Neil Gaiman Can’t Help Creating His Own Universe Inside of Yours
The pervasively magical stories of Neil Gaiman are everywhere these days, which often makes us wonder if hundreds of years from now he won’t be regarded in mythical, legendary tones, like Hans Christian Andersen, or the Grimm Brothers. Just like those guys, Neil Gaiman was inspired by existing stories, too, but interestingly enough, when Gaiman plays in other sandboxes, he frequently employs a kind of “bubble universe” where his unique sensibilities are free to roam, relatively unconstrained by the rules of the world he’s visiting.
Here are four instances of Gaiman setting up shop in a familiar world and making it his own.
Michael Sauers is the Director of Logan Library in Logan, UT. Prior to this he was one of the founding staff and Technology Manager for Do Space in Omaha, NE. After earning his MLS in 1995 from the University at Albany's School of Information Science and Policy Michael spent his first 20 years as a librarian training other librarians in technology along with time as a public library trustee, a bookstore manager for a library friends group, a reference librarian, a technology consultant, and a bookseller. He has written dozens of articles for various journals and magazines and has published 14 books ranging from library technology, blogging, Web design, and an index to a popular horror magazine. In his spare time, he blogs at TravelinLibrarian.info, runs The Collector's Guide to Dean Koontz website at CollectingKoontz.com, takes many, many photos, and typically reads more than 100 books a year.
Unless otherwise stated, all opinions are my own and are not to be considered those of the City of Logan, UT.
View all posts by Michael Sauers
The pervasively magical stories of Neil Gaiman are everywhere these days, which often makes us wonder if hundreds of years from now he won’t be regarded in mythical, legendary tones, like Hans Christian Andersen, or the Grimm Brothers. Just like those guys, Neil Gaiman was inspired by existing stories, too, but interestingly enough, when Gaiman plays in other sandboxes, he frequently employs a kind of “bubble universe” where his unique sensibilities are free to roam, relatively unconstrained by the rules of the world he’s visiting.
