge-podge, a ragout.