Living Dogs and Dead Lions
Thinking of Chapter 3 as “Chapter 2.5” rather than a chapter on its own really allowed me to think about structure and theme. Since I had afforded two chapters to tell this part of the story, I thought it would be fun to try and have Chapter 3 end as Chapter 2 began, which meant coming back to Lady May and the town of Lundy.
May played the ever important role of being the one who name-dropped the title of Chapter 2 but who also had the important job of being the thematic linchpin to that chapter as well. If she couldn’t be the person to say “Making Smoke” in Chapter 3, then it would only be fair to make sure she was the one to be a concluding voice to its themes as well as acting as a thematic bridge to the next movement of Long John.
Perhaps it was because of the nice parallel structure these last two pages make with the opening of Chapter 2, perhaps it was the excitement of almost being done with drawing Chapter 3, but any of the frustration I voiced about writing or drawing other pages in Chapter 3 (or writing Lady May in Chapter 2), this page felt almost effortless to create.
She may be the voice to summarize and generalize the themes of the chapter, she does so, of course, in her own, slightly oblique, religiously-tinged way. I’ve written before how a challenge with May is that I’m writing a devout Christian while not being one myself, that finding metaphors and references triggers the academic in me to dive into research and absorbing so I can use the knowledge for my own ends.
Because this kind of closes the book on Lady May for now, I already miss writing her, but I think she goes out––with these last two pages––on a really nice note.
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