Neil Gaiman Claps Back at Criticism, Says 'The Sandman' Was Always 'Woke'

Author Neil Gaiman on Tuesday hit back at a Twitter user who said an audio adaptation of The Sandman would succeed if it would "stay unwoke." Gaiman countered that his creation has been "woke" since he first introduced the character more than 30 years ago.

The interaction occurred after Gaiman announced the third part of Audible's adaptation of The Sandman, which features the voices of such stars as James McAvoy, Kat Dennings and Jeffrey Wright. Gaiman, who debuted The Sandman comic book for DC Comics in 1988 and this year helped create Netflix's live-action Sandman series, tweeted that the latest Audible installment is "soooo good."

Even so, a person who uses the name S.M. 1776 on Twitter wrote, "Stay unwoke and Sandman will do just fine."

Gaiman responded: "Too late. Sandman was already woke in 1988. But good news! We did fine anyway!"

Newsweek reached out to Gaiman for comment and was told by a representative that the author had nothing else to add on the matter because he's addressed the "woke" issue in the past.

The Sandman's Netflix adaptation stirred up some controversy online when it was announced that the show had cast several people of color—as well as a nonbinary actor—for central roles.

Gaiman addressed bigoted comments that were posted on social media by tweeting in late May that he gives "zero f**ks about people who don't understand" The Sandman and the choices made about the cast.

More recently, Gaiman spoke with Times Radio about being called "woke." In a clip the outlet posted online last week, the Coraline author compared the concept of being woke to political correctness.

"When people are accusing me of being quote-unquote woke for Sandman stuff that I wrote 35 years ago...it's like, 'Well, yes,'" Gaiman said. "I remember when instead of calling it woke they called it politically correct. And then you talk about political correctness gone mad."

He continued, "And I remember once reading a book where they started talking about political correctness and the fact that you could no longer make jokes about people's ethnicity or religion in the same way. And I thought, Well, actually, that's just—that's not political correctness. That's just treating other people with respect."

Gaiman also made headlines last month when he was asked about Elon Musk's assessment of Amazon's The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.

Musk had tweeted that J.R.R. Tolkien, the author of The Lord of the Rings, "is turning in his grave" due to the adaptation. He added, "Almost every male character so far is a coward, a jerk or both. Only Galadriel is brave, smart and nice."

Asked about Musk's take on the show, Gaiman replied, "Elon Musk doesn't come to me for advice on how to fail to buy Twitter, and I don't go to him for film, TV or literature criticism."