Current mood:	devastated
Current music:	"Hurt"-Johnny Cash

Will Eisner, 1917-2005
“Only the tears of ten thousand weeping angels could cause such a deluge! And, coming to think of it, maybe that is exactly what it was...”
-- from "A Contract with God", by Will Eisner

I’ve been struggling with the words for this, but I just have to write something.

Will Eisner passed away late last night. He was a legend in the comics industry and my biggest creative influence. I often describe him as being everything I’ve ever hoped to be. When I read about his passing this morning I was moved to tears. It was as if a member of my family had died, and perhaps that is what he was like, a benevolent grandfather to all the comics industry and it’s fans.

And yet I never met him, not really. I’d seen him around Comic-Con for years and not once did I have the courage to simply walk up and say, “hello”. Like the prettiest girl at a high school dance, Will was the one person I most desperately wanted to speak to, and the one far too intimidating for me to be capable of approaching. This kind and humble man was more a giant to me than any other creator around. Will was the greatest. And like that aforementioned pretty girl, any time I came near him I became flustered and unable to move, as if my shoes were filled with concrete. I had so much I wanted to say, so much I wanted to ask that all the words came swelling up into my mouth becoming traffic jammed into a suffocating lump. Selfishly, I regret this more than anything else.

The man was a legend. He was there during the birth of comics. He created masterworks time and time again. Setting and raising the bar of excellence in everything he did. Working all his life in the medium he so dearly loved. Even today he has work still scheduled to be released. And unlike some of his egocentric self-promoting contemporaries, he was a humble man who need not cite examples of his excellence, he WAS the example of excellence. His work casting a shadow of influence over generations of creators now and forever. Myself included.

His work is continually an inspiration to me, always helping to solve problems or challenging me to do better. At any given time, one of his books is within reach. While Frank Miller and Alan Moore may have lit the fuse creating my desire to become a comic book creater, Will Eisner was the powder keg that blew me away and sent me hurling toward my goal. His work always innovative, brilliant, thought provoking and moving.

Ten years ago the comics industry lost Jack Kirby and now we have lost Will Eisner. Our Michaelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci. The great masters of comics are gone. But their memories will never fade or yellow with time. No they will be sealed away and preserved as long as there are those who continue to read their works, and in this way they will continue to inspire and entertain.

Will Eisner’s legacy will live on... through the brilliant works he has left behind, and in creators who continue to make good comics.


"It was a time of gray foreboding...a time the realist scurried in the uncertain gloom to survive. While alongside him, less nimble, and walking to his own cadence came the dreamer."
-- from "The Dreamer" by Will Eisner