The Big Five in the Comics

The Big Five

The Big Five of the Storytellers were all authors of adventure fiction but they were also writers of Science Fiction, Fantasy or Horror. Mike Ashley wrote in the Introduction of The Storytellers: British Popular Fiction Magazines 1880-1950 (2006):

…One could argue that the “big five” of the Storytellers’ Generation — those who combined popularity with real imaginative quality and an ability to produce long-lasting works — were Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894), H. Rider Haggard (1856-1925), A. Conan Doyle (1859-1930), Rudyard Kipling (1965-1936) and H. G. Wells (1866-1946).

Robert Louis Stevenson gave the world Long John Silver of Treasure Island, David Balfour in Kidnapped as well as The Black Arrow and other adventures. But he was also the man who wrote “the shilling shocker”, “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” along with a handful of other horror tales like “Markheim”, “Ollala” and “Thrawn Janet”.

H. R. Haggard, who took a bet he could write a better adventure novel than Stevenson’s Treasure Island, produced Allan Quatermain and King Solomon’s Mines. He also created the fantasy goddess Ayesha, She-Who Must-Be-Obeyed along with other fantastic scenarios like the Baboon-Woman, Hendrika in “Alan”s Wife”. Novels like Nada the Lily also have fantastic elements.

A. Conan Doyle gave us the brilliant Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson but was not a fan of such cool logic himself. He was the most famous spokesman for Spiritualism in England, even became convinced by some pretty lame fairies. When he wasn’t writing Holmes or adventure novels like The White Company he was writing classic horror tales like “Lot 249” or “The Ring of Thoth” or SF with Professor Challenger.

Rudyard Kipling could offer a sea adventure like Captain Courageous or an Indian tale like Kim, then spin gold with Mowgli and his jungle friends or horror tales like “The Phantom Rickshaw” or “The Mark of the Beast”. The author had a mean streak in him that came out in his horror tales.

H. G. Wells is probably better known for his fantastic works but only the early stuff was great romance. He wrote mainstream stuff like Kipps or Ann Veronica or turned his SF into a lecture with the later works like The World Set Free. Of course he wrote a lot of non-fiction as well. In fact, all these men did.

Being the greats of adventure and imagination, their work was ripe for comic book adaptation. (Being the public domain doesn’t hurt either.) Gilberton adapted all five, as would Marvel and other companies over the decades. Comics liked to give short bios about the authors or in some cases like Real Fact Comics, write comics about them. Below are some of these biographies along with my favorite comic by the Big Five. Plenty to choose from…

Robert Louis Stevenson

“The Body Snatcher” (Creepy #7, February 1966) was adapted by Archie Goodwin and drawn by Reed Crandall

H. Rider Haggard

She (Stories by Famous Authors Illustrated #3, 1950) was adapted by Dick Davis and illustrated by Vincent Napoli

A. Conan Doyle

“The Speckled Band” (Classics Illustrated #110: A Study in Scarlet, August 1953) was adapted by Ken Fitch with art by Sy Moskowitz.

Rudyard Kipling

“The Mark of the Beast” (Chilling Tales #16, June 1953) was adapted by an unknown author and drawn by Harry Kiefer.

H. G. Wells

The Time Machine (Marvel Classics Comics #2, 1976) was adapted by Otto Binder and drawn by Alex Nino.

Conclusion

In 1999, Alan Moore and Kevin O’Neill began playing in the world of Victorian classics and the Big Five are well-represented. The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, the comic and later the movie, features Haggard’s Alan Quatermain, Stevenson’s Mr. Hyde, and Well’s Invisible Man as part of a super-team of famous characters. Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes or Professor Challenger would have made great additions but I think copyright may have been an issue. Kipling’s Kim, now grown, or even Mowgli, a true jungle lord, would have been fun too.