Sheffield graduates Will Milner and Richard Scott present the online version of their graphic short from Issuu.com.
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About The Story
Gallus Gallus: The Naked Heel is described by writer Will Milner as a modern take on an Aesop’s fable; the first-person narrative of a nameless protagonist who has his perspective changed by a chance surreal encounter with a rooster on his uncle’s farm.
Like all good stories, it begins over a pint in the pub. The 12-page ‘graphic short’ sees the protagonist exiled from his community after assaulting the wrong man, and hiding out on his uncle’s farm. There he is driven to the point of breakdown and seeming insanity at the claws of a rooster, which culminates in a moment of naked clarity in the middle of the woods at night.
Themes of pride, aggression, redemption and guilt all feature in this captivating and beautifully illustrated short story.
Milner envisions this as the first in a possible series of such tales. “There are so many wicked, funny and sad stories that drunken old men have told me. There’s a whole series of tales that somehow or other involve animals and that put you in mind of Aesop’s fables.
“As far as The Naked Heel is based in fact, well the essential elements are the same. There was a guy who did have an encounter with a rooster in the countryside and he said it changed his way of looking at things, but the characters and choreography of the story is all made up. The main point is that he finds himself naked in the woods with a brick – that much is true.”
The story of The Naked Heel draws on these tall tales, but Milner’s writing was also influenced by the background he shares with them: ‘I’m from a little village in Somerset where there’s a funny, almost nihilistic sense of humour, which hopefully comes across in the comic.’
The comedy is indeed dark, and with Scott’s fitting illustrations The Naked Heel is an intriguing and highly original piece of artwork.
About the Authors
Will Milner and Richard Scott met in their first year at the University of Sheffield and have been friends ever since. Both Scott and Milner are creative. Philosophy graduate Milner is a teaching assistant by day and uses his evenings to write. Scott is working on his PhD on dream theory and interpretation in Early Modern history, and in his spare time he pursues his love for drawing.
Milner in particular has plans to take his writing to another level. He is working on various projects, including an idea for an interactive audio book. This project would use recorded narration, dialogue and sound effects, which participants would listen to as they took certain routes through historic sections of Sheffield.
“I noticed that if I was walking through a place and I had got a particular tune on my headphones I thought about the place completely differently’ says Milner. ‘Plus we discovered a surround sound technique that really does sound like there’s footsteps walking past you; there’s real potential to scare people. The project we are working on at the moment is about the ghost of the city and how it has changed over time.”
In addition to the pair’s creative sparks, part of what makes Milner and Scott such good friends is the passion that they both have for telling stories. There is a clear energy between the two when they discuss this, bouncing ideas off each other.
Scott: “Stories allow you to invent yourself. Narratives are always about creating symmetry between ideas and helping you to understand life in a particular way.” This is something Milner clearly agrees with, stating that “there’s something really nice when a reader gets something out of your story that you didn’t intend or particularly see because it makes it seem like it’s got a bit of a life of its own.”
Amy Patricia Smith