I think both, Tony. His fascination with magick and synchronicity have always seemed silly to me outside the context of his stories, but his actual approach to them is anything but frivolous. He's very well read and always seems to go at them from an intellectual perspective. The ritualism is From Hell was was quite compelling and I've mostly heard good things about his exploration of magick in Promethea.

Agapito Qhelas wrote: Moore is widely regarded to be the best comic book writer ever and one of his works, Watchmen, is thought to be the pinnacle of the medium.

Of what kind of comic books?  That's like saying X is considered the best author of books without specifying what kinds of books they write: fiction, non fiction, historical, self-help, catalogs.  If a person generalizes and puts Moore at the top of the list of all authors of comic books of all time, regardless of the genre, then I'd have to cry foul.  His superhero work alone, especially on mainstream all ages, iconic heroes isn't enough to make him "the best" superhero writer "ever". 

As far as WATCHMEN being the "pinnacle of the medium" I'd laugh if I wasn't choking on my own bile.  It's just OK.  There are certainly superhero comic books, many of them in fact, that are far more worthy than the dark, deconstructionist, unsuperheroic story that is WATCHMEN.

You might choke all you like, but Watchmen, the movie, was *promoted* as being based on "The Most Celebrated Graphic Novel of All Time"

I'm not saying what Alan Moore and Watchmen are. You can think any number of writers or comics are better; I'm saying what they are considered to be and why fans tend to pay attention when he speaks on a subject.

Moore has done some brilliant work as a writer, but by no means would I put him anywhere near the top of the list of greatest comic book writers.

What I want to know, though, is has he always been eccentric or did he have a nervous breakdown at some point?

P.S. You know what? I never did actually ever read Watchmen until this year (checked it out at the local library), and when I did I found it good but very highly overrated.

Agapito is right. The opinion of any one of us is anecdotal, but broad perception is that Moore's one of the greats. Monte wanted to know why the clamor and that's the simple answer.

Sure, but if we use that qualifier then no one but Stan Lee holds any importance!

I could almost roll with that, but I think Moebius and Tezuka would frown on me :)