Spider-Man’s editor. Marvel’s Head of Special Projects. Writer of the Beano.
This is the CV of comic book legend Tim Quinn.
And Tim isn’t just the man behind some of the world’s favourite characters – he’s quite the character himself.
From learning to draw on the wall of his childhood bedroom in 1950s Liverpool, to illustrating and writing much-loved DC Thomson characters like Dennis The Menace, Minnie The Minx and Hungry Horace, Tim went on to become editor of his ultimate hero – Spider-Man – at the renowned Marvel Comics.
But it’s his own story he’s telling now, in a brand new “book beyond a book” created by Iranian author and artist Iman Kakai-Lazell – Tim Quinn: Confessions of a Superhero.
Iman and Tim met quite serendipitously on a plane from New York City to the UK.
“It was the most frightening plane ride!” Tim laughs, recalling the day the book was conceived. “We went through storm after storm after storm!
“So to take our minds off this horror, we started telling each other our tales. And by the time we touched down, she had come up with this idea…”
That idea grew into Confessions of a Superhero – a blend of stunning visuals and stories of Tim’s life among the inner workings of some of pop culture’s biggest names.
“She turned my life into a work of art,” Tim says of the graphic-novel style book.
“It reminds me, when I flick through it, of what’s supposed to happen to you before you die. My whole life flashes before me – but at least it’s been an interesting life!”
It certainly has.
Tim describes his own superpower as “the gift of the gab”, and with a wealth of fictional friends at his fingertips and a little black book containing every major name from Yoko Ono to Stan Lee, he’s never short of a yarn to spin.
So as Spidey-fever sweeps the nation on the release week of Spider-Man: No Way Home, The Courier caught up with him to hear first-hand the “Marvel-lous” life story of this real-life superhero.
Video guide:
- On learning to draw – 0.17
- On DCT comics – 3.34
- On getting that break – 7.27
- On superheroes – 9.44
- On tricks of the trade – 13.49
Click here to jump back to the video
Tim Quinn: Confessions of a Superhero by Iman Kakai-Lazell available from Moochin’ About. RRP £25.