David Victor Sim (born May 17, 1956 in
HamiltonHamilton is a port city in the Canadian province of Ontario. Conceived by George Hamilton when he purchased the Durand farm shortly after the War of 1812, Hamilton has become the centre of a densely populated and industrialized region at the west end of Lake Ontario known as the Golden Horseshoe...
,
OntarioOntario is a province located in east-central Canada, the largest by population and second largest, after Quebec, in total area. Ontario is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Manitoba to the west and Quebec to the east, and 5 U.S...
) is an award-winning
CanadianCanada is a country occupying most of northern North America, extending from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
comic bookA comic book is a magazine made up of narrative artwork, often accompanied by dialog and often including brief descriptive prose...
writerA writer is anyone who creates a written work, though the word usually designates those who write creatively or professionally, as well as those who have written in many different forms.-Profession:...
and
artistThe definition of an artist is wide-ranging and covers a broad spectrum of activities to do with creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. the worlds best artist is a man named mitchell peter lay who is often loved by the ladies. The common useage in both everyday speech and...
, best known as the creator of
Cerebus the AardvarkCerebus the Aardvark, or simply Cerebus , is an award-winning independent comic book, written and illustrated by Canadian artist Dave Sim, with backgrounds by fellow Canadian Gerhard. Cerebus began in December 1977, and was concluded in March 2004, running for 300 issues and 6,000 pages. The...
.
Early life
Dave Sim was born in Hamilton and moved to
Kitchener, OntarioThe City of Kitchener is a city in Southern Ontario, Canada. It was the Town of Berlin from 1854 until 1912 and the City of Berlin from 1912 until 1916. The city had a population of 204,668 in the Canada 2006 Census...
with his family when he was two. His father Ken–a native of Glasgow, Scotland–was a factory supervisor at
Budd AutomotiveThe Budd Company is a metal fabricator and major supplier of body components to the automobile industry. The company's headquarters are in Troy, Michigan. It was founded in 1912 by Edward G...
and his mother an elementary school secretary. He has an older sister named Sheila.
He was interested in comics from an early age, and dropped out of high school to pursue a career in the field. The only job he ever held outside of the comic field was working as an employee at Now and Then Books. "It was the only place in Kitchener that I ever felt truly comfortable before or since", Sim has said.
In the 1970s he published a
fanzineA fanzine is a nonprofessional and nonofficial publication produced by fans of a particular cultural phenomenon for the pleasure of others who share their interest...
called
The Now and Then Times (financed by Harry Kremer, the owner of the comic book store after which the newsletter was named), and did work for such other fanzines as John Balge's
Comic Art News and Reviews and
Gene DayHoward Eugene Day was a Canadian comic book artist best known for Marvel Comics' Star Wars licensed series and Master of Kung Fu...
's
Dark Fantasy and
National Advisor. Sim often interviewed professional comics artists such as
Barry Windsor-SmithBarry Windsor-Smith, also known as Barry Smith is a British comic book illustrator and painter whose best known work has been produced in the United States....
,
Harvey KurtzmanHarvey Kurtzman was a U.S. cartoonist and magazine editor. Kurtzman often signed his name H. Kurtz, followed by a stick figure Harvey Kurtzman (October 3, 1924, Brooklyn, New York – February 21, 1993) was a U.S. cartoonist and magazine editor. Kurtzman often signed his name H. Kurtz, followed by a...
and
Neal AdamsNeal Adams is an American comic book and commercial artist best known for helping to create some of the definitive modern imagery of the DC Comics characters Superman, Batman, and Green Arrow; as the co-founder of the graphic design studio Continuity Associates; and as a creators-rights advocate...
.
Sim also created various other comics, including a newspaper
comic stripA comic strip is a sequence of cartoons that tells a story, often humorous, though adventures and soap opera-like dramas are also prevalent. They are written and drawn by a comics artist or cartoonist, and many are published on a recurring basis in newspapers and on the Internet.In the UK and the...
called
The Beavers which was published in the
Kitchener-Waterloo Record, and wrote or drew stories published in anthologies such as
Phantacea and
Star*Reach.
The Beavers also saw print in
Star*Reach's sister
funny animalFunny animal is a cartooning term for the genre of comics and animated cartoons in which the main characters are humanoid or talking animals, with anthropomorphic personality traits. The characters themselves may also be called funny animals...
s comic
Quack!.
Cerebus
In December 1977, Sim began publishing
Cerebus, an initially bi-monthly, black-and-white comic book series. It began as a
parodicA parody , in contemporary usage, is a work created to mock, comment on, or poke fun at an original work, its subject, author, style, or some other target, by means of humorous, satiric or ironic imitation...
cross between
Conan the BarbarianConan the Barbarian is a fictional character in books, comics and movies. He is a hero, a well known and iconic figure in American fantasy, and the most famous barbarian in fiction.Conan is often associated with the fantasy subgenre of sword-and-sorcery and heroic fantasy...
and
Howard the DuckHoward the Duck is a comic book character in the Marvel Comics universe created by writer Steve Gerber and artist Val Mayerik. The character first appeared in Adventure into Fear #19 and several subsequent series have chronicled the misadventures of the ill-tempered, anthropomorphic, "funny...
. Progressively, Sim shifted his narrative style from story arcs of a few issues' length to longer, far more complex "novels", beginning with the storyline known as
High Society. The prominent
sword and sorcerySword and sorcery is a fantasy subgenre generally characterized by swashbuckling heroes engaged in exciting and violent conflicts. An element of romance is often present, as is an element of magic and the supernatural...
elements in the series up to that point were minimized as Sim concentrated more on
politicsPolitics is a process by which groups of people make decisions. The term is generally applied to behavior within civil governments, but politics has been observed in all human group interactions, including corporate, academic and religious institutions...
and
religionA religion is a system of human thought which usually includes a set of narratives, symbols, beliefs and practices that give meaning to the practitioner's experiences of life through reference to a higher power, deity or deities, or ultimate truth...
.
Cerebus was published through Sim's company,
Aardvark-VanaheimAardvark-Vanaheim is a Canadian comic book company most known for publishing Dave Sim's Cerebus.For a brief time, the company also published other titles. This was mainly in the early 1980s, and most of these titles moved to Renegade Press...
which was run by his wife, Deni Loubert. The two met in 1976, married in 1979, and divorced after nearly five years.
In 1979, Sim was admitted to
K-W HospitalGrand River Hospital is a 495-bed hospital serving Waterloo Region, Ontario, Canada and surrounding communities, primarily through the K-W Health Centre and the Freeport Health Centre, both located in Kitchener...
by his wife and mother after several days of taking
LSDLysergic acid diethylamide, LSD-25, LSD, formerly lysergide, commonly known as acid, is a semisynthetic psychedelic drug of the ergoline family...
. He later stated in his
Getting Riel dialogue with
Chester BrownChester Brown is a Canadian alternative cartoonist. His underground work was initially self-published, then released by the independent publishing company Vortex Comics...
that he was "diagnosed as a borderline schizophrenic." During his convalescence, Sim hit upon the idea of making
Cerebus into a 300-issue series, something that had never been done in Western comics with the same artist and writer.
In the 1980s, when
Cerebus was a large success for an independently produced comic book, Sim did much travelling to promote the series, which reached a peak circulation of 36,000 copies. In 1984 he began a collaboration with Gerhard, who handled the background drawings in the series. Aardvark-Vanaheim, managed by Loubert, began publishing other comics besides
Cerebus, such as
William Messner-LoebsWilliam Messner-Loebs is an American comic book writer and artist from Michigan, also known as Bill Loebs and Bill Messner-Loebs...
'
JourneyJourney: The Adventures of Wolverine MacAlistaire was an independent comic book created by William Messner-Loebs about Michigan frontier life in the 19th century....
and
Bob BurdenBob Burden is an American comic book artist and writer, best known as the creator of Flaming Carrot Comics and the Mysterymen.Born in Buffalo NY in 1952, Burden grew up in the industrial rust belt of the great Northeast. After 20 years of Buffalo, Pittsburgh, New Jersey, Milwaukee, Akron and...
's
Flaming Carrot. After Sim and Loubert's separation, Loubert started
Renegade PressRenegade Press was an American comic book company, founded by Canadian Deni Loubert, that operated from 1984 to 1988. Loubert was publisher of Aardvark-Vanaheim until she and husband Dave Sim divorced, at which point she started Renegade and moved to the United States. Notable titles published by...
, which assumed publishing duties for all non-
Cerebus Aardvark-Vanaheim titles.
Although Sim did not maintain a consistent monthly schedule for the entire run, which at times required an accelerated production schedule to catch up, he completed the
Cerebus series on schedule in March 2004. He purchased Gerhard's stake in Aardvark-Vanaheim, and has made arrangements for the
copyrightCopyright is a form of intellectual property that gives the author of an original work exclusive right for a certain time period in relation to that work, including its publication, distribution and adaptation, after which time the work is said to enter the public domain...
of
Cerebus to fall into the
public domainThe public domain is a range of abstract materials—commonly referred to as intellectual property—which are not owned or controlled by anyone. The term indicates that these materials are therefore "public property", and available for anyone to use for any purpose...
following his death.
After Cerebus
Following the completion of
Cerebus in 2004, Sim produces occasional guest work, goes to conventions and regularly attends city council meetings, provides interviews and art for a Texas-based magazine called
Following Cerebus, and reports on Kitchener politics for a local magazine called
Versus.
As of 2006, Sim is working on the Cerebus
ArchiveAn archive is a collection of historical records, and the location in which the collection is kept. Archives contain records which have accumulated over the course of an individual or organization's lifetime....
Project, an
onlineONLINE is a magazine for information systems first published in 1977. The publisher Online, Inc. was founded the year before. In May 2002, Information Today, Inc. acquired the assets of Online Inc....
searchable
databaseA database is an integrated collection of logically related records or files consolidated into a common pool that provides data for one or more multiple uses....
of Cerebus materials. Sim is also in the process of reading the
GospelA gospel is a writing that describes the life of Jesus. The word is primarily used to refer to the four canonical texts: the Gospel of Matthew, Gospel of Mark, Gospel of Luke and Gospel of John, probably written between AD 65 and 80...
s and The
Book of RevelationThe Book of Revelation, also called the Revelation of St. John, the Apocalypse of John, and the Revelation of Jesus Christ, is the last book of the New Testament. It may be shortened to Revelation but never Revelations...
out of
Brooke Foss WestcottBrooke Foss Westcott was an English churchman and theologian, serving as Bishop of Durham from 1890 until his death.-Early life and education:...
and
Fenton John Anthony HortFenton John Anthony Hort was an Irish theologian and editor, with Brooke Westcott of a critical edition of the The New Testament in the Original Greek.-Life:...
's 1881
interlinearIn linguistics and pedagogy, an interlinear gloss is a gloss placed between a line of running text and its translation, so that each line of the original text acquires multiple lines of transcription known as an interlinear text or interlinear glossed text , or interlinear for short...
GreekGreek , an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, is the language of the Greeks. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. In its ancient form, it is the language of classical...
to
EnglishEnglish is a West Germanic language that developed in England during the Anglo-Saxon era. As a result of the military, economic, scientific, political, and cultural influence of the British Empire during the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries, and of the United States since the mid 20th century,...
translationTranslation is the interpreting of the meaning of a text and the subsequent production of an equivalent text, likewise called a "translation," that communicates the same message in another language...
of The
New TestamentThe New Testament is the name given to the second major division of the Christian Bible, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament, both terms being associated with Supersessionism...
semi-weekly and taking notes. He has said that he plans to publish a commentary on it, using Chester Brown's artwork for the
Gospel of MarkThe Gospel of Mark is the second of the four Canonical Gospels, but is believed by most contemporary scholars to be the first gospel written, on which the other two synoptic gospels, Matthew and Luke, were partially based....
from Brown's unfinished gospel project as illustrations. Recently Sim said he may make his notes available as a free digital book. This project was discussed in
Collected Letters: 2004, and in recent letters between Sim and his readers.
In late 2006 and early 2007, Sim conducted public readings of the 1611 King James Bible at the Registry Theatre in Kitchener in order to raise money for the Food Bank of Waterloo Region. His stated intention is to read the Old Testament, the New Testament, and the Qu'ran. All of these readings have been taped and are being sold on eBay to raise money for the food bank. This project was discussed in
Collected Letters: 2004 and in recent letters between Dave and his readers.
Beginning in 2006, Sim began publishing an on-line comic book biography of Canadian actress
Siu TaSiu Ta is a Vietnamese Canadian actress and independent short film producer.- Biography :Born in South Vietnam, she moved to Canada with her family at age seven. A graduate of the University of Toronto majoring in drama, she has been steadily building a career in film and stage entertainment since...
titled
Siu Ta, So Far.
In late 2007, Sim announced two upcoming projects. One, which he initially referred to only as "Secret Project One", is
Judenhass (
GermanGerman is a West Germanic language, thus related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. It is one of the world's major languages and the most widely spoken first language in the European Union. Around the world, German is spoken by approximately 105 million native speakers and also by...
for "Jew hatred"), a 56-page "personal reflection on The Holocaust" which was released on May 28, 2008. The other is
glamourpussglamourpuss is an Canadian independent comic book written and illustrated by Canadian artist Dave Sim. Sim promises that the comic will ship promptly bimonthly, with 24 pages of story and art...
, a comic book series which is a combined parody of fashion magazines and a historical study of the photo-realist style of comic strip art as developed by
Alex RaymondAlexander Gillespie Raymond was an American cartoonist, best known for creating Flash Gordon for King Features in 1934...
and
Milton CaniffMilton Arthur Paul Caniff was an American cartoonist famous for the Terry and the Pirates and Steve Canyon comic strips.-Early life:Caniff was born in Hillsboro, Ohio. He was an Eagle Scout...
, for which he did a "tour" of online forums related to comics in February 2008.
In spring 2009, Sim began publishing
Cerebus Archive, a bimonthly presentation of his work before and surrounding
Cerebus.
Art, lettering, storytelling
Dave Sim's art, lettering, and storytelling innovations influenced several generations of comic book creators. Some artists integrated his visual style to the point of sometimes being originally called copycats, such as
James A. Owen-Biography:Owen was best known in the 1990s for self-publishing the black-and-white fantasy series Starchild under his Taliesin Press imprint. He then changed his self publishing to Coppervale Press for Starchild: Crossroads, then went to Image for the start of Starchild: Mythopolis, before...
(in
StarchildStarchild was a densely illustrated fantasy comic book self-published in the 1990s by James A. Owen. There were 24 issues total, and the series has been collected in a boxed set of reprints titled The Essential Starchild from Owen's Coppervale Press....
, 1990s) or
Troy LittleTroy Little is a Canadian comic book writer-artist, also working as an animator. He is known for Chiaroscuro, a graphic novel whose first volume was developed between 2000 and 2005 under his Meanwhile Studios imprint. After winning two grants and being praised by Dave Sim, Chiaroscuro vol...
(in
ChiaroscuroChiaroscuro is a comic series developed by Canadian artist Troy Little between 2000 and 2005.-Publication history:Little began self-publishing in 2001 and after releasing two issue he received a Xeric in 2001 which allowed him to produce another five issues. Personal circumstances slowed progress...
, 2000-2005/2007); others used only some of his storytelling tools, such as
Alex RobinsonAlex Robinson is an award-winning American comic book writer and artist.He grew up in Yorktown Heights, New York, and graduated from Yorktown High School in 1987. After a year spent at SUNY Brockport, he went to the School of Visual Arts in New York City, and graduated with a BFA in cartooning in...
(in
Box Office PoisonBox Office Poison is an acclaimed series of comic books by Alex Robinson. It was published in collected form by Top Shelf Productions in 2001...
, 1996-2000/2000). Sim jokingly calls them "Dave Sim magpies".
Sim's pioneering use of an extended, multi-layered storytelling canvas, divided in large arcs divided in mostly self-contained issues, was acknowledged by
J. Michael StraczynskiJoseph Michael Straczynski , known professionally as J. Michael Straczynski and informally as Joe Straczynski or JMS, is an American writer/producer. He works in a variety of media, including films, television series, novels, short stories, comic books, and radio dramas...
as his inspiration for the structure of
Babylon 5Babylon 5 is an American science fiction television series created, produced and largely written by J. Michael Straczynski. The show centers on the Babylon 5 space station: a focal point for politics, diplomacy, and conflict during the years 2257–2262...
.
Creator rights
During the 1980s and early 1990s, Sim used his
sales leverageIn finance, leverage or leveraging refers to the use of debt to supplement investment. Companies usually leverage to increase returns to stock, as this practice can maximize gains...
from
Cerebus to act as a major proponent and advocate of creator's rights and
self-publishingSelf-publishing is the publishing of books and other media by the authors of those works, rather than by established, third-party publishers. Although it represents a small percentage of the publishing industry in terms of sales, it has been present in one form or another since the beginning of...
. After
the Puma Blues incidentThe Puma Blues was a comic book written by Stephen Murphy and drawn by Michael Zulli. It ran from October 1986 to somewhere in the beginning of 1989, stretching over 23 regular issues and a single "half-issue" minicomic....
, he helped write the Creators' Bill of Rights along with
Scott McCloudScott McCloud is an American cartoonist and theorist on comics as a distinct literary and artistic medium.-Biography:...
, and
Kevin EastmanKevin Brooks Eastman is an American comic book artist, best known as the creator of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Eastman is also the current owner, editor and publisher of the magazine Heavy Metal.-Biography:Kevin Eastman was born on May 30, 1962 in Springvale, Maine...
and
Peter LairdPeter Alan Laird is an American comic book artist. He is best known for co-creating Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in the fall of 1983 with Kevin Eastman.-Early life and career:...
, creators of the
Teenage Mutant Ninja TurtlesThe Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are a fictional team of four mutant turtles, who were trained by a giant, talking rat sensei, Master Splinter, in the art of Ninjitsu...
. In addition to speaking on these topics at comic book
conventionsA fan convention, or con , is an event in which fans of a particular film, television series, comic book, actor, or an entire genre of entertainment such as science fiction or anime and manga, gather to participate and hold programs and other events, and to meet experts, famous personalities, and...
(as in his 1993 PRO/con speech), Sim also published the seminal
The Cerebus Guide to Self-Publishing in 1997, which instructed readers on the practical matters of how to successfully self publish their own comics. Sim often promoted other creators' fledgling work in the back pages of
Cerebus.
Sim has criticized the use of
copyrightCopyright is a form of intellectual property that gives the author of an original work exclusive right for a certain time period in relation to that work, including its publication, distribution and adaptation, after which time the work is said to enter the public domain...
s to restrict the use of creations which would have more quickly become public domain under earlier copyright law. He has stated that other creators are free to use his characters in their own works, which he characterizes as an attempt to be consistent with his own appropriation of others' works.
Feminism controversy
In the course of writing Cerebus, Sim expressed views contrary to
feminismThe term Feminism can be used to describe an academic discourse, or to describe a political, cultural or economic movement aimed at establishing more rights and legal protection for women...
, modern
materialismThe philosophy of materialism holds that the only thing that exists is matter; that all things are composed of material and all phenomena are the result of material interactions. In other words, matter is the only substance. As a theory, materialism is a form of physicalism and belongs to the...
, and leftist politics. Sim expressed his views on gender in issue #186 of
Cerebus, in a text piece as part of the story arc
Reads (one of four books in the larger
Mothers & Daughters arc), using the
pseudonymA pseudonym is a fictitious name used by a person, or sometimes, a group.Pseudonyms are often used to hide an individual's real identity, as with writers' pen names, graffiti artists, resistance fighters' or terrorists' noms de guerre and computer hackers' handles. Actors, musicians, and other...
Viktor Davis. The piece categorized humanity into metaphorical
lights, which tended to reside in biological men, and
voids, which tended to be in biological women.
The expression of these views caused major
controversyControversy is a state of prolonged public dispute or debate, usually concerning a matter of opinion, but sometimes the allegation that a matter of scientific fact is no better than opinion or even religious belief, as in the controversy between evolutionary biology and Creationism or Intelligent...
in the comic book industry and among his readership, and were followed by a substantial decline in sales. In 1995,
The Comics JournalThe Comics Journal, often abbreviated TCJ, is the foremost US magazine of news and criticism pertaining to comic books and strips...
#174 featured a
Bill WillinghamBill Willingham is an American writer and artist of comics.-Biography:Willingham got his start in the late 1970s to early 1980s as a staff artist for TSR, Inc., where he illustrated a number of their role-playing game products...
caricature of Sim on one of the covers, bearing the title
Dave Sim: Misogynist Guru of Self-Publishers. Inside was a lengthy article written by
Jonathan HageyJonathan Hagey is an Canadian television producer best known for pop culture program Zero Avenue. His work was broadcast on the CBC....
and
Kim ThompsonKim Thompson is an American comic book editor, translator, and publisher, best known as vice president and co-publisher of Seattle-based Fantagraphics Books. Along with co-publisher Gary Groth, Thompson has for almost thirty years used his position to further the cause of alternative comics in the...
about responses to Sim’s piece. The article published responses from comics creators such as
Alan MooreAlan Oswald Moore is an English writer known for work in comics, including the acclaimed comic book series Watchmen, V for Vendetta and From Hell...
, Canadian Gregory Gallant (better known by his pen name
SethSeth is the pen name of Gregory Gallant , a Canadian comic book artist and writer. He is best known for comics like Palooka-Ville.-Biography:Born in Clinton, Ontario, Seth attended the Ontario College of Art in Toronto...
),
Rick VeitchRick Veitch is an American comic book artist and writer who has worked in mainstream, underground, and alternative comics. He is the brother of Tom Veitch, underground comix writer, American poet, and writer of Star Wars comics.-Early career:...
, Steve Bissette, and Sim’s friend (and fellow Canadian)
Chester BrownChester Brown is a Canadian alternative cartoonist. His underground work was initially self-published, then released by the independent publishing company Vortex Comics...
. The responses ranged from anger to a belief that Sim was joking. The article also included a short interview with Sim's ex-wife, wherein she described the essay as evidence of Sim being "very scared". The article was accompanied by an illustration depicting Sim as a
NaziNazism, known officially in German as National Socialism , is the totalitarian ideology and practices of the Nazi Party or National Socialist German Workers’ Party under Adolf Hitler, and the policies adopted by the dictatorial government of Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945.Nazism is often considered...
GermanGermany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered to the north by the North Sea, Denmark, and the Baltic Sea; to the east by Poland and the Czech Republic; to the south by Austria and Switzerland; and to the west by France, Luxembourg, Belgium,...
concentration camp warden, standing in front of a gate with the name of his publishing company on the top. Piles of emaciated bodies lay within. In the essay in
Cerebus #186, Sim characterized fellow self-publishing cartoonist
Jeff SmithJeff Smith is an American cartoonist, best known as the creator of the self-published comic book series Bone.-Early life and education:...
as an example of a man dominated by his wife. Smith contested this, and Sim later challenged Smith to a
boxing matchBoxing is a combat sport where two participants, generally of similar weight, fight each other with their fists. Boxing is supervised by a referee and is typically engaged in during a series of one to three-minute intervals called rounds. There are three ways to win...
to sort things out.
In 2001, Sim published another essay called "Tangent" in
Cerebus #265, (April 2001). In it, Sim furthered the themes from
Reads, describing the veering-off course (or tangent) he contends
western societyWestern culture refers to cultures of European origin.The term "Western culture" is used very broadly to refer to a heritage of social norms, ethical values, traditional customs, religious beliefs, political systems, and specific artifacts and technologies...
has taken due to the widespread acceptance and proliferation of feminism, beginning in 1970.
The Comics Journal posted the full essay on its website, although a short introduction by staff distanced the Journal from the ideas therein, calling them "nutty and loathsome". The site's message board received many responses, mostly opposing Sim's arguments. The next issue of the journal included a rebuttal to the first Tangent by "Ruthie Penmark", a pseudonym for Anne Elizabeth Moore, one of the
Journals editors. Several years later, in TCJ issue #263, the Journal
devoted a section to discussion of Cerebus
. In it was a reprint of an essay by Renee Stephen, first published in 2001, titled Masculinity's Last Hope, or Creepily Paranoid Misogynist? : An Open Letter to Dave Sim
, addressing the "Tangent" controversy.
Recently, as a response to the criticism he has received, Sim has declared that he will only correspond with people who first agree that he is not a misogynist. , saying he will only answer letters and submissions if they sign an online petition titled, "I don't believe Dave Sim is a misogynist."
Relationship with
The Comics Journal
The coverage of his writings about feminism was not the only subject of Sim's conflict with The Comics Journal
. He and Gary GrothGary Groth is an American comic book editor, publisher, and critic. He is editor-in-chief of The Comics Journal and a co-founder of Fantagraphics Books.- Early career :...
, editor-in-chief of The Comics JournalThe Comics Journal, often abbreviated TCJ, is the foremost US magazine of news and criticism pertaining to comic books and strips...
, have enjoyed a combative relationship over the years. Groth and Thompson are co-owners of Fantagraphics BooksFantagraphics Books is an American publisher of alternative comics, classic comic strip anthologies, magazines, graphic novels, and the adult-oriented Eros Comix imprint.The company is currently located in the Maple Leaf neighborhood of Seattle, Washington....
, which publishes such high-profile creators as Daniel ClowesDaniel Gillespie Clowes is an Academy Award-nominated American author, screenwriter and cartoonist of alternative comic books. Most of Clowes' work appears first in his ongoing anthology Eightball , a collection of self-contained narratives and serialized graphic novels...
, Peter BaggePeter Bagge is an award-winning American comics artist and creator of Buddy Bradley, Hate, Neat Stuff, Martini Baton, and Sweatshop. His stories often use black humor and exaggerated cartooning to dramatize the reduced expectations of middle-class American youth...
, and Chris WareFranklin Christenson "Chris" Ware is an American comic book artist and cartoonist, best-known for a series of comics called the Acme Novelty Library, and a graphic novel, Jimmy Corrigan, the Smartest Kid on Earth. Born in Omaha, Nebraska, he resides in Oak Park, Illinois as of 2007.-Style:Ware's...
. The magazine was the first to publish a review of the first dozen or so issues of Cerebus, by
Kim ThompsonKim Thompson is an American comic book editor, translator, and publisher, best known as vice president and co-publisher of Seattle-based Fantagraphics Books. Along with co-publisher Gary Groth, Thompson has for almost thirty years used his position to further the cause of alternative comics in the...
in 1979.
Early in the 1990s, Groth took issue with Sim’s stance of self-publishing as the best option for creators, and began to disseminate the view that it was best to work for a publisher, mentioning
Ivan BoeskyIvan Frederick Boesky is an American businessman who is notable for his prominent role in a Wall Street insider trading scandal that occurred in the United States in the mid-1980s....
's address to the University of California's commencement ceremony in May 1986, where Boesky informed his audience that "greed is all right, by the way. I want you to know that. I think greed is healthy. You can be greedy and still feel good about yourself." Sim took this as an implication by Groth that the motivation for self-publishing is greed, whereas his belief was that self-publishing was the best option for reasons of principle: creative autonomy and ownership of one's own creations.
In 2000, Groth and Thompson published "The Comics Journals 100 Greatest Comics of All Time", a list selected by its writers, which some commentators noted appeared biased towards Fantagraphics titles and seemed to pointedly omit
Cerebus.
Later, on a panel at the San Diego Comic Con Groth indicted Sim in a "Nuremberg-style tribunal designed to bring to light the most deserving criminals who had over the past decade and longer besmirched the good name of the comics art and industry" Sim was charged with boosting the speculation boom in the comics market in 1992, early boosterism of
Image ComicsImage Comics is an American comic book publisher. It was founded in 1992 by seven high-profile illustrators as a venue where creators could publish their material without giving up the copyrights to the characters they created, as creator-owned properties...
, making a "misogynist rant", and promoting self-publishers at their expense, this last wherein Groth accused Sim of promoting self-publishing to the point of possibly bankrupting thousands of self-publishers.
Sim was interviewed by
Tom SpurgeonTom Spurgeon is a U.S. writer, historian and editor in the field of comics. He was editor of The Comics Journal from 1994 to 1999. In 2004, he launched the comics news blog The Comics Reporter with site designer Jordan Raphael....
for the magazine in 1996, the second part of which interview was published eight issues after the first, which was interpreted by Sim as a slight. Despite this adversarial relationship over the years, Groth telephoned Sim to congratulate him upon the completion of his work on
Cerebus in December 2003, and later published an issue of the
Journal featuring a critical roundtable on
Cerebus.
Theology and philosophy
Following his reading of the
BibleThe Bible contains the central religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. Modern Judaism generally recognizes a single set of canonical books known as the Tanakh, or Hebrew Bible, as it is written almost entirely in the Hebrew language, with some small portions in Aramaic...
and the
Qur'anThe Qur’an is the central religious text of Islam...
beginning in December 1996, Sim underwent a
religious conversionReligious conversion is the adoption of new religious beliefs that differ from the convert's previous beliefs. It involves a new religious identity, or a change from one religious identity to another. Conversion requires internalization of the new belief system...
from
atheistAtheism can be either the rejection of theism,or the position that deities do not exist.In the broadest sense, it is the absence of belief in the existence of deities....
secular humanismSecular humanism is a humanist philosophy that espouses reason, ethics, and justice, and specifically rejects the supernatural and the spiritual as the basis of moral reflection and decision-making...
to a non-mainstream
monotheismIn theology, monotheism is the belief that only one god exists. The concept of "monotheism" tends to be dominated by the concept of God in the Abrahamic religions, such as Judaism, Christianity and Islam, and the Platonic concept of God as put forward by Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite...
of the Abrahamic religions. He lives a lifestyle of
fastingFasting is primarily the act of willingly abstaining from some or all food, drink, or both, for a period of time. A fast may be total or partial concerning that from which one fasts, and may be prolonged or intermittent as to the period of fasting...
,
celibacyCelibacy is defined as the lifestyle of someone who is, and is striving to remain, unmarried all his/her life. It is also used to describe a state of life where one chooses to abstain from all sexual activities...
,
prayerPrayer is the act of addressing a god or spirit for the purpose of worship or petition. Specific forms of this may include praise, requesting guidance or assistance, confessing sins, as an act of reparation or an expression of one's thoughts and emotions...
, and
alms-givingAlms or almsgiving is a religious rite which, in general, involves giving materially to another as an act of religious virtue.It exists in a number of religions. In Philippine regions, alms are given as charity to benefit the poor. In Buddhism, alms are given by lay people to monks and nuns to...
, and considers
scripturesReligious texts, also known as scripture, are the texts which various religious traditions consider to be sacred, or of central importance to their religious tradition...
from the Jewish (the
TorahThe term "Torah" , refers either to the Five Books of Moses or to the entirety of Judaism's founding legal and ethical religious texts...
, and
Nevi'imNevi'im is the second of the three major sections in the Hebrew Bible, the Tanakh. It falls between the Torah and Ketuvim .Nevi'im is traditionally divided into two parts:...
),
ChristianA Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic, religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, who Christians believe was the Messiah prophesied in the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible, and the Son of God.The term "Christian" is also used adjectivally to...
(the Gospels,
ActsThe Acts of the Apostles is the fifth book of the New Testament. It is commonly referred to as Acts and outlines the history of the Apostolic Age...
and the
Book of RevelationThe Book of Revelation, also called the Revelation of St. John, the Apocalypse of John, and the Revelation of Jesus Christ, is the last book of the New Testament. It may be shortened to Revelation but never Revelations...
), and
IslamIslam Islam Islam ( al-’islām,
[There are ten pronunciations of Islam in English, differing in whether the first or second syllable has the stress, whether the s is or , and whether the a is pronounced as in father, as in cat, or (when the stress is on the i) as in the a of sofa...]
ic (the
Qur'anThe Qur’an is the central religious text of Islam...
) religions to be equally valid as the Word of
GodGod is a deity in theistic and deistic religions and other belief systems, representing either the sole deity in monotheism, or a principal deity in polytheism....
. He explored theological themes heavily in the later issues of
Cerebus.
Awards Won
Sim has been nominated for many awards, and has won several:
- Comic Book Legal Defense Fund
The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund is a United States non-profit organization created in 1986 to protect the First Amendment rights of comics creators, publishers, and retailers covering legal expenses....
: Defender of Liberty Award 1996
- Diamond Gemmie as Small Press Pioneer
- Eisner Award
The Will Eisner Comic Industry Award, commonly shortened to the Eisner Award, is a prize given for creative achievement in American comic books. It is named in honor of the pioneering writer and artist Will Eisner, who was a regular participant in the award ceremony until his death in 2005, and...
: Best Graphic Album: Reprint, 1994, for Cerebus: Flight by Dave Sim and Gerhard
- Harvey Award
The Harvey Awards, named for writer-artist Harvey Kurtzman and coordinated by the publisher Fantagraphics are given for achievement in comic books. The Harveys were created as part of a successor to the Kirby Awards which were discontinued after 1987.The Harvey Awards are nominated by an open vote...
: Best Cartoonist (Writer/Artist), 1992, Dave Sim, for Cerebus; Best Letterer, 2004, Dave Sim, for Cerebus
- Ignatz Awards
The Ignatz Awards are intended to recognize outstanding achievements in comics and cartooning by small press creators or creator-owned projects published by larger publishers. They have been awarded each year since 1997, but skipped a year in 2001 due to the show's cancellation after the September...
: Outstanding Artist, 1998, Dave Sim, Cerebus
- Inkpot Award
The Inkpot Award, bestowed annually since 1974 by Comic-Con International, is given to professionals in comic book, comic strip, animation, science fiction, and related pop-culture fields, who are guests of that organization's yearly multigenre fan convention, commonly known as Comic-Con or the San...
1981
- Joe Shuster Awards
The Joe Shuster Awards are given for achievement in the creation of comic books, graphic novels and webcomics by Canadians. The full name is the Joe Shuster Canadian Comic Book Creator Awards....
: Outstanding Canadian Comic Book Achievement, 2005, Dave Sim and Gerhard for completing Cerebus in 2004; Canadian Comic Book Creator Hall of Fame, 2006; Best Cartoonst, 2009, for Glamourpuss and Judenhass
- Kirby Award
The Jack Kirby Award for achievement in comic books was presented from 1985-1987 by Amazing Heroes magazine, and managed by Dave Olbrich. It is named after the pioneering writer and artist Jack Kirby, and voted on by comic-book professionals....
: Best Black & White Series, 1987 and 1985, Cerebus by Dave Sim
- Squiddy Awards
The Squiddy Awards, also known as The Squiddies were the annual awards given by the participants in the Usenet newsgroup rec.arts.comics through 2004. The awards are named after the humorous typo Suicide Squid. The awards cover a wide variety of areas, including Best Writer, Penciller, Cartoonist,...
: Best Creative Team, 1987, 1990, 1991, 1992, and 1993 (all for the team of Dave Sim and Gerhard); Best Letterer, 2001.
- SPACE Lifetime Achievement Award 2004
Day Prize
In 2001, Sim and Gerhard founded the
Howard E. Day PrizeCreated by comic-book writer-artist-publisher Dave Sim and his collaborator, Gerhard, in memory of Sim's late mentor and self-publishing pioneer Gene Day , the Howard E. Day Prize was awarded yearly from 2002 until 2008 for outstanding achievement in self-publishing...
recognizing excellence in self-publishing in memorial of Sim's mentor
Gene DayHoward Eugene Day was a Canadian comic book artist best known for Marvel Comics' Star Wars licensed series and Master of Kung Fu...
. Sim selects a Short List of nominees from the applicant pool, then names the annual winner.
Collections of Sim's writing
Cerebus Guide to Self-Publishing (ISSN 0712-7774) collects selections from Sim's 'Notes from the President' column that dealt with self-publishing, the Pro/Con speech from 1993, and more.
Collected Letters: 2004 (ISBN 0-919359-23-X) collects Sim's responses to readers' letters (the original letters are not included) after the publication of Cerebus #300.
Dave Sim's Collected Letters 2 collects Sim's responses to readers' letters (the original letters are not included) from June and July 2004.
External links