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The Green Hand and Other Stories
Nicole Claveloux s short stories originally published in the late 1970s and never before collected in English are among the most beautiful comics ever created: whimsical, intoxicating, with the freshness and splendor of dreams. In hallucinatory color or elegant black-and-white, she brings us into lands that are very different from our own but oddly recognizable. They are lands filled with murderous grandmothers and lonely city dwellers, bad-tempered vegetables and walls that are surprisingly easy to fall through, lands in which the very air seems alive and capable of telling you a dirty joke (or the meaning of life).
In the title story, a new houseplant becomes the first step in an epic journey of self-discovery and a witty fable of modern romance complete with talking shrubbery, infantile gourmands, a wised-up genie, and one very depressed bird. This new selection is the perfect introduction to the work of an unforgettable, unjustly neglected master of French comics."
In the title story, a new houseplant becomes the first step in an epic journey of self-discovery and a witty fable of modern romance complete with talking shrubbery, infantile gourmands, a wised-up genie, and one very depressed bird. This new selection is the perfect introduction to the work of an unforgettable, unjustly neglected master of French comics."
100 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1978
16 people are currently reading
512 people want to read
About the author
Nicole Claveloux
118 books13 followersNicole Claveloux is a French painter, illustrator and comic book artist.
She was born in 1940 in Saint-Étienne, where she also studied fine arts. She moved to Paris in 1966, to work as an illustrator and comics artist. Her work appeared on a number of magazines, including 'Planète', 'Okapi', 'Marie Claire', 'Charlie Mensuel', as well as the alternative comics magazines 'Métal Hurlant' and 'Ah! Nana'.
She was born in 1940 in Saint-Étienne, where she also studied fine arts. She moved to Paris in 1966, to work as an illustrator and comics artist. Her work appeared on a number of magazines, including 'Planète', 'Okapi', 'Marie Claire', 'Charlie Mensuel', as well as the alternative comics magazines 'Métal Hurlant' and 'Ah! Nana'.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 80 reviews
August 26, 2024
Interesting collection of stories with art by Nicole Claveloux (who I had not heard of). The stories are somewhat surreal and are somewhat connected in a kind of flowing cinematic perspective. The art reminded me of a cross between Bakshi/Crumb. Very glad to have been introduced to this important French artist.
October 7, 2022
Nicole Claveloux was a strange mainstay of 70s Heavy Metal. Not sci-fi and not explicitly sexual. Her artwork and plots have a dream-like quality to them. Also one of the few female creators they featured.
Now all these years later we get the first collection of her work in English. It's great to have!
Now all these years later we get the first collection of her work in English. It's great to have!
March 27, 2022
Surreal.
Everything flowed, melted and reformed into newer, stranger images.
It was as though it had been written by an alien
- and Nicole Claveloux is French!
Enjoy!
November 26, 2017
In his introduction to The Green Hand (reproduced here), Daniel Clowes cites French comic book artist Nicole Claveloux as a formative influence, despite not having actually read any of her stories until the production of this new edition. The comics in this book were originally published between 1978 and 1980, but until now translations have been scarce and piecemeal, and translated versions have not been collected together before.
The first half of the book comprises five linked stories, collectively titled 'The Green Hand'. The first of these, also called 'The Green Hand', is by far the most arresting. A woman shares an apartment with a huge, very depressed, anthropomorphic bird. She decides to brighten their home by buying a plant. But the bird is jealous of the plant's presence, and hatches a cruel plan to kill it. In the end, the plant is destroyed, and woman and bird have a furious argument, before the woman's body surreally fractures and floats as she pitches through the apartment wall. The scene is absurd, the colours hallucinatory, yet a devastating amount of emotion is conveyed as the woman mourns the plant and rages against the cringing, self-loathing bird.
The second half is made up of seven one-off stories. I particularly loved 'The Little Vegetable Who Dreamed He Was a Panther', an almost too-on-the-nose depiction of the creative's tendency to self-sabotage through procrastination. An interview with Claveloux and her collaborator Edith Zha, included at the end of the book, reveals this story is close to the artist's heart: '[it] told the story of my life; it's my portrait of that time, my desires, my obstacles, etc.'
I'm not going to pretend I've read enough graphic novels or comics to be adequately able to judge Claveloux's influence and impact, but The Green Hand is intense and vivid, full of kaleidoscope colours and dreamlike scenes. It's grotesque, funny and, although it's a quick read, very memorable.
I received an advance review copy of The Green Hand and Other Stories from the publisher through Edelweiss.
TinyLetter | Twitter | Instagram | Tumblr
The first half of the book comprises five linked stories, collectively titled 'The Green Hand'. The first of these, also called 'The Green Hand', is by far the most arresting. A woman shares an apartment with a huge, very depressed, anthropomorphic bird. She decides to brighten their home by buying a plant. But the bird is jealous of the plant's presence, and hatches a cruel plan to kill it. In the end, the plant is destroyed, and woman and bird have a furious argument, before the woman's body surreally fractures and floats as she pitches through the apartment wall. The scene is absurd, the colours hallucinatory, yet a devastating amount of emotion is conveyed as the woman mourns the plant and rages against the cringing, self-loathing bird.
The second half is made up of seven one-off stories. I particularly loved 'The Little Vegetable Who Dreamed He Was a Panther', an almost too-on-the-nose depiction of the creative's tendency to self-sabotage through procrastination. An interview with Claveloux and her collaborator Edith Zha, included at the end of the book, reveals this story is close to the artist's heart: '[it] told the story of my life; it's my portrait of that time, my desires, my obstacles, etc.'
I'm not going to pretend I've read enough graphic novels or comics to be adequately able to judge Claveloux's influence and impact, but The Green Hand is intense and vivid, full of kaleidoscope colours and dreamlike scenes. It's grotesque, funny and, although it's a quick read, very memorable.
I received an advance review copy of The Green Hand and Other Stories from the publisher through Edelweiss.
TinyLetter | Twitter | Instagram | Tumblr
June 28, 2019
Reading this comic felt like dreaming - one of those dreams that make perfect sense but only while you're still in the middle of it all, still fully immersed into it, and then you wake up and you begin to wonder what the hell you just went through?
It made me think. I'm not sure about what, but I am thinking now. So I guess it was an eye-opening experience that way.
It made me think. I'm not sure about what, but I am thinking now. So I guess it was an eye-opening experience that way.
October 4, 2020
Thank you nyrb & Daniel Clowes !
https://youtu.be/3CIBZDCEPrY
https://youtu.be/3CIBZDCEPrY
December 21, 2017
THE GREEN HAND AND OTHER STORIES introduces me to the great cartoonist Nicole Claveloux. She published in Heavy Metal magazine when I was reading it as a boy, but I don’t recall her work, yet it looks instantly recognizable. Her style is of a time, trippy line drawings of fantastic dimensions that warp time and space into whatever pleases her. But these are not relics, even if evocative of the past. Her pen work is awe-inspiring as it rushes from crosshatched detail to brilliant negative spaces. Renowned for her use of color that bridges the surreal into the psychedelic, it is her shadows, those inky expanses of blackness, that anchor her drawings. I could look at them all day.
September 7, 2018
Nicole Claveloux I love you.
November 21, 2019
Synopsis: This anthology consists of stories from underground French cartoonist Nicole Claveloux during the 70s and 80s.
My Thoughts: First off, the art here was fantastic and especially shines in the title (and longest) story in the collection where the vivid psychedelic coloring and slick shading breathed in a sui generis layer of life and vivacity 'unlike any I’d seen before (or since)' to quote Daniel Clowes who wrote an excellent foreword to this book. While there was a lack of discernible plot in many of the stories, the whimsy, quirky nature of the characters and universe somehow managed to make up for it along with the droll, morbid humor sprinkled throughout including that comic with the little girl fantasizing having a period which humored me more than I had expected. Perusing through this work was similar to venturing into a weird acid trip or dream world which enthralls your imagination with fascination and intrigue while confounding you on what the deuce just happened after it's all over.
Final Thoughts: The Green Hand and Other Stories is an oddly charming work of surrealism worth looking into for anyone interested in psychedelic/underground art.
My Thoughts: First off, the art here was fantastic and especially shines in the title (and longest) story in the collection where the vivid psychedelic coloring and slick shading breathed in a sui generis layer of life and vivacity 'unlike any I’d seen before (or since)' to quote Daniel Clowes who wrote an excellent foreword to this book. While there was a lack of discernible plot in many of the stories, the whimsy, quirky nature of the characters and universe somehow managed to make up for it along with the droll, morbid humor sprinkled throughout including that comic with the little girl fantasizing having a period which humored me more than I had expected. Perusing through this work was similar to venturing into a weird acid trip or dream world which enthralls your imagination with fascination and intrigue while confounding you on what the deuce just happened after it's all over.
Final Thoughts: The Green Hand and Other Stories is an oddly charming work of surrealism worth looking into for anyone interested in psychedelic/underground art.
January 26, 2018
At last, a full-on English-language Nicole Claveloux collection. This contains The Green Hand, which is what I mainly knew her from via late-70s Heavy Metal issues, and it continues in its extended form as it was in microcosm: dreamily unpredictable, saturated in deep shadowy color contrasts, a little over-archetypal, but still one of the least typical and most interesting bits to turn up in Heavy Metal -- Claveloux and writer/collaborator Zha were also not so incidentally among the only women in those pages. I wish this also contained their other story together Dead Times, instead it has a somewhat random sampling of solo Claveloux shorts, which are more hit or miss, despite bits of great artwork and surrealist lapses seeded throughout.
June 6, 2019
The title story, The Green Hand, reads like a gorgeous nightmare.
The illustrations, the coloring, the story itself is all perfect. A talking bird and plant. A disintegrating woman. Too odd to summarize, tbh. Vivid coloring, the amount of detail in illustrations is what makes some images and scenes so nightmarish. The story, of course, is very odd and surreal. At times it feels like something Kafka could have written if he were a comics artist. I lingered on that story for days before moving on and even now it's the one I keep thinking about.
The other stories were also weird and gross. I liked some of the stories, like The Vegetable Who Dreamed He Was a Panther bc I see myself in it.
The illustrations, the coloring, the story itself is all perfect. A talking bird and plant. A disintegrating woman. Too odd to summarize, tbh. Vivid coloring, the amount of detail in illustrations is what makes some images and scenes so nightmarish. The story, of course, is very odd and surreal. At times it feels like something Kafka could have written if he were a comics artist. I lingered on that story for days before moving on and even now it's the one I keep thinking about.
The other stories were also weird and gross. I liked some of the stories, like The Vegetable Who Dreamed He Was a Panther bc I see myself in it.
May 14, 2018
I read this as a volunteer reader for the American Translators Association Literary Division's annual book translation prize; my task is to evaluate whether it's worthy of being passed on to the shortlist from which the actual winner will be selected.
Whooooo I was not ready for this. The images do the majority of the heavy lifting, though I did appreciate that the translator made an extra effort to really make the English text idiomatic. One I particularly liked was the use of "now and again," which is a great, normal way to say "from time to time."
I will be honest, most of this book creeped me the hell out. I love absurdism, as a category, but I do not love surrealism, its neighbor. This is a surreal masterwork, and I did not like it. Too many colors in too many weird ways, and everyone's faces are a little too detailed? Or something? Everything is lit from weird angles, like every terrifying picture of a clown you've ever seen. Only a book for a hundred pages.
I will note that I really particularly DID like the vegetable who wanted to be a panther, because while I still didn't like the art, it felt like she was narrating my own experience trying to make progress on anything.
Ultimately, for the fact that I never intend to read most of this ever again, I really did appreciate the commitment. I can see how this influenced a LOT of subsequent "sequential art"; and honestly probably art in general. It's very distinct (I just hate it).
Whooooo I was not ready for this. The images do the majority of the heavy lifting, though I did appreciate that the translator made an extra effort to really make the English text idiomatic. One I particularly liked was the use of "now and again," which is a great, normal way to say "from time to time."
I will be honest, most of this book creeped me the hell out. I love absurdism, as a category, but I do not love surrealism, its neighbor. This is a surreal masterwork, and I did not like it. Too many colors in too many weird ways, and everyone's faces are a little too detailed? Or something? Everything is lit from weird angles, like every terrifying picture of a clown you've ever seen. Only a book for a hundred pages.
I will note that I really particularly DID like the vegetable who wanted to be a panther, because while I still didn't like the art, it felt like she was narrating my own experience trying to make progress on anything.
Ultimately, for the fact that I never intend to read most of this ever again, I really did appreciate the commitment. I can see how this influenced a LOT of subsequent "sequential art"; and honestly probably art in general. It's very distinct (I just hate it).
January 15, 2021
The title story, “The Green Hand,” is the strongest entry in an already impressive collection. Throughout her comics, Nicole Claveloux works in the realm of dreams and the unconscious, staging psychodramas using talking animals, plants, babies, and other unlikely interlocutors.
December 26, 2017
if anyone reading this can teach me to use watercolor in this way and not in the dumb baby way i do it please let me know & maybe we can work out a deal
March 30, 2018
Strange and gross. I wish it was longer.
May 7, 2018
A dream of a book. I particularly loved "The Ninny and Her Prince Charming."
February 6, 2024
My first exposure to Nicole Claveloux was in the August 1977 issue of Heavy Metal, which featured the titular "The Green Hand" story here. In an issue containing the works of Tardi, Druillet, Corben and Moebius, it was interesting to me that the most striking piece in that issue was that of Claveloux's. Where Corben's "Den" and Moebius' "The Long Tomorrow" find superb ways to utilize color for their own distinct brands of psychedelia, it was Claveloux's colorful dreamlike surrealism in "The Green Hand" that really made me rethink the way colors are used in comics altogether. And even beyond the use of color itself was the construction of the story itself which followed a stream of consciousness approach that felt oddly satisfying despite the lack of finality to it. It was, after all, the first in a five part story, but after reading the entirety of "The Green Hand" in this reprint by New York Review Comics, I can't say there really was a narrative direction or a conclusion to the story. It's really about the road traveled (and untraveled) that makes this such a special little comic.
Collected in this edition published by NYRC are a few of Claveloux's works from Métal Hurlant and Ah Nana! (the women's exclusive offshoot of Métal Hurlant). "The Green Hand" is one of the main features here, with all five installments reprinted in their full technicolor glory. The story follows a woman and her pet bird who live in a stuffy little apartment. The opening chapter begins with the woman attempting to tend to a new plant she has and decides that she requires a "green hand" to allow the plant to flourish. Though she's informed that having a green hand is an innate talent and cannot be learned, she decides to simply paint her hand green for the sake of her plant. It's a minor plot point though since the rest of the narrative begins to shift into a bizarre journey as she floats through walls naked, relocates to a new career in a isolated hotel amidst a haunted forest and navigates the odd denizens who live in the woods. The narrative also follows the woman's bird, who is less of a pet and more of a roommate. Presented as a monstrous stork like entity, the bird displays a melancholic and even self-destructive attitude towards life, finding ways to bring the woman's mood down whenever he can. He goes on his own little dreamlike journey that is equally nonplussing with respect to the major narrative. It's the winding nature of the story here that really captures the imagination though, and for me it seems like Claveloux is exploring a series of "what ifs?" throughout.
The rest of the collection is primarily in black & white which allows for Claveloux's rigorous pen hatching to shine, though the fantastical brushed color gradients are a bit missed here. Plant metaphors are extended to "The Little Vegetable Who Dreamed He Was a Panther", a short story about a plant who dreams about having mobility - perhaps the truest metaphor for freedom. Other absurdist tales include "Underground Chatter", a story that is effectively a lengthy subway anecdote that gets progressively weirder. "No Family" is the only story in the back half to include color again, though it isn't quite as boldly colored as "The Green Hand" stories were. "No Family" is framed in the style of a children's picture-book but involves a series of murders all designed to set up a pretty predictable punchline.
This edition includes a nice interview with Claveloux and Edith Zha (writer of "The Green Hand" stories) along with an interesting forward by Dan Clowes. From what little I've gleaned from the extended material here is that "The Green Hand" itself is only a fraction of Claveloux's comics oeuvre, so I can't say how it stacks up with respect to her best work. But I can say safely that her work as presented here is nothing but a pure showcase of surrealism in comics done at the highest level. This is one of my favorite comics in my collection and something I've returned to a few times now with increasing joy each time I've read it.
Collected in this edition published by NYRC are a few of Claveloux's works from Métal Hurlant and Ah Nana! (the women's exclusive offshoot of Métal Hurlant). "The Green Hand" is one of the main features here, with all five installments reprinted in their full technicolor glory. The story follows a woman and her pet bird who live in a stuffy little apartment. The opening chapter begins with the woman attempting to tend to a new plant she has and decides that she requires a "green hand" to allow the plant to flourish. Though she's informed that having a green hand is an innate talent and cannot be learned, she decides to simply paint her hand green for the sake of her plant. It's a minor plot point though since the rest of the narrative begins to shift into a bizarre journey as she floats through walls naked, relocates to a new career in a isolated hotel amidst a haunted forest and navigates the odd denizens who live in the woods. The narrative also follows the woman's bird, who is less of a pet and more of a roommate. Presented as a monstrous stork like entity, the bird displays a melancholic and even self-destructive attitude towards life, finding ways to bring the woman's mood down whenever he can. He goes on his own little dreamlike journey that is equally nonplussing with respect to the major narrative. It's the winding nature of the story here that really captures the imagination though, and for me it seems like Claveloux is exploring a series of "what ifs?" throughout.
The rest of the collection is primarily in black & white which allows for Claveloux's rigorous pen hatching to shine, though the fantastical brushed color gradients are a bit missed here. Plant metaphors are extended to "The Little Vegetable Who Dreamed He Was a Panther", a short story about a plant who dreams about having mobility - perhaps the truest metaphor for freedom. Other absurdist tales include "Underground Chatter", a story that is effectively a lengthy subway anecdote that gets progressively weirder. "No Family" is the only story in the back half to include color again, though it isn't quite as boldly colored as "The Green Hand" stories were. "No Family" is framed in the style of a children's picture-book but involves a series of murders all designed to set up a pretty predictable punchline.
This edition includes a nice interview with Claveloux and Edith Zha (writer of "The Green Hand" stories) along with an interesting forward by Dan Clowes. From what little I've gleaned from the extended material here is that "The Green Hand" itself is only a fraction of Claveloux's comics oeuvre, so I can't say how it stacks up with respect to her best work. But I can say safely that her work as presented here is nothing but a pure showcase of surrealism in comics done at the highest level. This is one of my favorite comics in my collection and something I've returned to a few times now with increasing joy each time I've read it.
November 17, 2022
It's FANTASTIC *!* you will be entertained!
I became hooked on looking at her work through other works of hers on my French shelves, but the handwriting isn't translator-friendly enough (yet), so this was first full experience- which was so neat since I was treated to three types of narrative and got the only other printing of the middle short that was only seen in a rare female-run womens' bd magazine (right?). Plus, it's two and a touch tomes' worth of wonderfully whacky whimsicality.!!
In their "The Green Hand" (p. 9-48) collaboration, Zha writes quite interestingly which mints brilliantly in tableau within the visioabstractionarium created by Claveloux.
But be warned that expresses herself with no filters...
*reprinted in the States as "Heavy Metal Magazine"
I became hooked on looking at her work through other works of hers on my French shelves, but the handwriting isn't translator-friendly enough (yet), so this was first full experience- which was so neat since I was treated to three types of narrative and got the only other printing of the middle short that was only seen in a rare female-run womens' bd magazine (right?). Plus, it's two and a touch tomes' worth of wonderfully whacky whimsicality.!!
In their "The Green Hand" (p. 9-48) collaboration, Zha writes quite interestingly which mints brilliantly in tableau within the visioabstractionarium created by Claveloux.
But be warned that expresses herself with no filters...
*reprinted in the States as "Heavy Metal Magazine"
April 28, 2025
uma coletânea divertida de estórias insólitas - um pássaro deprimido, rainhas e princesas, planetas alienígenas - cheias de um autodeboche picante e observações sobre família, amor, coragem e resignação. desenhos de tirar o ar, letterings incríveis.
Read
November 25, 2017***** for the extended title story which operates with an unsettling dream logic.
The remaining stories are far less impressive.
The remaining stories are far less impressive.
May 18, 2018
This is a collection of creative comics out of France by an artist that I wasn't familiar with. About half the volume is the series that begins with The Green Hand and is a dark story with some really vivid and unique illustrations. The majority of the rest is filled with a variety of black and white works by Claveloux that all show some of the same creativity.
May 9, 2018
Gorgeous, surreal, luminescent work.
April 24, 2018
I will confess that a lot of what I read went over my head, but it was gorgeously illustrated. There are times when her style reminds me of Richard Corben's but Claveloux has a lot of other styles, too. The color stories are particularly mesmerizing.
October 4, 2025
Klasyk z czasów świetności „Metal Hurlant”, którego składowe przypominają strumienie świadomości bez zasad i logiki, będące wytworem nieskrępowanej wyobraźni twórczyń. Czasem trudno złapać jakiś trop interpretacyjny (tytułowe, najbardziej obszerne „The Green Hand”), czasem jest to krzywe zwierciadło relacji rodzinnych, jak w „No Family”, które mówi o tym kto kogo ze swoich krewnych zamordował. Bywa, że autorki trawestują klasyczne wątki baśniowe, by za chwilę zakpić z uwierających mieszczańską mentalność tematów tabu i ograniczeń, którymi dorośli kierują się podczas wychowywania dzieci („A Little Girl Always in a Dream”). W mojej ulubionej miniaturze („Stupistory nr 1”) rozpoznaję te męczące sny, w których próbujesz coś zrobić, ale nie możesz, bo trwa to całe wieki lub coś ci ciągle przeszkadza.
Deliryczny sen, którego nie można przegapić
Deliryczny sen, którego nie można przegapić
December 11, 2017
I'd seen and loved some of Claveloux's children's-book illustrations a while back, so when I found out nearly a year ago that an upcoming book would collect all of her comics work, I immediately pre-ordered a copy. I was not disappointed! Her style is a unique type of post-pop surrealism that feels both nostalgic and foreign to me at the same time - and the stories themselves (several written in collaboration with writer Edith Zha) are wonderful and strange and unsettling. I have precisely one complaint, and that's that there aren't more - though there she seems to have a lot of illustration work out there (though regretfully little in English), her comics output is tantalizingly modest. That said, Claveloux is an amazing talent, and every line is worth cherishing.
December 26, 2017
Some of the best illustrations I’ve ever seen. A really incredible collection of work.
May 25, 2018
I love this depressed French bird.
March 29, 2018
Trippy, beautiful, odd and surreal with an at times hilarious focus on the body. The art's the standout.
March 25, 2023
Thank you NYRC for translating European comics!!
June 26, 2022
Man, I want to read these stories again.
Great art, that, as a child of the 1970s, reminded me of B. Kliban and M. K. Brown teaming for stories in Heavy Metal magazine instead of National Lampoon.
Recommended for fans of fantasy comics and art.
Thanks for the loan to Emory University Library, Science Commons collection.
Great art, that, as a child of the 1970s, reminded me of B. Kliban and M. K. Brown teaming for stories in Heavy Metal magazine instead of National Lampoon.
Recommended for fans of fantasy comics and art.
Thanks for the loan to Emory University Library, Science Commons collection.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 80 reviews