The Dancing Plague
The Dancing Plague
The Dancing Plague tells a true story, from 1518, when hundreds of inhabitants of Strasbourg were suddenly seized by the strange and unstoppable compulsion to dance, from the imagined perspective of Mary, one of its witnesses. Prone to mystic visions as a child, betrayed in the convent to which she flees, then abused by her loutish husband, Mary endures her life as an oppressed and ultimately scapegoated woman with courage, strength, and inspiring beauty.
All artwork in the book is created using pyrography and embroidery on calico.
Each copy is signed by the author.
Published by SelfMadeHero. Paperback with flaps, 192 pp 17.15 x 24.13 cm
NOMINATED BEST GRAPHIC NOVEL - BROKEN FRONTIER AWARDS 2021
SELECTED - GOSH COMICS BEST OF 2021
“With fire and needle, Brookes crafts a book the likes of which we’ve never seen before”.
Ed Park - The New York Times
“A beautiful comic I would recommend to any fortean with a fascination for dance and gorgeous art”
Steve Toase - Fortean Times
“The Dancing Plague is a stunning work in comics, a graphic novel that’s a unique and incredibly well-crafted thing. Brookes’ mixed-media approach expertly tells a version of history from the ground up, through the bizarre events of the dancing plague, that results in a visionary piece of work on visions, the human condition, and more."
Richard Bruton — Comicon
"This is a book many readers will return to and find freshly nuanced detail in every time, alongside a commentary on both the world half a millennium past and, inevitably, our contemporary pandemic-stricken times."
— The Morning Star
"This is another graphic triumph no fan of the medium or social redeemer should miss."
— Now Read This!
“Two pages in and I’m sold”
- Kate Beaton