Memory, Prophecy and Fantasy: The Works and Worlds of Clive Barker

Memory, Prophecy and Fantasy is the continuing project to document the evolving themes, concerns and passions within Clive's work. With full access to Clive's archives and invaluable contributions from his friends and closest collaborators, for the last fifteen years we have been piecing together fragments, scripts, sketches and ephemera to chart the successes, the failures and the what-might-have-beens, compiling the definitive and illustrated portrait of Clive's work.

What started as a personal exploration into the plays performed by the Dog Company in the years before Clive rose to prominence with his eponymous Books of Blood has blossomed into a multi-volume series that will ultimately cover all of Clive's works, all the way from those earliest plays through his more famous works and right up to the present day.

"I sobbed my heart out because there were so many things in there that I hadn't thought of before. Amazing. Breath-taking. And you have captured, or quoted, or found things I just would not have remembered in my life, you know? I think in some ways I was crying for a life that I'd forgotten. You know, my thoughts, and meanings: you are the keepers of those."

Clive Barker

"I sat down and read from page one through both of the books you did about my life and putting all those pieces in order with all those wonderful illustrations and, I have to tell you, the critical analysis that you guys did of all the material is second to none, it's absolutely breath-taking... Watching you summarise the plays and the stories and then draw it out in a very straightforward, clear fashion what the salient points are: breath-taking. I just wanted you to know that...
"And what the two of you have done with these books, what you are doing, is going to be - when all of us are dead, unfortunately! Certainly when I'm dead! - is going to be a matrix, a model for a way that people won't do things in the future. Just as people don't do things the way Cocteau did things - back in the Fifties there just weren't the models - people don't make art that way anymore and I think the models will have changed again. What you're doing is, doing for me, is what nobody ever did for Cocteau which is to preserve everything. We know almost nothing about his early drivers. We know them only as echoes of what Picasso was doing, we know what Picasso was painting and we know Cocteau's there because he's in a drawing but quite what he was doing there at the age of twenty... ? You know, he obviously was doing something of significance because he's in all the drawings and all the photographs, but nobody knows. And you've done that for me. You've filled in all the blanks."

Clive Barker

The Making of Hellraiser

by Phil and Sarah Stokes

The legacy of Clive Barker's movie, Hellraiser, has reached far into the minds and hearts of filmgoers and filmmakers in the years since its 1987 theatrical release.

It has spawned multiple sequels, inspired three separate runs of comic books, influenced fashion and culture, prompted academic texts and documentaries and added the iconic figure of Pinhead to the pantheon of great horror characters.

This full-colour companion book, scheduled for 2024 (put back due to the Dark Worlds book project overtaking it), includes unseen material drawn from full and exclusive access to Clive's own archived notes, drafts, sketches and screenplays which document his step into the world of feature filmmaking. Alongside these are materials from the archives of New World Pictures and from the archives of cast and crew of the film.

Documenting the journey from vision to page to screen and reflecting reaction at the time, it illuminates the creative passion and commitment from Clive and his collaborators in front of and behind the cameras - a shared passion that forged a landmark in horror movies.

This definitive volume covers:

• early film and theatrical projects from Clive and the Dog Company which pre-figure the themes of Hellraiser;

• the critical reaction to the Books of Blood and The Damnation Game, Clive's first published fiction;

• writing screenplays for Rawhead Rex and Underworld;

• writing The Hellbound Heart as the basis for a possible debut theatrical drecting project;

• collaborations with Christopher Figg, Bob Keen and others in the pre-production stage;

• Clive's first draft screenplay, with annotations and analysis of amendments to the shooting script;

• the detailed shooting schedule;

• pre-production and production artwork;

• casting

• set visits and contemporaneous press reports and cast and crew interviews;

• on-set and behind-the-scenes photographs;

• press and publicity material;

• critical reaction on release;

• the mythology and metaphysics of Hellraiser; and

• the birth of a franchise.

Much has been said about Hellraiser in the three decades since cameras first rolled in September 1986. Featuring exclusive new commentary from Clive himself, this lavishly illustrated, studio-approved, large format book draws out the thoughts and observations of those involved with the film - as they were making it.

The book will contain unpublished and rarely seen materials, such as this on set image, taken by photographer Steve Lyne (high quality prints of which are available at his site). 

For more images see the Archive Gallery.

Gallery Installations