A Victim of Laughing Chance

MARGARET LISS:

A few years ago I scanned all of Dave Sim's notebooks. He had filled 36 notebooks during the years he created the monthly Cerebus series, covering issues #20 to 300, plus the other side items -- like the Epic stories, posters and prints, convention speeches etc. A total of 3,281 notebook pages detailing his creative process. I never really got the time to study the notebooks when I had them. Just did a quick look, scanned them in and sent them back to Dave as soon as possible. So this regular column is a chance for me to look through those scans and highlight some of the more interesting pages.

It has been a while since we've looked at Dave's twenty-fifth notebook, back in April of 2016, Pleasure's Simple Life.  Covering Cerebus #213 through 241 with only 96 pages of this smaller notebook scanned, there is a bit on Rick Nash and his story.

On page 19 it looks like perhaps "Pleasure's Simple Little Lives" was originally going to be Rick's Story, and not F. Stop's.

Notebook #25, page 19

The quote under the issue number box is a quote from the Steely Dan song, Deacon Blues, which is also the name they want when they lose. The lines right before that line is "Drink Scotch whiskey all night long And die behind the wheel".  Good thing Cerebus can't drive and just wants some raw potatoes and ale with his scotch.

After a bit of stuff from Guys, we get another look at what an older Rick would look like:

Notebook #25, page 28

"If you're lucky there's a few good years at the end there."

Indeed.