TwentySevenLetters

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First published on ComixTalk.com, August 2010. [Note: The following interview was conducted in July 2009.] Since the 1997 release of his first graphic novel, Two-Fisted Science, writer, librarian, and one-time nuclear engineer Jim Ottaviani , has been telling compelling stories about the lives and work of scientists. He’s written about everything from J. Robert Oppenheimer’s work on the atomic bomb (Fallout, 2001), to Hedy Lamarr’s invention of an early “frequency hopping” communication sytem (Dignifying Science, 2003), to Harry Harlow’s investigations into the necessity of love (Wire Mothers, 2007). Along the way, he’s worked with more than two dozen artists, including Donna Barr, Roberta Gregory, Roger Langridge, Steve Lieber, Dylan Meconis, Linda Medley, and many others. His eighth and most recent book, T-Minus: The Race to the Moon, illustrated by Zander Cannon and Kevin Cannon, relates the dual stories of the US and Soviet space programs through the late 1950s and 1960s, as they competed to be first to the lunar surface. But true to form, Ottaviani’s telling of the story focuses less on the astronauts who made the journey than on the engineers and rocket scientists who made the journey possible. [Danner] Did you do anything interesting to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission this past July? [Ottaviani] I did a T-Minus signing at my local comic book shop! We showed Apollo footage, talked about space, I signed some books, and we had Tang on hand to quench our thirst and provide crucial vitamin C. So nobody got scurvy and we had a great time. One scene that really struck me in T-Minus was the montage of the whole world preparing for the Apollo 11 launch—England considering a public notification system, the pope having a special color television installed. The only recent events I can think of that had that kind of effect were either national disasters or celebrity deaths. Am I being too cynical? Or is it possible that, as a culture, we’ve lost our ability to appreciate extraordinary achievement? I don’t think we’ve lost that ability. I wonder if one factor among the many that lead to the loss you’re talking about is that it’s more of an effect of us not all experiencing achievements and events the same way, or even at the same time. Your best friend learns about something new via Twitter and gets the full 140 character impact of that, someone else sees it on Fox News and gets their spin on it that evening, I read about it in the New York Times (online) a day later, you hear an extended piece on NPR that weekend via a podcast from the day it happened, etc. ad infinitum. I won’t argue that more choices—both in terms of venue and in terms of the ability to experience something at a time and place that’s convenient for you—is a bad thing, because it’s not. But I don’t think big chunks of the world stop what they’re doing and all tune into the same, live, broadcast the way they used to. And that collective experience does change our appreciation of events. Again, that’s just one thing that contributes to this.

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