Enter Sandman

The Edification of Neil Gaiman's Sandman Series

Abstract

Sandman, Neil Gaiman’s comic series opened a new chapter in the history of the genre; it came to a new life in the form of a Netflix series proving to be a new hit with the public. These works, which have also been published in Hungarian, create an interesting alloy of references to world literature with popular genres. This study examines the elements that are combined in Gaiman’s world, and how its lessons can be utilized within the domestic cir-cumstances. The genre of comics has a handful but fanatic camp of supporters – not among the young generation but mainly the adults (30-40 years of age). While recently adaptations of American comics and comic versions of novels dominated the market, this situation has now changed: there are promising initiatives that make better use of the opportunities pro-vided by the genre like Lakatos István’s Lencsilány representing stories by Edgar Allan Poe and Csáth Géza recycling Tim Burton’s visual world. Among many other elements, Gaiman includes Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream and The Tempest in his work as sig-nificant key components; this method may also prove inspiring for Hungarian comic artists.