David Beck's THE PIG WARS

I am thrilled, thrilled, thrilled to share one of my student's debut books... Introducing THE PIG WAR, written by John Placentius, puzzled out by Michael Fontaine, and illustrated by Winthrop University Illustration student David Beck! I asked him about it... As the descriptor states:

A timeless fairytale of privilege and oppression

In 1530, amid the ferment of the Reformation, the strangest poem in all of Latin literature appeared. Written by one Joh Placentas, it consists of 248 verses in which every word begins with the letter p. The poem—titled Pugna Porcorum—is a satirical epic telling of a conflict between the corrupt hogs, who are hogging all the privileges, and the disgruntled piglets, who want in on them. It devolves into open war.

In The Pig War, Michael Fontaine offers the first critical Latin text and the first translation of the Pugna into any language, and original illustrations by David Beck bring the timeless fairytale of privilege and oppression to life. In an afterward, Fontaine explores the poem's possible influence on Orwell's Animal Farm, and he explains how Plaentius' ill-advised pseudonym, Publius Porcius, triggered all kinds of misidentifications, accusations, recriminations, and, in modern scholarship, at least on hilarious crackpot theory.

Fascinating, right? Here's the opening page. (Right click to see the image larger.)The poems are interspersed with David's black and white images, that he created in Procreate on an iPad Pro. He uses a brush he downloaded that simulates a micron pen, because he says it felt really good to him. Curved lines on the pigs bodies show how the shadows lay on various forms.
Poems are in Latin on the left and in English on the right. David also formatted the book, so every page was laid out by him in inDesign. (Right click the image to see it larger.)Followed by more illustrations. David likes cinematic angles, which is obvious in this first piece.
     David shared that he got this project through his girlfriend who used to work at the Paideia Institute, with whom Fontaine worked through. David says his favorite part of the project was the world building. There were very few visual resources for this story, that had never been translated into English before. The only existing images are from the 1600s and are in the back of the book. David had to decide whether or not the pigs stood upright, what they wore, what the architecture looked like. David got to make all the decisions about what he thought the story was portraying and what the story meant to him. For instance, it didn't make sense to him that they should be carrying guns in a world with cobblestones, wood, and hay—marketplaces with simple beams of wood. In working with one line weight, he used herringbone to differentiate surfaces, somewhat like printmaking or etching and seemed to fit the story.
      The book is published by The Paideia Institute for Humanistic Study, Inc. at www.paideiainstitute.org. You can purchase the book from Paideia HERE or from AMAZON HERE.