Lessons from Neil Gaiman

I am incredibly vocal about my love for Neil Gaiman and his gorgeous storytelling. My introduction to his work was the movie Coraline, which I didn’t know was based on Gaiman’s book until later on. Some years after I encountered Coraline, Neverwhere came to me during a tough time. I was navigating my newly diagnosed panic disorder and depression and I felt incredibly isolated and scared. During a charity shop book raid, I found Neverwhere, and since then Gaiman’s work has helped me reframe the way I see the world and myself. The day I finished Neverwhere, I went out and bought American Gods and Fragile Things.

I want to take you through some of the lessons I have learned from a selection of Neil’s work and describe how significantly it has shaped my worldview in the wake of mental health problems. Let’s look at three of my favourite of his books and their adaptations.

Coraline

In 2009, I saw the movie adaptation of Coraline and it was my first taste of Gaiman’s storytelling. It’s one of the few films I vividly remember seeing at the cinema and leaving the screen excited from it. The bit with the 3D needle coming through the fabric of the doll in the opening credits- I still remember seeing that and being blown away.

The Coraline adaptation remains one of my absolute favourite films. It’s visually stunning, and rightly earned an Oscar nomination. The stop-motion animation and CGI blend beautifully, and the colours, tone and music in the film work to immerse you in the world Gaiman and Sellick built.

Beyond the film, Gaiman’s book is a tribute to female strength and independence. Coraline and her parents relocate to a remote apartment building, where she feels ignored by her writer parents. She discovers a tiny door in the new house, bricked up in the day time but open at night, and enters it to discover her Other Mother- a caring, attentive replica of her real mother who anticipates Coraline’s needs and exceeds them. But, before long, Coraline’s Other Mother begins to show her sinister side.

I was quite a lonely child most of the time because my family relocated when I was young and I struggled to make friends in primary school. I spent a lot of time on my own, like Coraline. In the movie, Coraline’s friend Wybie helps her defeat the Other Mother, but he isn’t present in the book. She does it all herself, the little badass. She spends so much of the story alone, rattling round her new house, discovering her new surroundings and getting into trouble through the little door. The adults Coraline knows are neither use nor ornament for the overwhelming majority of the story, they don’t believe her about the trips she makes to see her Other Mother and Father, and ultimately she has to save herself and her parents when they are kidnapped by the Other Mother and Coraline is in danger of being kept prisoner by the Other Mother.

I really could have used a story like Coraline’s when I was much younger- it’s a story of finding the courage to do the things you’re scared of, and I think that can resonate with everyone. Gaiman consistently writes strong female characters, and has said that he consciously doesn’t write story arcs of males saving females. Coraline is the perfect embodiment of this. Wybie was a necessary addition to the film to move the story along and Neil was vetoed when he said no to putting a scene in the movie in which Wybie helps Coraline destroy the Other Mother’s hand and dump it down the well. Regardless, the story is about a girl’s ability to be independent and solve her own problems.

The story is also a call to accept and nurture love where you find it. Coraline spends so much of the story alone, but she also rejects the help and love of her family and new neighbours. Coraline and her parents are emotionally absent towards one another throughout most of the story. I think they all take one another for granted, and once Coraline has gone through all the dangers she needed to face in order to save her parents, she realises how much she needs them. She learns to let people in while remaining independent, and that’s such an important lesson.

In terms of taking care of your mental health, there are lessons to be taken from this story. Stay independent, accept and give love, and find a way to deal with what’s bothering you while remaining firmly and unapologetically yourself. Be wise, be brave, be tricky. Keep your agency while you care for yourself and try to navigate a scary, unfamiliar world.

Stardust

First of all, Stardust the film and Stardust the book are two VERY different things. I saw Stardust the film before reading the book, and I wasn’t expecting quite as many sex scenes to be in the book. But there they were, and now the book and the film exist in quite different parts of my mind. If you’ve seen the film and assume the book can’t add anything new, guess again.

The film adaptation of Stardust is one of my ultimate favourite films. Put a Neil Gaiman adaptation in front of me and I will definitely love it, but this one is my favourite by far. I put this film on whenever I’m feeling really sad because it always cheers me up. I have films that I always watch when I’m sad or ill, and Stardust is my first port of call. Aside from the fantastic main cast of the film, there are so many British comedy stars are in it- Mark Heap, Adam Buxton, Sarah Alexander and Ricky Gervais are all in Stardust.

In Stardust, shop boy Tristran lives in the village of Wall, so named after the wall that the villagers are allowed to cross every nine years to visit the magical market in the land of Faerie. Tristran tries to win the heart of his true (but aloof) love, Victoria, by vaulting the wall to find a fallen star to bring back to her. Meanwhile, three ancient witches are in search of the star to restore their youth and unparalleled magical powers, and the descendants to the throne of Faerie journey to find the star in order to claim the title of King. The star, as it turns out, isn’t a cluster of cosmic matter. Well… it is, but not in the way you might imagine a star would manifest. The star is a woman called Yvaine. And she isn’t going with any party quietly.

My favourite character is Yvaine. That woman STANDS. HER. GROUND. She doesn’t take Tristran’s shit, she doesn’t take the Witch Queen’s shit, she doesn’t take anyone’s shit. She’s a star, but she’s hardly the twinkly and demure angel you’d expect from her to be. She’s complex, brave and sassy. She’s prickly at times and is more than capable of keeping herself safe. However assertive Yvaine may be, she also loves with deep ferocity and passion. After watching humanity for centuries from the skies, she has seen the darkest side of it- but she doesn’t let that put her off loving Tristran. Yvaine is the best example of a strong, caring woman Stardust has to offer and, once again, she doesn’t need Tristran to save her. The Witch Queen approaches her while she is alone at the end of the book, but Yvaine isn’t afraid of her.

Stardust is essentially a fairytale, but the characters don’t conform to this- particularly Yvaine. In the film, the character of Captain Shakespeare is also a formidable, but hardly one-dimensional, character. Robert De Niro’s role in Stardust is a fan favourite, and for good reason. The dead brothers (Primus, Secundus, Tertius, Quartus, Quintus, Sextus and Septimus) are funny, engaging and provide moments of necessary narration. They also keep trying to kill one another. The Lillim are genuinely frightening, but it’s possible to see why they’re doing what they’re doing. They just want to cling onto their youth and power, and are willing to do this at the expense of others.

Yvaine, like Coraline, is a strong female character who doesn’t need to be saved, but accepts love and lets people help her. She accepts the help of Tristran, Una and Captain Shakespeare. Yvaine is a literal STAR. She’s in unfamiliar territory, having never stepped foot on a planet. She’s never met a person, but has spent her life watching them. She finds out that watching and engaging are very different things. I think Yvaine is a lesson in bravery. She shows us that going into a (literally) alien situation is, of course, scary. She encounters dangers and bad people. But, like Coraline, she stays fierce and doesn’t let anyone walk all over her. She learns her lessons and remains true to herself. It seems to me that she wasn’t lacking something without Tristran- rather, Tristran is a lovely supplement to her life. He helps her navigate through her new home, but I’m certain she’d do just fine without him.

The Graveyard Book

This 2008 childrens book, tragically, doesn’t have an adaptation. It does have a graphic novel version, if that’s your bag. Gaiman has recently signed a huge content deal with Amazon, so maybe we will be getting a series adaptation of The Graveyard Book soon. But that’s just my own wishful thinking. Just going to put this one out there- Tom Hiddleston would make a great Silas.

The story takes place, you guessed it, in a graveyard. Fun fact- Neil based the graveyard on Highgate Cemetery, an iconic graveyard in London that has been the home of an enduring vampire myth, cult activity, movie sets and ghost stories.

After a baby escapes the scene of his family’s murder and stumbles into a graveyard, he is taken in and protected by the resident ghosts, who represent many eras of British history. The long dead Mr and Mrs Owens adopt the baby and call him Nobody- Bod for short. Bod is given the Freedom of the Graveyard, which allows him to pass through solid objects within the graveyard and learn supernatural abilities. He is schooled in haunting practices, like Fading, and Dream Walking. His life is in the graveyard, until he grows bored of learning from his ghostly neighbours and insists on attending a school for living children. This exposes Bod to new experiences and dangers, including those that saw his family murdered.

The Graveyard Book in almost an anthology. We spend each chapter getting to know a different resident of the graveyard through the eyes of Bod, and we follow him through key events in his life as he grows up, encounters new characters and learns from the graveyard’s residents. We follow him through a Devil’s Door, make friends with an executed young witch with him and we trail him to an unusual dance event. Through these adventures, Bod’s guardian, Silas, is an ever present watchman. Silas seems to be an omnipotent being within the graveyard, and is the only resident who can leave to get Bod food and books. Why does he have the ability to leave?

Bod’s entry into a school where he can meet other children marks a turning point in the story and it becomes apparent that he neither belongs in the land of the living or the dead. He encounters bullies and deploys his own unorthodox- and very much on brand- methods of dealing with them. What’s interesting about Bod is that he becomes disenchanted with the lessons in the supernatural he is taught in the graveyard and he yearns for a “normal” education, like other living children receive. How many of us haven’t wished they were at Hogwarts learning magic? Bod just wants to learn maths and make some nice, normal friends.

The Graveyard Book is a melancholy journey through the life of a boy who can’t stay in the real world but doesn’t belong in the graveyard. He longs to discover the world, but it isn’t safe for him. It’s the first book to make me cry for a few years, and it has, for me, the most bittersweet but beautiful and moving ending of any Gaiman novel. Bod has to decide between staying put in the graveyard and living an insular existence with the ghosts that have loved and protected him all his life, or leaving and finding a place to belong without his graveyard family.

It was one of those books that I finished, closed and sat still and thought about for probably an hour. I remember just staring at the wall for a while after I finished the book. I totally adore each story told in the book, particularly the Devil’s Door and the Danse Macabre. The characters span the beautiful, the formidable, the tragic and the ridiculous, and we get to know them through their relationships with Bod. There is a real chasm between the graveyard inhabitants Bod is raised by and the people who live in the village Bod eventually ventures into- and this only reinforces Bod’s feeling that he doesn’t belong in either world. He is deeply loved in the graveyard, but there are so many things he would miss out on if he stayed there. He could never have children of his own in the graveyard, travel to new countries, make new friends, learn new things. To do those things, Bod must learn to function properly outside the graveyard, without the ghosts he loves and has spent his life with.

There is such an endearing naivety to Bod. It’s clear that all he wants is to belong. The relationships weaved in the book are masterful, and it is Bod’s relationship with Silas that illuminates the choice Bod has to make. I think the lesson for me in The Graveyard Book is that sometimes what we need to do isn’t the easiest or most appealing thing. Sometimes what’s best for us isn’t what we would choose, and we need to think of the long term and our own development. Not only that, but leaving the place that the people we love are doesn’t mean you love them any less- it just means that you are in a different place, doing different things, following what you need to follow.

It's so difficult to rate Gaiman's work because every book falls into a different category, but I think if I were to try, The Graveyard Book would take the top spot. It's many different stories within one, and, while the subject matter appears dark, it is actually a stunning chronology of a boy growing up and having to make difficult choices. These choices are the things that will resonate with adult readers, and offer lessons in how to take the long term into account when thinking about what is best for them.