Clive Barker "Write for the Most Intelligent People You Know!" Advice for Writers circa 2010

Clive Barker talks about his experience as a young writer and the benefit of “writing for the most intelligent people I knew.” Clive Barker details the process of crafting his early stories and plays that would eventually comprise the bulk of the Books of Blood. Special guest appearance by Doug Bradley, who answered Barker from the crowd.

Clive Barker (born 5 October 1952) is an English novelist, playwright, author, film director, and visual artist who came to prominence in the mid-1980s with a series of short stories, the Books of Blood, which established him as a leading horror writer. He has since written many novels and other works. His fiction has been adapted into films, notably the Hellraiser series, the first installment of which he also wrote and directed, and the Candyman series. He was also an executive producer of the film Gods and Monsters, which won an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay.

Barker's paintings and illustrations have been shown in galleries in the United States, and have appeared in his books. He has also created characters and series for comic books, and some of his more popular horror stories have been featured in ongoing comics series.

Books of Blood is a series of six horror fiction anthologies collecting original stories written by British author, playwright, and filmmaker Clive Barker in 1984 and 1985. Known primarily for writing stage plays beforehand, Barker gained a wider audience and fanbase through this anthology series, leading to a successful career as a novelist. Originally presented as six volumes, the anthologies were subsequently re-published in two omnibus editions containing three volumes each. Each volume contains four, five or six stories. The Volume 1–3 omnibus contained a foreword by Barker's fellow Liverpudlian horror writer Ramsey Campbell. Author Stephen King praised Books of Blood, leading to a quote from him appearing on the first US edition of the book: "I have seen the future of horror and his name is Clive Barker."

Books of Blood Volume 6 is significant for its story "The Last Illusion" which introduced Barker's occult detective character Harry D'Amour. The detective went on to appear in more of Barker's writings, the Hellraiser comic book series from Boom! Studios, and the movie Lord of Illusions (1995) (based on "The Last Illusion" and adapted by Barker himself).

Follow me:
Comic-Jutsu: https://comicjutsu.blogspot.com/
Twitter:   / jtmcroberts  
Pinterest:   / jtmcroberts  
Instagram:   / jtmcroberts  
MVP Mutant Radio: https://mvpmutantradio.blogspot.com/
Protofunk by Kevin MacLeod (http://incompetech.com) is licensed under a Creative Commons license.    • Protofunk - Kevin MacLeod