Notebook One: Cerebus #24 Part Nine

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.

Maybe instead of rewriting this opener every week, I’ll be a bit more efficient with my use of time and have this standard opening . . .though Boss Man saying I'm giving the notebook away for free, I see it as a way of advertising all the good stuff in the notebook, and wouldn't it be easier to have a hard copy to flip through and read at your own leisure? 

Have you got your copy of Albatross One? That is Dave Sim’s name for his first notebook used in the creation of Cerebus. If you want a copy of the notebook – and trust me, as someone who has held the actual Albatross One, it is a pretty close duplicate and looks great – you can check out this post right here. Well not this post. The one at this link. Go check it out, this post will still be here.

And if you don’t want to buy one, you can wait as I release a couple of pages a week and check them out using the Notebook One tag. But trust me, the notebook is much much nicer then my silly little posts.

Okay, now that is done, on with this week’s Notebook One post.

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Last week we left off on page 108 of Dave Sim’s first notebook used during the publication of Cerebus. That page was a wall of text with Dave annotating it with circled numbers indicating which page he thought the item would be on. And those numbers on page 108 ended with 17.  So what happened to #18 through 20? Well, they’re on page 109:

Notebook #1, page 109

Then down at the bottom of the page, we see yet another rehashing of the plot for pages #1 through 15 for Cerebus #24.  We also see a note for Cerebus #25: “Town has Sepran soldiers housed in it.” Flip the page to #110 and we get the notes for #s 13 through 20, and then a bit more on Cerebus #25:

Notebook #1, page 110

The item marked as Cerebus #25 on this page is “Cerebus is headed for a farmhouse near Fluroc. He has five bags of gold hidden under the floor boards. Remember? #17?” This does make page one of Cerebus #25, but as this line: “…His curiosity about the apocalypse beast woman-thing and Professor Charles X’s Plan compels him to take the longer route to the eight bags of g old he had hidden beneath the floorboards of a small farmhouse near Fluroc. . .”

We also get a sketch of Madam DuFort Professor Charles X. Claremont, and a quote from what appears to be Cerebus “That reminds Cerebus of a Borealan saying ‘People with porcelain armour shouldn’t initiate military confrontations.” Then near the bottom of page we get yet another recap of plot points for Cerebus #24. Though Dave has numbered only #1 through 8. And yes, that is what continues on the next page.

Notebook #1, page 111

Though in all of this text, only two numbers appear: #11 & 12. The text in the middle is the dialogue between Cerebus and Theresa talking about Elrod’s rescuing of a kid in a bunny suit. But then she continues on about Elrod visiting the school, but Dave leaves this out of the finished issue:

Believe, M’Sieu? Elrod himself broke bread in this very house not more than a year ago. And t old us these stories swearing on his oath as an officer and a swordsman and a gentleman of royal blood that every word was true. Well, I guess there’s no denying a first hand report indeed M’Sieu. Quite so! 

Going to the next page, I think we are finally done with Cerebus #24 material.

Notebook #1, page 112

A quick sketch of Cerebus laying in bed with a grimace on his face as he tries to sleep over the ‘schluk schlock schluck’ noises. Up at the top of the page Dave wrote the notes: Portfolio. Outtakes. Pigeon scene from #21. Skulls from #15.

If you’re curious about pages #113 through #117, check out “The Notebook Pages for The Challenge”. You can also see pages #118 and #124 in “The Way to Sannozay”.