Notebook 21: Oct 1992 Calendar & Cerebus #164 Page 17

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’re continuing our look at Dave Sim’s 21st notebook used during the creation of Cerebus #164 to 187. We’ll be looking at this notebook, which there were 260 out of 300 pages scanned, until we’ve seen every single page of it. Well, the pages scanned. If you want to see all of the notebook #21 posts to date, just use the Notebook 21 tag. 

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Pages 15, 16, and 17 of Notebook 21 is what we saw last week in ‘Notebook 21: Cerebus #164 page 12 & 13’. This week we continue with page 18. And yes, it has material for Cerebus #164./ Kind of.

Notebook #21, page 18

Cerebus #164 is dated November of 1992 and thanks to friend of the blog, Jesse, I know now it was actually published on December 2, 1992. Looking at the dates above, it must be October of 1992. For if it were 1991, I don’t think we’d see the material for Cerebus Campaign ’93 right below it. 

So not only is Dave working on Cerebus #164 page 9, but the Free Cerebus cover at the same time. October 14 through 18 is crossed off as are October 28 through November 1st, which says ‘Portland’. I just pulled my copy of Cerebus #161 and on the back is the Cerebus US Tour ’92 listing. October 4th is Phoenix, AZ, October 16 – 18th is Seattle, and October 31st and November 1st is Portland. In the calendar are dates for the ’92 tour and then we have Campaign ’93 material right under it, though we never did see that trading card set for Campaign ’93.

We are skipping page 19 because we saw it in November of 2014, Notebook 18: Ends & Odd Bits. It had some Campaign ’93 material but also Cerebus dressed in an t-shirt with the Image I on it and talk of Spawn 10.

The following page goes back to Cerebus #164 material. 

Notebook #21, page 20

Hard to tell from the page thumbnail what it is – other than a Cerebus in the bottom right panel. The dialogue gives it away: "She’s gone to get the guards, dear. Finish your drink. I’m afraid we are out of time." Those words were spoken by the original Cirin to Cerebus as her keeper, Vera, had enough and went to get the Cirinist guards. The words appear on page 17 of Cerebus #164. 

The thumbnail doesn’t really match up with that page – as it looks like a six-panel grid while the finished page is an eight-panel gird. But looking at the thumbnail closer, I’m thinking it is the thumbnail for page 17. The top left corner matches up with original Cirin closing her eyes as Vera’s notepapers fly at Original Cirin’s face. We get an upset Vera looking down at us in the top right corner which matches the 3rd panel on the top of page 17. 

However, the sketches on the bottom panel more resemble that which is on page 18: original Cirin standing and in the bottom right corner a shocked looking Cerebus. Dave must’ve taken this thumbnail and turned it into two pages.  If you want to see if Dave did that on the next page of the notebook, then take a look at the entry from September of 2015, Alcohol Is Free and There Is No Last Call. Instead of another page thumbnail we get the rest of the original Cirin’s dialogue as she says goodbye to Cerebus.