A TEESSIDE University lecturer has released a graphic novel about a famed Irish revolutionary to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the Easter Rising.

The Trial of Roger Casement, released in comic book form by Fionnuala Doran, focuses on the life and struggles of the celebrated humanitarian and Irish revolutionary who is believed to have been an inspiration for Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness.

He first came to prominence for exposing the atrocities of Belgium's King Leopold II in the Congo Free State in his 1904 Casement Report and was knighted for his services in 1911.

However, Casement became enamoured with the Irish independence movement and the book focusses on his efforts to gain German support for an independent Ireland and his subsequent arrest in County Kerry.

Casement was publicly outed by the release and circulation of his private diaries – what became known as The Black Diaries – after his arrest.

The 120 page novel pictures his interrogation, his incarceration in the Tower of London and his time in the dock at the Old Bailey.

The novel also highlights several other serious subject areas such as LGBT history, the struggle for acceptance and the treatment of the oppressed and disadvantaged by western powers.

Ms Doran said: “Roger Casement is a fascinating character, he was, in turn, a humanitarian, a revolutionary and then denounced as a traitor.

“He has now become an icon for LGBT Ireland following the gay marriage vote of 2015."

Ms Doran is a graduate of the Royal College of Art in London and won the British Library’s Comics Unmasked competition in 2014.

She is a lecturer on Teesside University's degree course on comics, graphic novels and sequential art.

The Trial of Roger Casement will be published by SelfMadeHero in September.