May
22
Written by:
James Burke
22 May 2010 10:18
The 9/11 Commission Report, formally named Final Report of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, is the official report of the events leading up to the September 11, 2001 attacks. It was prepared by the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (informally sometimes known as the "9/11 Commission" or the "Kean/Hamilton Commission") at the request of the President and Congress, and is available to the public for sale or free download.
The 9/11 Commission Report was released to the Public Domain(follow @thepublicdomain if interested in this topic) and available as a PDF, on scribd (flash & HTML5), LibreVox audio and an XHTML version amongst many other formats.
The 9/11 Report: A Graphic Adaptation by Sid Jacobson and Ernie Colón, and published by Hill & Wang, is an abridged graphic novel adaptation of the report (although a copyrighted work).
Preview pages from the graphic novel are available from the Amazon website and an eight page extract is available via The First Post.
Whilst these extracts are useful I personally don’t think that they do the graphic novel justice.
The adjacent contents page from the graphic novel are the same as the full commission report but the quote below from Stan Lee sums up the adaptation nicely for me.
Never before have I seen a nonfiction book as beautifully and compellingly written and illustrated as The 9/11 Report: A Graphic Adaptation. I cannot recommend it too highly. It will surely set the standard for all future works of contemporary history, graphic or otherwise, and should be required reading in every home, school, and library.
Stan Lee
A recommended purchase and read as a prelude to the full report and it leaves me wondering whether a graphic adaptation of the UK Iraq Inquiry / Chilcot Inquiry will ever be developed and/or encouraged as it is a great way of encouraging a legal Remix culture.