Creativity & Aging

Cerebus #295 (October 2003)
Art by Dave Sim & Gerhard

DAVE SIM:
(from The Blog & Mail #413, 29 October 2007)

...the ability to make comics doesn't get taken away, but the ability to produce them quickly -- which is really the core element of successful comic books: not only being able to produce them but being able to produce pages in sufficient volume to hold an audience between issues -- does erode as you move from your thirties into your forties. The idea that you will always be able to produce comics at the same pace originates in the sense of immortality that everyone in their twenties and thirties possesses. "I will always be like this." Well, no you won't. The decision to do Cerebus as a monthly until I was 46 was a decision only a twenty-three year old could make... I can only reiterate that drawing comics in your forties is a very different deal from drawing them in your thirties... At the age of 51, I'm hoping that I have enough juice left to produce a bi-monthly title for an indefinite period of time but monthly is definitely beyond me at this point – and, really, was beyond me for at least the last two years of Cerebus.