The release date for the English version of 'From Hell' by
Alan Moore is Jan 2007. If you enjoy this novel, it is available for buy as a paperback from Barnes & Noble or Indigo, as an ebook on the Amazon Kindle store, or as an audiobook on Audible.
I'll let you know where we are. We are at the farthest and most complete recesses of the human psyche. a shadowy, subconscious realm. An illuminating chasm where men confront themselves. Netley, holler. We are in the Hells.
After establishing his incomparable reputation for reimagining superhero stories, Alan Moore directed his razor-sharp vision to the grim, mysterious realm of Jack the Ripper and the Whitechapel murders of 1888. With 576 pages, From Hell is undoubtedly the longest of Moore's writings. Surprisingly, it may even be his best work to date in a career marked by such brilliant high points as Watchmen and V for Vendetta. Beyond the plethora of explanations that have been proposed, which vary from the sublime to the absurd, Moore offers a clever analysis of the massacre. The cruel actions of His Ripper serve as the focal point of a plot linking the Freemasons and the Royal Family, two organizations at the core of the British Establishment. The conventional belief that the Ripper killings served as the incubator for the 20th century's stunning, visceral birth of violence among celebrities is changed by Moore's masterful and utterly compelling picture.
Encouraged by his ability to arouse empathy in such heinous characters and by his painstaking research covering a broad range of Ripper studies and myths, Moore has produced what may be the best analysis of the Ripper legacy, looking far beyond society's compulsive desire to reveal the face of Evil. In the end, Jack's identity and his deeds are irrelevant to how society accepted the Fear, as Moore notes: "It's about us. It's about the dance our thoughts make. Jack mimics our fits of frenzy. He is the container for every new societal fear, without a face."
The striking black-and-white artwork by Eddie Campbell, which has a gritty, scratchy finish, is a wonderful fit for Moore's writing's often unwavering ferocity. Each murder committed by them is described in graphic detail, making for some of the most terrifying sequences in the novel. These times are made even more unpleasant by poetic moments, such as when the antagonist hugs a decapitated body and begs for understanding, saying that they "are wed in legend, inextricable within eternity".
Even though From Hell is a comic, the word hardly does it justice given its unique grandeur and elegance, which elevate the genre to unprecedented levels of creativity and skill. Moore and Campbell's autopsy on the thin body of the mythical Jack the Ripper has revealed a masterwork that is both incredibly unsettling and utterly compelling. —Graydon Danny