Bibliograph

The dancing plague, [written and illustrated by] Gareth Brookes

Type

Label

The dancing plague, [written and illustrated by] Gareth Brookes

Language

eng

resource.biographical

individual biography

Illustrations

illustrations

Index

no index present

Literary Form

non fiction

Main title

The dancing plague

Nature of contents

comics graphic novels

Oclc number

1182858746

Responsibility statement

[written and illustrated by] Gareth Brookes

Summary

The Dancing Plague tells a true story, from 1518, when hundreds of inhabitants of Strasbourg were suddenly seized by the strange and unstoppable compulsion to dance, from the imagined perspective of Mary, one of its witnesses. Prone to mystic visions as a child, betrayed in the convent to which she flees, then abused by her loutish husband, Mary endures her life as an oppressed and ultimately scapegoated woman with courage, strength, and inspiring beauty. As difficult to interpret now (as a psychological reaction to social injustice?) as it was then (as a collective demonic possession?), the story of the "Dancing Plague" finds suitably extraordinary expression in the utterly unique mixed-media style Gareth Brookes has devised to tell it. The pioneering blend of his trademark "pyrographic" technique with sumptuously colourful (and literal) embroidery perfectly reflects, in a beautiful work of art, the enduring fragility of our human condition - from "choreomania" to coronavirus

Target audience

adult

Classification