Unveiling the Real Neil Gaiman: Beyond Allegations and Celebrity
I know Neil Gaiman.
Neil Gaiman is a friend of mine.
And believe you me, you’re no Neil Gaiman.
Up til now I’ve been keeping my mouth shut about the allegations being made against Neil Gaiman, mainly to avoid adding fuel to fire. These rumours have taken on a life of their own. In this age of short-attention span memes and conspiracies, even the most unfounded accusations can gain traction. This happens because people associate truth with what they last recall hearing or reading.
I have nothing to say about the actual accusations. I don’t know the women making the allegations and I see Neil so infrequently, that it would be irresponsible for me to speculate one way or another as to their credibility as I really have no idea.
I do have a very clear idea of who Neil Gaiman is and how he is or is not capable of behaving. I’ve known Neil since he was a struggling journalist in the 1980s. He tried to carve a living out of writing SF book reviews for porn mags in London. Most nights, he scraped the train fare together to get back to Maidenhead.
I used to buy Neil drinks (scotch and American, as I recall) because as a publicist I had an expense account, and Neil was terminally broke.
In return, Neil introduced me to Douglas Adams (for whom he was preparing The Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Companion), Terry Pratchett, John Brosnan, Lisa Tuttle, CliveBarker and later Alan Moore.
Neil was a sharp social butterfly at the time and although he was always on the hustle for paying writing work, he was a kind, funny guy who always had time to make useful introductions while keeping the conversations going with his wit and easy charisma. His eternal black leather jacket and devotion to Lou Reed became his recognizable brand.
I don’t think he ever took that black leather jacket off and it’s most probably now hanging in some comics museum somewhere. Neil introduced me to his first comics collaborator Dave McKean, a visual genius in his own right who actualized Neil’s first graphic novel, Violent Cases and later all the comics covers to his Sandman opus.
These were heady times. Great talents like Alan Moore, Frank Miller, Bill Sienkiewicz, the Hernandez Brothers, Dave McKean, and Neil himself were radically redefining the nature of the comics medium. These guys were artists who were intent on pushing boundaries and they did they succeeded,as demonstrated by the last 25 years of graphic storytelling.
At the time, I worked for Titan Books and once Neil had conned (ahem), convinced Publisher Nick Landau to publish Violent Cases as an album (pre trade paperback, Graphic Novel times), I was paid to publicize the “book”. Quotes around “book”. because Violent Cases was more of a long short story than a novel in the classical sense.
But Neil’s narrative emphasis on the role of childhood memory and mistaken memory was captivating, bringing a literary approach to ‘just another comic’ that was groundbreaking for the medium. I had never read such a theme and it’s exploration in a comic before and of course Dave McKean’s artwork, in its early representational realism style (combing mixed media of photos, sketches and painting): was sunning. No one had ever painted a comic like that before.
So I got to work alongside my buddy Neil, and my soon to be friend Dave for a few months while I wrote press releases, arranged interviews, organized signing events.
And I got paid for it.
To be honest, my best efforts only produced mixed commercial results for the album. It was too wide for most bookshops to shelve and the lessons learnt in it marketing Violent Cases is what led to Nick and DC comics settling on the standard of trade paperback for graphic novels.
But Violent Cases had a much further reaching impact: it got both Neil and Dave into DC. First with the tenuous Black Orchid limited 3 issue series (albeit featuring a stunningly handsome villain in a dark suit) and then of course Sandman.
Sandman is the reason I’m finding these accusations of sexual aggression on Neil’s part so suspect. People forget that Sandman was a break thru comic.
I actually didn’t like it at first, as I found it prosaic and flowery (inspiring me to create and write a parody of his style for Britain’s 2000AD entitled The Clown, a self obsessed, flowery speaking clown seeking revenge for the killing of his pony, Toby.
Compared to Sandman, that was a terrible strip, btw)
But in hindsight, it was groundbreaking because there were no superheroes in Neil’s fantasy Dreamscape. The Sandman was more a figure of fragile pathos than hero. More importantly, Neil’s voice was speaking not just to boys, but to girls as well at a time when, well girls just didn’t read comics.
Alan Moore once described Neil’s writing as “feminine writing” and his prose as somewhat effeminate. It sounded like an insult at the time as the big burly masculine Yeti from Northampton was busy during stakes in the hearts of boys own superhero’s in Watchmen.
But he wasn’t being condescending, he was profoundly right. Neil wasn’t just writing for boys, he was writing for boys AND girl. By the 12th issue of Sandman, boys were buying it to show to their girlfriends demonstrating the cross gender value of graphic story telling.
And remarkably, girls started buying and reading comics and then writing and drawing and publishing comics! By the late 90s female attendance at Comics Conventions was normal and Cosplay began to be a regular thing.
I’m not suggesting that Neil did this by himself. Karen Berger helped considerably. More and more male artists started to write for a gender wide audience and more and women became auteurs.
And Neil had a lot to do with this. I personally witnessed Neil going out of his way to open doors, make introductions and help women artists and writers break through the glass comics frame.
Of this I assure you with all certainty: as night follows day and day follows night, Neil Gaiman respects women. He loves women to which his daughters can attest and has supported women his entire life.
Now I’m not saying that this demonstrated respect discredits the standing allegations. What I am saying is that knowing Neil, having been around Neil, I find it highly suspect that he would commit acts of aggression, sexual or otherwise to women, regardless the circumstance.
Neil just isn’t made that way.
Now sex is a funny thing at the best of times.
So is celebrity.
I think the parameters of sexually appropriate behavior between men and women have changed radically over the past 30 years and for the better.
I myself have been called out by younger men for inappropriate attitudes towards young women when within my generational context, I was paying an innocent compliment. I’ve had to change my behavior and adapt.
Why? Because times have changed and women have the right to more succinctly determine how and when they will entertain male attention, and on what terms. Now is the time when sexual attention must be overt and clearly permit-able. Men cannot assume, we must ask if it’s OK. If our attentions are welcome or, in fact, an annoyance. We also need to know when to back off without rancor or retribution.
In the end, making love means just that, having love, affection, and respect for the object of your desires.
So maybe Neil has to adapt to his own generational context as well, but I doubt it. Neil was always ahead of the curve when it came to gender sexuality. He connected with trans people before it became a thing and promoted the sexual diversity of all people, regardless, both professionally and personally.
So these facts about Neil that I know first hand leads me to the latter conclusion. That the issue here being raised is more about celebrity than sexuality.
Celebrity is after all, merely a surplus of attention.
Most if not all the women accusing Neil of improprieties concede that their relationship were not just consensual but mutually initiated. That’s a big deal and very different from the Harvey Weinstein or Donald Trump’s sexual assaults.
Nor does there appear to be much basis for coercion or the undue use of a professional power dynamic, which has often been true in such situations. Sex used as power is not love at all.
In reading these women’s accounts of what they hold Neil accountable for,what comes through is a tone of regret and disappointment.
Now with all due respect to their pain, I know of no human being on this planet who does not regret some sexual encounter they’ve had in their life, myself included. the pain is all part of growing up, of maturing personally and sexually. Of learning what we don’t want and do want out of intimacy.
Inevitably, this requires making mistakes, regretting them, and correcting those mistakes.
I suspect that if Neil wasn’t a celebrity author caught in the media spotlight that these allegations (some over 20 years ago), would have taken a less public form. Not that they shouldn’t be brought forwards. On the contrary, I would invite any woman I have known in my life who feels that they have been subjected to my abuse, sexual or otherwise. They are welcome to confront me. They should come forward and receive my apologies for their regret and my behavior.
I’ve made some serious mistakes with the women in my life.
I am separated from my English wife with whom upon reflection and hindsight I did not treat as well as I should have or she deserved to be treated. I cannot undo the past, but I can recognize my mistakes, apologize for my trespasses and try to live and be a better person.
Hopefully, be a kinder person who does no harm.
When it comes to Neil, all I can really say is that in the time I have known him, he has proven to be an artist, a man of integrity who’s generous spirit has improved the lives of others for the better, especially women.
He’s no saint, but he’s no demon either and his demonization is not only injust and unfair but does nothing to help the lives of his accusers.
We are all hopefully entering a gentler, kinder and more honest political and personal age. The personal is political and if I stand to be corrected for anything I’ve written above, I invite you to do so with the kindness and compassion my words invite.
Respectfully, Igor Goldkind
August,2024
igorgoldkind
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