Tideland
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Tideland is the third published book by author Mitch Cullin, and is the third installment of the writer's Texas Trilogy that also includes the coming-of-age football novel Whompyjawed and the novel-in-verse Branches.
Lyrically written and dark in tone, the story is a first-person narrative told by the young Jeliza-Rose, detailing the summer she spent alone at an isolated, rundown farmhouse in Texas called What Rocks. With only the heads of old Barbie dolls to keep her company, Jeliza-Rose embarks on a series of highly imagined and increasingly surreal adventures in the tall grass surrounding the farmhouse.
Tideland was first published in the U.S. in 2000 by Dufour Editions. While destined to maintain a cult status, the book received major notices upon publication, including a review from New York Times Book Review which wrote that Cullin's novel was "brilliant and beautiful." Some have favourably compared the book to earlier Southern Gothic American literature such as To Kill a Mockingbird and A Rose for Emily, while others, including Terry Gilliam and film producer Jeremy Thomas, have called the book a modern hybrid of Psycho and Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. A subsequent United Kingdom paperback edition followed in 2003 from Weidenfeld & Nicolson, with Gilliam's infamously funny blurb on the cover: "F*cking wonderful!". Other editions have since been published in The Netherlands, Japan, France, Greece, Italy, Poland and Russia.
In 1999, Cullin sent a pre-publication galley to Gilliam for a cover blurb, but Gilliam so liked what he read that he optioned the book with an eye to direct. The controversial film version was produced by Gabriella Martinelli and Jeremy Thomas for Capri Films and Recorded Picture Company, and was directed by Gilliam and shot in Canada in 2004. Cullin was given a brief cameo in the movie, contributed lyrics to the soundtrack, and the name "M. Cullin" appears on the mailbox at the farmhouse where much of the film takes place. The script adaptation was written by Gilliam and screenwriter Tony Grisoni.
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