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WORK TITLE: The Trial of Roger Casement
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE: 1984
WEBSITE: http://www.fionnualadoran.com/
CITY:
STATE:
COUNTRY:
NATIONALITY: Irish
http://www.tees.ac.uk/sections/research/design_culture_arts/staff_profile_details.cfm?staffprofileid=U0030652 * http://irishcomics.wikia.com/wiki/Fionnuala_Doran *
RESEARCHER NOTES:
LC control no.: nb2012017803
LCCN Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/nb2012017803
HEADING: Doran, Fionnuala, 1984-
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035 __ |a (Uk)008535401
040 __ |a Uk |b eng |c Uk |e rda
046 __ |f 1984
100 1_ |a Doran, Fionnuala, |d 1984-
370 __ |a Armagh, Northern Ireland |c Northern Ireland
372 __ |a Multimedia (Art) |a Collage |a Animation (Cinematography) |2 lcsh
373 __ |a University of Ulster |a Catalyst Arts (Organisation) |2 naf
374 __ |a Artists |a Animators |2 lcsh
375 __ |a female
377 __ |a eng
670 __ |a Portmanteau, 2011: |b t.p. (Fionnuala Doran)
670 __ |a Lingua comica www site, 25 July 2012: |b Sarah & Fionnuala (Fionnuala Doran, Northern Irish artist born in Armagh in 1984; graduate of Fine Art from University of Ulster; member of Catalyst Arts, Belfast; work includes mixed-media installations, collages, drawing sequences and animation)
PERSONAL
Born 1984, in Lurgan, Armagh, Northern Ireland.
EDUCATION:University of Ulster, Coleraine, Northern Ireland, B.F.A.; Royal College of Art, London, England, M.A., 2015; residencies with the Banff Centre, Canada, the European Exchange Academy, Turkey, and the Atlantic Center for the Arts, Florida.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Graphic artist and teacher. Teesside University, Middlesbrough, England, senior lecturer; Catalyst Arts, Belfast, director; Modern Times, co-editor.
MEMBER:Catalyst Arts, Belfast.
AWARDS:British Library, Comics Unmasked competition winner, 2014.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
Fionnuala Doran is a graphic artist and university lecturer born in Lurgan, Armagh, Northern Ireland in 1984. With a master’s degree in visual communication from the Royal College of Art in London, Doran has participated in residencies with the Banff Centre, Canada, the European Exchange Academy, Turkey, and the Atlantic Center for the Arts, Florida. Doran teaches comics, graphic novels, and sequential art at Teesside University in Middlesbrough, England. Her first graphic novel, The Trial of Roger Casement, describes the life of the early twentieth century Irish gay icon. Doran’s artistic work also includes mixed-media installations, collages, drawing sequences, and animation. She is also director of artist-led gallery, Catalyst Arts in Belfast and is co-editor of Modern Times, a British magazine of graphic journalism since the nineteenth century. Doran lives and works between Scotland and England.
On the one-hundredth anniversary of the 1916 Irish rebellion against Britain, Doran’s 2016 graphic novel The Trial of Roger Casement traces the rise and fall of Roger Casement, who in 1911 was knighted by King George V, but five years later was hanged for treason and for being homosexual. Casement (1864-1916) was born in Ireland but raised in Britain, and spent time doing humanitarian work in the British colonies overseas helping to uncover abuses in the Congo and Peru, work for which he was recognized knighted. However, beginning in 1914 he endeavored to earn Ireland’s freedom from Great Britain. He recruited volunteers and requested Germany’s help in gaining Irish independence, but he was soon detained, stripped of his knighthood, interrogated by Scotland Yard, and put on trial for treason. Investigators found his private diaries which detailed his homosexual liaisons. The British used this against Casement and publicized his sexual orientation to those sympathetic to Irish independence, such as conservative Irish Catholics and Americans, who eventually turned against Casement. Casement was hanged in 1916.
Before his death, Casement was allowed to make a final statement, in which he made an impassioned plea for Ireland’s right to self-governance that made a lasting impression and remained a rallying cry for future generations. Doran’s graphic novel offers historical information and skips through the chronology of events. According to a reviewer in Publishers Weekly, “The timeline is sometimes hard to follow, especially for newbies to Irish history” and the art often reverts to talking heads, nevertheless, the story of the charismatic freedom fighter is “well-researched and thoughtful.” Writing in Booklist, Ray Olson commented that “Her drawing style mixes documentary realism and expressionist figuration,” during the era of Edvard Munch’s “The Scream.”
Commenting on how the graphic novel is “Narrated in a jerking, stop-start manner and illustrated in a bold, frantic manner,” Fred McNamara online at A Place to Hang Your Cape interviewed Doran about her book. She noted that Roger Casement was an icon of human rights and of the gay experience in Ireland and one of her biggest heroes. She explained her purpose for creating the graphic novel: “It’s as much to fulfill a burning desire to depict the end of Casement’s life as it is to bring his story to more popular attention. 20th century Irish history has been a constant throughout my life, and in some way I hope the book makes other people realise its relevance—and specifically the relevance of Casement’s life—to the 21st century.”
Although the chronology of the book is difficult to follow, and readers may need an introduction to Casement’s life before reading the book, a reviewer online at Starburst Magazine said: “The graphic novel does great justice of Roger Casements life whilst trying to put forward an engaging story. Fionnuala Doran has done a splendid job of interpreting a historical figure’s life into a work of art.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Booklist, December 15, 2016, Ray Olson, review of The Trial of Roger Casement, p. 35.
Publishers Weekly, October 31, 2016, review of The Trial of Roger Casement, p. 60.
ONLINE
A Place to Hang Your Cape, https://ap2hyc.com/ (November 1, 2016), Fred McNamara, author interview.
Fionnuala Doran Website, http://www.fionnualadoran.com (November 1, 2017), author profile.
Starburst Magazine, http://www.starburstmagazine.com/ (November 1 2017), review of The Trial of Roger Casement.
About Fionnuala Doran
Fionnuala Doran
Fionnuala Doran
Senior Lecturer in Comics, Graphic Novels & Sequential Arts, School of Computing, Media & the Arts
T: 01642 345433
E: f.doran@tees.ac.uk
Research: Computing research
Fionnuala Doran is an Irish artist, living and working between Scotland and England. She graduated with an MA in Visual Communication from the Royal College of Art in 2015 and is senior lecturer at Teesside University‘s newly launched BA in Comics, Graphic Novels and Sequential Art. Winner of the 2014 Comics Unmasked competition at the British Library, she has worked between fine art and comics, acting as a director of Catalyst Arts, Belfast’s foremost artist-led gallery, and as co-editor of Modern Times, Britain’s first magazine of graphic journalism since the 19th Century. She has participated in residencies with the Banff Centre, Canada, the European Exchange Academy, Turkey and the Atlantic Centre for the Arts, Florida. She came down with a bad case of comic-fever in 1990 and has never recovered.
Her first graphic novel, The Trial of Roger Casement, chronicling the contested life of Irish rebel, revolutionary and gay icon, Sir Roger Casement, is released September 2016 by Self Made Hero.
Irish Echo- 'Casement's Road to Banna Strand', 28/09/2016.
Fionnuala Doran and Marcel Ruijters at the Edinburgh Book Festival-Graphic Biographies, 28/09/2016.
Naughton Gallery’s Art in the AM, Naughton Gallery, Belfast, 29/07/2016
Morning Star- 'It's my Passion Project', 19/09/2016
Irish News- 'The Graphic Tale of Irish Revolutionary Roger Casement', 11/08/2016
Irish Examiner- A New Graphic Novel Tells The Tale of the Trial of Roger Casement', 14/10/2016
REVIEW: The Trial of Roger Casement- A Place To Hang Your Cape, 30/09/2016.
Trial of Roger Casement, Starburst magazine,
The Trial of Roger Casement Graphic novel review- Front Row Reviews, 28/08/2016
Two successful bios of very different men: review of the Trial of Roger Casement at Comics Beat, 18/10/2016
Fionnuala Doran
EDIT
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10-11
Interior page from Roger Casment- a (partial) life, by Fionnuala Doran and produced for the Royal College of Art show, June 2015.
Fionnuala Doran was born in 1984 in Lurgan, County Armagh. She received an MA in Visual Communication from the Royal College of Art, London in 2015. In 2014 she won first prize in the British Library and Arts Thread's Comic Unmasked competition, and runner-up in the Observer/Jonathan Cape/Comica graphic short story prize.
At the June 2015 Royal College of Art show, Doran exhibited a short-form graphic novel, focusing on the journey of Roger Casement into the Congo Free State, as he tries to investigate the horrific rumours that have been sneaking out of Belgian brutality.
Her work has appeared online and in print in the Guardian, Observer, the British Library and Modern Times.
Live sketch of Jacques Tardi, Paul Gravett, Pat Mills at Comica talk 2015
Live sketch of Jacques Tardi, Pat Mills and Paul Gravett at Comica, Foyles bookshop, London.
External linksEdit
Fionnuala Doran's website
Fionnuala Doran on Tumblr
Fionnuala Doran on Twitter.
Fionnuala Doran on ComicSpace
•About
Fionnuala Doran is an Irish artist, living and working between Scotland and England. She graduated with an MA in Visual Communication from the Royal College of Art in 2015 and is senior lecturer at Teesside University‘s newly launched BA in Comics, Graphic Novels and Sequential Art. Winner of the 2014 Comics Unmasked competition at the British Library, she has worked between fine art and comics, acting as a director of Catalyst Arts, Belfast’s foremost artist-led gallery, and as co-editor of Modern Times, Britain’s first magazine of graphic journalism since the 19th Century. She has participated in residencies with the Banff Centre, Canada, the European Exchange Academy, Turkey and the Atlantic Centre for the Arts, Florida. She came down with a bad case of comic-fever in 1990 and has never recovered.
Her first graphic novel, The Trial of Roger Casement, chronicling the contested life of Irish rebel, revolutionary and gay icon, Sir Roger Casement, was released in September 2016 by Self Made Hero.
“Irish culture has all but canonized the heroes and martyrs of the 1916 rebellion against England, but for a century the Irish-born British-raised Casement has been quietly erased from the record. Once knighted for his work in the British colonies overseas, Casement switched sides to fight for the liberation of his own people and was hailed as a hero of the Irish rising-until his treason trial revealed homosexual affairs, which turned sexually conservative Irish Catholics against him. Doran’s graphic novel debut seeks to return Casement to his place in history with a nuanced portrait of a man whose life defies categorization. Skipping through time and place in rough, impressionistic ink sketches, this is less a historical record than a poetic evocation… Casement is an electric figure, his story stranger than fiction, and this well-researched and thoughtful book provides a fine introduction.”
Publishers Weekly
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Home » INTERVIEW: Fionnuala Doran, Author of The Trial of Roger Casement
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INTERVIEW: Fionnuala Doran, Author of The Trial of Roger Casement
11 months agoby Fred McNamara6 min read
Written by Fred McNamara
We recently had the privilege of reading Fionnuala Doran‘s The Trail of Roger Casement, a fresh, riveting biography of the final years of Irish political activist Roger Casement. Once knighted by King George V for his humanitarian work in South America and Africa, Casement would eventually be hanged for attempting to lure German support for an independent Ireland.
This absorbing graphic novel depicts a harsh reminder of Casement’s downfall in such a short space of time. Narrated in a jerking, stop-start manner and illustrated in a bold, frantic manner, The Trial of Roger Casement certainly stands as a highlight of SelfMadeHero’s biography catalogue I’ve read thus far.
We recently caught up with author Fionnuala to talk about The Trial of Roger Casement, and the lasting impact of Casement himself. To be discussed along the way: the Heart of Darkness, Fionualla’s grandparents, and the joys of teaching comic books to university students.
A Place To Hang Your Cape: Can you tell our readers a little bit about The Trial of Roger Casement?
Fionnuala Doran: My comic looks (mostly) at the last two years of Casement’s life, narrated in a sort of nonchalant manner by Casement himself. These are the two years he’s primarily known for- washing up on Banna Strand in an attempt to stop the Rising, the trial, execution and public outing. It introduces a man who played a huge and often underappreciated role in Casement’s actions during that time- Adler Christensen, who to this day remains a mystery. Did he betray Casement? Why would Casement, a man of the world, not recognise Christensen’s nature from the start?
Casement himself is trying to establish where he should start telling his story- on that beach in Banna Strand, or in New York City 1914 when he meet an apparently stranded and penniless young Norwegian man looking for assistance. It was a spectacular act of misjudgement on Casement’s part, and started a chain of bad luck and thankless decisions that led him almost inevitably to his death.
AP2HYC: What inspired you to create a comic about this iconic Irish figure?
Doran: I can’t remember when I became aware of Roger Casement as an icon of human rights and of the gay experience in Ireland, but certainly my whole adulthood he’s been one of my biggest heroes. So much has been said about his life and legacy, but no-one has ever seemed to know who the real Casement was. We know what he did- the report, Banna strand- but what was he thinking? Why did he come back to Ireland to stop the Rising when he knew it was doomed? For all that’s been written and said, he’s a mystery.
AP2HYC: What might you say is the overall purpose of the comic?
Doran: It’s as much to fulfill a burning desire to depict the end of Casement’s life as it is to bring his story to more popular attention. 20th century Irish history has been a constant throughout my life, and in some way I hope the book makes other people realise its relevance- and specifically the relevance of Casement’s life- to the 21st century.
AP2HYC: I assume some research was conducted into Casement’s life in order to create this comic. Based on what you found from your research, how did you decide which portions of Casement’s life would make a great comic?
Doran: I began creating a comic around Casement’s life nearly 5 years ago with a series of short, newspaper sized comics. I didn’t get to develop it fully until I started at the Royal College of Art in 2013, but it was playing around in my mind all of the intervening time. I had planned to do a whole biography as my final project- from birth to death- but about halfway through the research it became very clear that tackling his whole life in one graphic novel would need either a great deal of time from both me and the reader, or would need to rush through a lot of very important points.
AP2HYC: Were there any elements of his life you found in your research that you decided against including in the comic?
Doran: A great deal, actually. Casement’s life contained so many different elements- his work in the Congo, in Peru; his relationship with Joseph Conrad and the creation of Heart of Darkness; the Howth gun running of 1914 and relationship with the other Irish revolutionaries. Trying to tackle it all in a graphic novel would take years- and a lot of pages. I hope that readers who enjoy the book will be motivated to go and find out more about Casement and his work before the Rising.
AP2HYC: The Trial of Roger Casement is narrated in a rather fragmented manner, swerving back and forth between multiple time periods. Why this method of telling the story?
Doran: I was trying to find ways to balance the spectacular, grand-standing aspects of Casement’s last two years- his washing up on Banna Strand and trial- with the quieter moments that explain how he ended up in that situation. I was also planning to tell it from Casement’s point of view and he, I felt, would want to start and end with DRAMA and would sometimes segue into substories, such as his meeting the mystery man in Warrenpoint.
AP2HYC: What’s been the most rewarding aspect of making this book?
Doran: Getting to tell the story of Casement’s last two years was rewarding in itself. It’s a privilege and an honour to do so, and to talk to other artists and historians who have also been studying Casement’s life. Also, I was able to make my first book dedication- to my Granny and Grandad. I’ve been waiting a long time to do that!
AP2HYC: Do you think Casement’s impact still felt in Ireland today?
Doran: Certainly! Not as much as it should be- there’s still far too many people with no clue who Casement was or his significance today. I saw a few people online using his image to promote the Yes vote in last year’s gay marriage referendum, but his impact on how we understand the impact of Western exploitation in Africa and South America is hugely undervalued. I guess if it was recognised we’d have to question a lot of attitudes and policies that persist towards the developing world to this day.
AP2HYC: What’s next for you as a comic creator – any new projects in the pipeline?
Doran: I’m finding it hard letting Casement go. So much of his work in West Africa is relevant to the world we’re in now, and is very poorly understood in Europe. My biggest project at the minute though is leading the BA in Comics, Graphic Novels and Sequential Art at Teesside University. We’ve got over 40 students in our new first year just as excited about comics as I am.
You can get your copy of The Trial of Roger Casement from SelfMadeHero here! Let us know if you’ve read the book in the comments section below or send us a Tweet!
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HOME»LIFESTYLE»ARTS, BOOKS, FILM & TV
A new graphic novel tells the tale of the Trial of Roger Casement
96
Friday, October 14, 2016Don O’Mahony
Fionnuala Doran began her career as a Ninja Turtles fan, but has just published a graphic novel on Roger Casement, writes Don O’Mahony
I was intrigued by the mystery of the diaries and his role as an outsider even within the eclectic mix of people that formed the big cheeses of 1916
Fionnuala Doran began her career as a Ninja Turtles fan, but has just published a graphic novel on Roger Casement, writes Don O’Mahony
COMICS always figured in Fionnuala Doran’s life. She recalls being very small and reading the adventures of Asterix the Gaul and the Belgian reporter Tintin. In her teenage years, she gravitated towards the iconic mainstays of the DC and Marvel Comics universe, Superman and Batman, and the X-Men and Spider-Man, but there is one comic that has a special place in her affections, a syndicated comic strip of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles that appeared in newspapers.
Generally, three panels in length, her grandfather would cut them out and glue them into a scrapbook so she could read them all in one sitting as one continuous story. A graphic novel, if you will.
The protagonists in Doran’s own comics may also be heroes associated with the colour green, but that’s where any comparison with our wisecracking amphibians ends. Doran’s protagonists are historically real and complex, and, to date, include Countess Markievicz and Roger Casement. Growing up in the 1980s in Lurgan, Co Armagh, Doran says it was hard to avoid such nationalist and revolutionary figures.
“If you grew up in Lurgan, by default you were aware of at least a bit of Irish history, because Lurgan still is quite a centre of unrest,” she points out, alluding to the recent arms find in her hometown.
A frame from the Roger Casement graphic novel by Fionnuala Doran.
“So, from there, I was aware of a lot of the contentiousness of Irish history and aware of figures. Even from following the GAA, there’s [Belfast’s] Casement Park. There’s all these different parks and venues named after people from Irish history. When you’re a kid, you hear these names. Then you hear a wee bit more about the people associated with the name and, when you’re a teenager, you go and Google them or you go and look them up in the library, you find out a wee bit more about these events or characters.”
In 2007, Doran graduated with a BA in Fine and Applied Art from the University of Ulster. While working for the Catalyst Arts Gallery in Belfast she began creating comics as part of a British Council-funded project called Multiples. The brief was to create something that could be sold in multiples. Doran’s idea was for a newspaper-sized comic that would deal with different events in Irish history. One of her subjects was the human rights campaigner and Irish patriot Roger Casement.
She explains her fascination with Casement on the fact she was “just kind of intrigued by the mystery of the diaries and his work in Africa and South America and kind of his role as an outsider, even within the eclectic mix of people that formed the big cheeses of 1916”.
The diaries in question were the so-called ‘black’ diaries, the personal journals attributed to Casement (it’s still a matter of debate whether they were his, or even if they were factual) that detailed evidence of his homosexual orientation and were used by the British government to discredit him during his trial for treason.
In Doran’s recently published graphic novel, The Trial of Roger Casement, a compelling account of his final two years, she manages to present a rounded version of this complex individual, a character that is both knowing and self-aware and yet hopelessly adrift in the world — both insider and outsider.
Doran says: “It only came to me recently, actually, but I was just thinking what it would be like to be gay or to have to hide something really fundamental about yourself for your entire life and what kind of effect that would have on a person. And I can’t even conceive what a huge effort it would be to pretend, to basically masquerade in public for the entirety of your life? It’s such a strange thing to think about today, but it must have been very common a hundred years ago.”
Reflecting on her book, Doran concludes: “Casement was a romantic kind of guy, so I figured he probably wouldn’t appreciate a straightforward biography.”
The Trial of Roger Casement by Fionnuala Doran is published now by Self Made Hero
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Print Marked Items
The Trial of Roger Casement
Publishers Weekly.
263.44 (Oct. 31, 2016): p60.
COPYRIGHT 2016 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
The Trial of Roger Casement
Fionnuala Doran. SelfMadeHero, $19.95 (136p) ISBN 978-1-910593-20-2
Irish culture has all but canonized the heroes and martyrs of the 1916 rebellion against England, but for a century the
Irish-born British-raised Casement has been quietly erased from the record. Once knighted for his work in the British
colonies overseas, Casement switched sides to fight for the liberation of his own people and was hailed as a hero of the
Irish rising--until his treason trial revealed homosexual affairs, which turned sexually conservative Irish Catholics
against him. Doran's graphic novel debut seeks to return Casement to his place in history with a nuanced portrait of a
man whose life defies categorization. Skipping through time and place in rough, impressionistic ink sketches, this is
less a historical record than a poetic evocation. The timeline is sometimes hard to follow, especially for newbies to
Irish history, and the art too frequently defaults to talking heads. But Casement is an electric figure, his story stranger
than, fiction, and this well-researched and thoughtful book provides a fine introduction. (Oct.)
Editor's note: Reviews noted as "BookLife" are for self-published books received via BookLife, PW's program for
indie authors.
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"The Trial of Roger Casement." Publishers Weekly, 31 Oct. 2016, p. 60. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA470462542&it=r&asid=cee1f14cde072698ed00704c76b88d9e.
Accessed 8 Oct. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A470462542
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The Trial of Roger Casement
Ray Olson
Booklist.
113.8 (Dec. 15, 2016): p35.
COPYRIGHT 2016 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/ala/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist_publications/booklist/booklist.cfm
Full Text:
The Trial of Roger Casement.
By Fionnuala Doran. Illus. by the author.
2016.120p. SelfMadeHero, $19.95 (9781910593202). 741.5.
On April 21, 1916, Sir Roger Casement (1864-1916) was arrested, ill and exhausted, on a southwestern Irish beach,
ending his attempts since 1914 to get German support for Irish independence and leading to his trial for treason in
England. He was convicted, stripped of his honors, and hanged. Yet the court had allowed him a final statement, in
which he castigated imperial rule over Ireland so cogently that nationalists throughout the British Empire were
inspired. Casement's fate was probably sealed in any event, but to shortcut appeals for clemency, the government
distributed evidence of Casement's homosexuality broadly to the press, especially in America, a huge source of support
for Irish independence. While concentrating on the revolutionary activities and gay liaisons of Casement's last several
years, Doran mentions the investigations of Belgian and British imperial abuses in the Congo and Peru for which he
was knighted. Her drawing style mixes documentary realism and expressionist figuration--the latter, especially, in faces
that remind us that Casement's era was also that of Edvard Munch's The Scream.--Ray Olson
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
Olson, Ray. "The Trial of Roger Casement." Booklist, 15 Dec. 2016, p. 35. General OneFile,
go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA476563521&it=r&asid=2692d26af200d30b2778ef4ef33314c9.
Accessed 8 Oct. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A476563521
THE TRIAL OF ROGER CASEMENT
PrintE-mail WRITTEN BY ANDREW MUSK
Roger Casement's tale is well known throughout history with many biographies based around him. However, his story is now told through this new graphic novel by Fionnuala Doran, which charts the rise and fall of this powerful and historic character.
At first, the graphic novel can be difficult to follow as the set up changes from different time periods to try and provide the reader with the sufficient information required to enjoy the story. This adaption of his life follows Roger Casement from his many successes from being honoured for the ‘Casement Report’ on the situation in the Congo and his eventual knighthood following his efforts in Peru. However, the story many follows the eventual downfall of this famous humanitarian. Although Roger Casements many humanitarian and reports earned him a reputation as a kind hearted man, but his move for German backing to secure and independent Ireland and his eventual return home saw him eventually arrested. This adaption really focuses on his arrest, incarceration, and trial. It also shows the ‘Black Diaries’ and how they contributed to Roger Casements fate.
This story is very much politically focused, but also contains some very moving character elements. In particular, the court room scenes are emotionally engaging and tragic. However, a brief introduction to Roger Casements life may be needed for people not familiar with his life, as the story may be difficult to follow. Luckily, the author has provided a brief timeline of Roger Casements life at the back of the book, which provides some background context to the story.
There is some uncertainty surrounding the case of Roger Casement, and elements of potential forgery of the Black Diaries have pointed towards the British authorities ensuring Roger Casements trial is swiftly settled. The graphic novel does great justice of Roger Casements life whilst trying to put forward an engaging story. Fionnuala Doran has done a splendid job of interpreting a historical figures life into a work of art. The graphic novel is told through black and white drawings which truly capture the tone of the story. This adaption will allow many readers to discover a historical figure for the first time. A hauntingly true tale of belief and tragedy.
THE TRIAL OF ROGER CASEMENT / AUTHOR: FIONNUALA DORAN / PUBLISHER: SELFMADEHERO / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW
Review: Two successful bios of very different men
10/18/2016 5:00 PM BY JOHN SEVEN
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casement
It’s always a pleasure when a new graphic novel biography comes out about someone I know absolutely nothing about, and I certainly had no clue about the existence of Roger Casement. Fionnuala Doran‘s The Trial of Roger Casement covers exactly that, the circumstances by which he was tried for treason in the United Kingdom and found guilty, but a biography of Casement could have been much more expansive if the author had chosen, but the political focus is the reason for the narrative one, an examination of both the personal nature of liberty and the ways in which a person’s sexuality has before, and still can be, used to cause further damage.
An Irishman, Casement was knighted by King George V after vigorous humanitarian work in Africa and South America, carried out over a couple decades at the turn of the century. It was after this, and directly related to his disenchantment with what imperialism spread across the globe. that he became involved with an Irish military force devoted to Irish independence and actively fundraising to build its army. Casement takes his fundraising efforts to America and then Germany as World War I begins.
Doran’s narrative begins with this transition between America and Germany, documenting Casement’s doomed efforts to raise a resistance to England, and doing so in now enemy territory. A revolution not quite materializing, Casement finds himself arrested and under trial for his efforts to raise a rebellion while consorting with the enemy, a process exacerbated by the discovery of his diaries and the use of his homosexuality against him.
Doran builds the narrative to Casement’s crucial statement at his trial, a lengthy and eloquent examination on the right of a governmental body to pass judgment on an individual when the individual does not recognize the right of that governmental body to do so, specifically because that governmental body has enslaved his own people through sneaky laws designed to keep them in place. In Casement’s argument, the only people who have the right to judge him are the Irish, and his statement, which takes up probably the last fourth of the book, is a powerful defense of self-determination and anti-imperialism.
The Trial of Roger Casement
Issue section: Books
Issue: February 2017 (421)
By
Richard Rose
The Trial of Roger Casement
Fionnuala Doran
Self Made Hero
£12.99
Buy from Bookmarks
While being one of the most compelling and interesting figures around the events of the 1916 Easter Rising, Roger Casement has not always dined at the top table of Irish rebels.
His homosexuality and his work for the British Empire while at the Foreign Office have meant that he has sat uneasily among some nationalists.
This entertaining, well-produced and timely graphic novel is symptomatic of recent moves to rehabilitate him.
The book seeks to give Casement’s trial historical context, by describing his work in Africa and South America, work which earned him a knighthood while simultaneously turning him into a committed anti-imperialist.
The injustices and abuses he witnessed and exposed won him widespread praise for being a great humanitarian, but also turned him into a campaigner against injustice closer to home, in Ireland — campaigns which didn’t go down so well with the British government.
This led to him becoming involved with trying to procure both arms and soldiers from Germany to join the fight for Irish independence. As he organised this during the First World War, once discovered and captured, he was accused of treason.
Much of this book uses transcripts of the moving, articulate and passionate speech he delivered to the court: “I assert from this dock that I am being tried here, not because it is just, but because it is unjust. If it be treason to fight against such an unnatural fate as this, then I am proud to be a rebel.”
Of course this speech fell on deaf ears, and Casement was duly executed. To help nullify the groundswell of rebellious support he received from Ireland, his remains were buried in quicklime in Pentonville Prison and were only repatriated in the 1960s.
The British government also used the so-called Black Diaries to try to smear his name. These were journals, whose authenticity is still debated, which described his secret gay lifestyle, a lifestyle which was of course heavily disapproved of by the Catholic church (among others!).
This graphic novel does a fine job of describing the main parts of Casement’s career and tragic end. The evocative black and white drawings set the mood thoughtfully, while the chronology at the back of the book helps clarify any confusion caused by the way the narrative deliberately skips around.
If you want a book to argue about the (missing) links between events in Ireland in 1916 and what was happening at the same time across Europe, with masses of workers involved in revolutionary activity, then this isn’t the book for you.
However, if you want an entertaining way of bringing to life one of the 20th century’s most unlikely but principled rebels, a flawed hero but “a pioneer in the fight against colonialism, racism and prejudice” (to quote Mario Vargas Llosa), then this is it.
The Trial Of Roger Casement back
Fionnuala Doran
Price: £12.99
Page 45 Review by Stephen
"The sun rises in the east, so I arrived that morning with the night sky behind me... facing an unbearable light. A metaphor for my whole life.
"A tired metaphor, to be sure...
"But I'll have time to correct it before publication."
He won't, you know.
It's Good Friday, 21st April 1916, three days before the Easter Risings.
Two months later, Sir Roger Casement would be tried for treason; and two months after that he'd be hanged.
It may seem odd that an account such as this begins with the mildly comedic, but that's part of its charm - along with the illusion that Sir Roger's narrating - and it endeared me immediately. It's repeated when, after washing up on Ireland's west coast then passing out on its shore, he's discovered by a dog and its owner. He'd barely had time to help bury the cache of German arms, and had been desperate to reach Dublin incognito.
"Bollocks."
'Bollocks' seems the perfect summary of this thoroughly bungled affair - from Roger Casement's point of view, anyway. Throughout, this formerly effective, distinguished and decorated negotiator and diplomat for the British government is depicted as weary and worried - and frazzled, in fact. At one point he visually fractures. Again, there's something funny about his wide-eyed dishevelment as he protests to a police sergeant later that day, claiming to be an academic and author writing a book on St Brendan... until that cache of German arms is unearthed.
"Oh, shit."
It's World War I, I'd remind you, and Britain is at war with Germany. So what was Casement doing smuggling German arms to Ireland?
Well, he'd been dispatched by the clandestine US-based Irish Republican Brotherhood to Germany in order to secure support there for an Irish revolt. His bargaining chip was that it would distract Britain from its war effort and divert troops to Ireland. In exchange he hoped to receive funding, arms and the release of German-held Irish soldiers to fight the revolution.
What's made clear in this graphic novel - which flashes backwards and forwards in time between America, Germany, washing up on that shore and Casement's subsequent trial - is that he received virtually no support from his own HQ (funding evaporated), a lukewarm fobbing off from German high command, and a great big duffing up from the Irish soldiers he was hoping would delight in his nationalist cause and their liberation. Slight miscalculation, there: they were German prisoners of war! They knew who the enemy was: the captors they'd just fought against. Britain was signing their pay cheques.
Hapless is one word to describe Casement's fall from grace; hopeless, his left-in-the-lurch and hung-out-to-dry predicament. And it's not so much his fall from grace, either, it's his fall from efficacy.
Doran handles the trial sequences very intelligently, presenting Casement's silent retort to the prosecution's dissemblance as a conversational, internal monologue outlining his motivations, his switch in allegiance following Prime Minister Asquith's offer of the prospect of Home Rule to Ireland. Ulster's Protestant middle classes "fearful of Rome and hating Papism, did not want a government domination by Roman Catholics" so the paramilitary Ulster Volunteer Force is formed to resist Home Rule, followed by establishment of the Irish Volunteers as an equal and opposite reaction to the UVF.
The rest, as they say, is history. But so is this missed trick: Casement's two decades in the Congo from 1884 where he met Joseph Conrad. If you've read Conrad's damning 'Heart Of Darkness' you'll know what a transformative experience that must have been. It was Casement's exceptional work as a consul there - gathering evidence to expose and condemn Belgium's King Leopold's strip-mining exploitation of the country's natural resources, and indeed its people who endured horrific, systematic abuse as slaves - which earned him his decorations including the British knighthood. Ironically it must surely have been those self-same atrocities which helped fuel his disgust for any sort of colonial imperialism - including that of Britain in Ireland. Nevertheless, none of this is mentioned during the graphic novel itself. There's a nod to the Boer War but the Congo's only mentioned in an editorial timeline. That doesn't ruin the book for me one jot - it's just a blindingly obvious missed opportunity.
Instead Doran concentrates on another thread: Casement's affair with a supposedly stranded Norwegian sailor whom he adopts as his valet, and other same-sex dalliances he documented in his diaries which the British government discovered then used to smear Casement in order to forestall any post-trial appeals for clemency. And that's fair enough - the thread, I mean! - because it's the trial that's in the title.
I loved the rough-hewn art and all the haunting or haunted expressions, as well as the expressionistic flourishes like tuberculosis-ridden Joseph Plunkett, Casement's only Irish Rising face-to-face contact in Berlin, whose face dissolves in front of an increasingly anxious, hopeless, deflated and defeated Casement into a skull. The faint sage green only adds to the austerity: the outlook is bleak throughout.
This is exactly what I want from a biographical graphic novel: an angle, clearly focussed and an immersion which gives me some sense of stake in what's proceeding.
THE TRIAL OF ROGER CASEMENT
Writer / Artist
FIONNUALA DORAN
RATING: BUY NOW
Review by Ian Keogh
Martyr or traitor? On the centenary of his judgement Roger Casement is a man all-but forgotten in today’s Britain, yet in the midst of World War I his trial for treason was sensational and salacious. At least to those who knew the detail. The British establishment, fighting rebellion in Ireland, needed to make a very public declaration, and thoroughly discrediting Casement was the opportunity.
To all intents and purposes the Irish born Casement was an upstanding member of that establishment, knighted in 1910 for his diplomatic work in Africa where he was instrumental in highlighting abuses. Yet Casement was a deeply conflicted man, having to hide his homosexuality, still a criminal offence in his era, and gradually coming to believe extreme measures were required if Ireland were ever to be free of British control.
Promises of self-determination had been made by Prime Minister Asquith, which outraged Protestants in Ulster, and their opposition kicked plans into the long grass. It was under these conditions that Casement was seduced to the cause of the freedom fighters. As the British fought a war against Germany he agreed to visit that country with a dual mission. He was to persuade Germany to supply arms for the Irish fight, and to persuade captured soldiers from Irish regiments that their interests weren’t being met by serving in the British army. He rapidly and violently discovered his message was unwelcome to all but a very few.
Fionnuala Doran has some fascinating historical material to work with, including the possibility that Casement’s homosexuality was fabricated, but never entirely brings it to life. She chooses to cut and paste elements from Casement’s recent past between details of his arrest and trial, which confuses rather than enlightens as there’s no direct lead from one to the next. It comes across as random splicing when a chronological run through would have better served. Doran’s also opted for an understated and, as far as possible, strictly factual presentation, but choosing within this also to provide Casement’s narrative captions undermines a full understanding of a man who took an extraordinary journey. Until the final pages he lacks the stature of his position, and her loose version of Edwardian cartooning works for portraits, but also presents an exaggerated wild-eyed cast in moments of stress. There are further panels requiring considerable study to reveal their secret.
The most powerful sequence is a word for word presentation of the speech Casement gave to close his trial. It finally reveals the man in a coruscating condemnation of the laws under which he’s been tried and his assessment of Ireland’s plight. This though, is undermined by what’s in essence a good idea. Doran’s illustrations move through Ireland’s then present and future, counterpointed by Casement’s attempts to avoid his fate, and the destinies of some he associated with. There’s little context, however, and those unfamiliar with the leaders of the 1916 Easter Rebellion or the stature of John Galsworthy will be left none the wiser.
There’s no way of knowing the level of editorial input, but much of what fails to engage about The Trial of Roger Casement could have been relatively easily addressed, and that’s extremely frustrating.
The Trial of Roger Casement Graphic novel review
August 28, 2016 Reviews
TORC3Sir Roger Casement was a campaigner and advocate of Human rights and Irish freedom. He stood up to the evils of Leopold II and his activity in Congo and was finally knighted for his work in Southern and Central Africa were he worked to better the lives of many of the poorest and harshest treated by colonial rule. However as he became an enemy of the state for his views, he became vilified in England and his support for a free Ireland lead to the press calling for his knighthood to be removed. Casement was tried and allegations were brought about his private and public life, his visits to Germany (an enemy country) during the First World War that was still ongoing and his friends in the Independent Irish movement.
TORC5Fionnuala Doran has crafted for me, one of the greatest graphic novel books about the injustice of British colonialism and the headache of empire. I have ever read many works of historical importance that develop ideas of colonial miscarriages of justice. This takes the world of those involved and layers it with substance. It gives Casement a retrial, a court of appeal standing that is just and fair but also humane and politically charged.
TORC4Casements final weeks are weaved with great insight into his life. Doran gives us visual metaphor and verbal resonance. The piece is not only factually accurate, compelling and a study in balanced story telling, it is also deeply felt and personal. Casement is made a man of flesh and sexuality. He becomes a man that desires for change and body but also justice. I felt it so powerful in its use of visual harmony and written narrative that it occasionally is too much. You have to pull away from the world as its strokes hit you and tears welled. I am one that always commits to a piece but this was so natural because its characters not only a re real but they are made flesh. All is done with grace and you never feel emotionally forced or coerced into positions. I will beg you to read this book, it should be seen by many and far. It is a story of a man wronged but a man that did so much right. He stood for what was freedom and rights of those in a position of none. He did it and lost his life standing for them and this book does that a service that is worthy of much praise.
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