Letter From and To The Prime Minister

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.

We last saw Dave Sim’s second notebook in a post called A Soliloquy in Graveyard from January of 2020. The second notebook covers Cerebus #27 through 37 and had 198 out of 200 pages scanned. 

On page 34 of the notebook we see a sketch of Cerebus in bed, holding his head in hand. A very similar drawing appears on page one of Cerebus #29. 

Notebook #2, page 34

At the top of the notebook page is an outline for Cerebus #29. However, it doesn’t quite match up with the finished issue. For example, the notebook has the “formal sounding threat answer” on page four, but in the finish issue that answer is at the bottom of page three. The Regency Elf does show up on page 7 just like, the outline states.

On the next page of the notebook there is a rough sketch of page #2:

Notebook #2, page 35

Even on the next page Dave had put the “formal sounding threat letter” and the “formal sounding threat answer” on the same page. The dialogue does’t quite match up, but the differences are small. The art on the other hand is different. Here is the final page for comparison:

Cerebus #29, page 2 (aka High Society page 70)