Notebook 21: Cerebus #170 Part One

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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Last week we saw the pages from Dave’s 21st notebook that covered the Lord Julius and Baskin dialogue from Cerebus #169 pages 18 and 19. This week we’re jumping into Cerebus #170 with thumbnails for pages 8 and 9:

Notebook #21, page 84

And while they are pretty close, the panel count for page 9 doesn’t match up with the final published page. The thumbnails show us going from a six panel grid on page 8 to a four and five panel layout for page 9. However,  page 9 in the finished work maintains the six panel grid. The next sketch below the two pages is for page 10 of the issue, and while the feet sticking out of the blankets and the three Swoon dialogue balloons show up on the finished page, the text is different as is the layout of page 10. On the notebook the text says: “Please. Just three more strokes. I was almost there.” On the finished page 10 the dialogue from Swoon is “I’ll be right out in a few more strokes. Er. . .minutes my sister.”

On the next page of the notebook, we again see the feet sticking out of the blankets that is used on page 10, and then we get a page listing for the end of Cerebus #170. And yes, page 15 does have a bit from Cirin’s The New Matriarchy that goes over sorcery and meanders into childbirth and motherhood being the One True Path. On page 16 we get a paragraph from Astoria’s Kevillist Origins that goes against the Cirinist belief of childhood as the end all and be all of a woman’s existence. 

Notebook #21, page 85

Then the bottom third of the page is the first revision of Cirin’s text for page 15 of Cerebus #170.  The text continues onto page 86:

Notebook #21, page 86

After the last few sentences from Cirin’s The New Matriarchy excerpt, we get an excerpt from Astoria’s Kevillist Origins. Both are pretty spot on with the final pages of Cerebus #170.  

The final text excerpt is Jaka’s dream. But it isn’t the dream we see on pages one and two of Cerebus #169 as the text in the notebook is different, and the notebook starts with ‘The dream continued’. So I’m thinking this part of Jaka’s dream turned into page 17 of Cerebus #170, which is Jaka walking around a garden, seeing Cerebus with arms outstretched, but when she looks again, the Cerebus figure has turned into an angel statue. This text of Jaka’s dream continues to the next page of the notebook.

Notebook #21, page 87

I can’t find this text in the series, if you know where it is located, speak up. Here are both parts, from page 86 of the notebook and then the next revision on page 87:

THE DREAM CONTINUED to haunt Jaka’s waking hours. Even as she tried to think, to reason her way through the strange and inexplicable sensations encompassing her, the particular triple image of book, maze, and life coloured each thought and sensations. She had thought she had at last put her life in Iest behind her, or so she had thought. She had cried her tears and gradually

THE DREAM CONTINUED to haunt Jaka through the rest of that day. Though she often dreamed at night, her dreams had always faded evaporated with the morning dew and if they remained at all it was as a series of disconnected images and impressions. As of late afternoon shadows stretched across the manicured grounds of the Executive Building, the book, the maze, and her life still seemed tangible. She still smelled the delicate scent of the candles. In the past two months she had managed to put away all of her past life behind her. Rick, Oscar, the apartment, the jail, her nurse. She thought only of her duties as Lord Julius’ official hostess, planning meals dinners, parties, masquerades, entertainment.  Even now she knew she should be consulting wit the cooks and the caterers, choosing subdued but elegant place settings fo the reception for the joint delegation from Iest and Upper Felda. Instead she continued to stare out the window as the sun set and the sky became a deep navy blue, cut with wisps of crimson and pink and saw this seeing only the maze, the book, the stone chair, the gilt lettering and the small girl at her elbow. 

‘Cerebus is alive, you know. And he loves you very much.’

It wasn’t possible. It was just a dream.

Wasn’t it?