Neil Gaiman, the author of acclaimed comic book series The Sandman, has denied a series of allegations of sexual misconduct, including one incident alleged to have taken place in Cornwall. The author said he has “never engaged in non-consensual sexual activity with anyone,” after claims from eight women were published in New York Magazine this week.
The article, which was published on Monday, January 13, reports claims from eight women, including four women who previously made allegations against the Sandman author in a podcast series last year. One of the alleged incidents is said to have taken place in Cornwall, while Mr Gaiman and a woman were visiting the county.
In a blog post shared yesterday, Mr Gaiman said he read the allegations with “horror and dismay”: “As I read through this latest collection of accounts, there are moments I half-recognise and moments I don’t, descriptions of things that happened sitting beside things that emphatically did not happen.
“I’m far from a perfect person, but I have never engaged in non-consensual sexual activity with anyone. Ever,” he said.
He continued, saying he had read back text messages from the time of the alleged incidents and felt they were “of two people enjoying entirely consensual sexual relationships”. He said that while reading through them, he realised he “could have and should have done so much better”, adding he was “not as thoughtful as I could or should have been”.
In July last year, Tortoise Media produced a series of podcast episodes covering sexual assault allegations against Mr Gaiman made by five women. Mr Gaiman’s representatives had previously told Tortoise Media that “sexual degradation, bondage, domination, sadism and masochism may not be to everyone’s taste, but between consenting adults, BDSM is lawful”.
A police report accusing the author of sexual assault was made in January 2023, but the investigation was eventually dropped.