PAUL SLADE:
Published between 1981 and 1984, Dave's six Swords of Cerebus volumes were his first attempt to collect the book in a more permanent form. He gave each story included in these volumes a prose introduction, explaining where the book stood when he'd been working on that particular issue and how he was thinking of its prospects at the time. We’re currently covering the intros from Swords volume 3. Also check out the full 'Swords Of Cerebus' Introductions Index.
"This was the first time that Cerebus is shown to use any discretion whatsoever
when it comes to a potential confrontation," says Dave.
Next week: The Sarah Bernhardt of comics.
3 comments:
And here we get both the Origin of Dave's use of the Hunt 102 and Winsor-Newton brushes AND the wrist-action fever that would eventually end his drawing career. Like Logan's adamantium implantation making him better than ever but eventually overriding his healing ability. The bitter irony!
Like a deal with the devil: Draw like nobody's business for 25 years or so, winning acclaim and fortune, and then, suddenly, no more. I guess we all have to go through the yin and the yang, don't we?
"Wrist Action Fever". Good name for a band.
"Acclaim and fortune?"
I must have missed something.
"Notoriety and subsistence living?"
As I indicated before, these introductions are mostly entertainment. Me trying to be funny: writing Dave Sim the cartoonist as a kind of comics character. Comedic hyperbole. If you're reading lines like "screamed at me from every panel" that's what you're reading.
I didn't realize, at this point, how important it was to be 100% honest when committing recollections to paper and posterity. And not to mix humour with autobiography. If you're relating a funny anecdote, yes, that's fine. But don't try to make an autobiographical anecdote funny by "riffing" on it.
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