Stardust: Kindness and Strangers
It’s got sorcerers, half-blood princes, supernatural creatures and a hero from the mundane world finding his true destiny in a world of magic. But it clocks in at 500 pages fewer than the final Harry Potter doorstop. Neil Gaiman’s 1997 fairy tale—with lovely illustrations by Charles Vess—is a charmingly low-key road story that reads as though you’re hearing it aloud after having been tucked into bed with a cup of cocoa. Fans of Gaiman’s live readings will particularly enjoy this book—but then, if you’re that much of a fan, you probably already know that.
With the movie version of Stardust reaching theaters this summer, I wanted to return to the source, which I had probably not read since its initial release, in four parts, by DC Comics in 1997. 
I waited until after I saw the movie, attending the screening with little more in memory than that a boy from our mortal world walks into faerie to capture a fallen star, and the star takes a dim view of such prospect. The film kept most of the rest—the evil witch who wants the star’s heart to restore her own youth, the homicidal prince after the star as part of his quest for a throne, and other key characters and plot points. But while the film goes for big adventure, Gaiman’s writing is very relaxed, his plot turns fanciful, as likely to be a small amusement as a fantastic tangent of adventure.
(Which is not to say there’s no big action, sudden violence or, for that matter, reasonably explicit sex. Don’t mistake the “faerie tale,” with its pretty pictures and soothing voice, for a kids’ book.)
The classic storybook voice Gaiman employs is perfects complemented by Vess’ elegant illustrations. There’s a Victorian propriety to the linework to my less-trained eyes. Vess has cited Howard Pyle, Arthur Rackham and N.C. Wyeth and Maxfield Parrish as among his influences, while I am reminded of the fine-art comics work of such pioneers as Windsor McKay, Alex Raymond and Hal Foster. His work is perfectly suited to Gaiman’s tone. Wikipedia informs me that the writer is deliberately evoking Lord Dunsany, among others. I’m unfamiliar with Dunsany’s work, but found some online, and this very short bit (.pdf, but worth it) made me want to read more, probably on paper rather than my monitor.
Rereading Stardust after having seen the movie, I was struck by the differences, and many of them point to the uniqueness of Gaiman’s storytelling. Matthew Vaughn’s very entertaining film is paced like a film, while Gaiman’s story has a more leisurely saunter. He seems in no rush to get where he’s going, and in the best way, you sometimes feel like even he doesn’t know quite where we’ll end up. 
He’ll toss in things like a secret brotherhood of the road that are utterly undeveloped in the story and merely leave you certain that this large world he’s crafted has only barely been shown to you.
That invisible brotherhood, and heroine Yvaine’s final confrontation with the evil witch who is the story’s main antagonist, got right to the core of what I like best about Gaiman’s work: The writer’s belief in kindness. His hapless traveler, Tristan, is saved repeatedly by the kindness of apparent strangers, often in response to the boy’s own acts of good nature. And in the book’s final confrontation with the wizened old witch (do I even need to flag a spoiler here?), Yvaine and the witch have, not the battle to the death that Vaughn wisely put into the cinematic version, but a conversation. And when that chat is over, Yvaine forgives the woman who has relentlessly sought to murder her, and sends her away with a kiss.
Look back at The Sandman.
It was with the eighth issue, when he introduced his most successful character, that the series really took off. He created Death not as a grim reaper but as a very sweet 16-year-old Goth waif. I think the world view that gave the scariest thing in life such a comforting face—in an ostensible horror comic, no less—has as much to do with the series’ success as the sheer vitality of his imaginative stories. 
That series had a good number of road trips in which the kindness of strangers became an issue. The most significant, the “Brief Lives” storyline, was touching for the kindness (in his own way, and despite his protestations) with which Dream accompanied his addled little sister, Delirium, on her quest for their missing brother. Those two things, the fantastic journey and the essential kindness in the metaphorical forest, make Gaiman’s work, from The Sandman to Anansi Boys, such a delight.
Gaiman has a pretty kind and mild voice on his popular blog, and he’s well-known for staying at signings for as long as there are people waiting for his autograph—hours longer than any sensible author or celebrity would last. So perhaps he lives by the values in his writing. It would be presumptuous of me to conclude as much, but I like to think it’s true.
The lessons I take from his writing, then, are these:
Write the world as you see it, even when you’re writing things no one has ever seen; and the twin tonics of danger and friendship are essential to any good adventure. Our longing to escape the mundane includes not only trading office cubicles for distant shores, but trading the muddle of daily acquaintance for greater passions, greater certainties, and greater loves.
And a little kindness goes a long way.