The first time I read Sandman, I almost didn't make it through Preludes and Nocturnes. I don't really like horror much, and some parts of the book really disturbed me (mostly the John Dee storyline, though Morpheus' vengeance on Alex Burgess also felt disproportionately awful). The only things that made me keep reading were the fact that so many people had recommended the books to me, and the story "A Hope in Hell."
But then I got to the end of the volume and read "The Sound of Her Wings" and knew I was going to have to finish the whole set, no matter what. The story was funny, and sad, and beautiful, and I couldn't get it out of my head.
After several readings, it strikes me just how much of the end of the story is set up in this first volume. It seems to me that Sandman is, in many ways, a classic tragedy. I'm not sure things could unfold any differently than they do, given the natures of the characters involved. They make their own choices, of course, but it leads to the same end. I wonder if this is tied in with the themes of escape? Maybe we only escape to go back. John Dee goes back to Arkham. Dream returns to the Dreaming. Cain and Abel repeat their story over and over again. The story changes, but it's still the same story.
Joi, you summed up my feelings about this storyline perfectly. It feels the most out of place, especially with the brief superhero involvement, but it sets up so much of what' so come, even with the vaguest throwaway comments.
While issue 1 still feels the weakest to me, there are several parts to this tale that still really have an effect on me. Abel's final page is incredibly sad, and issue 3 made me an instant Constantine fan. As a new comic reader at the time, the Dee storyline amazed me with its nastiness--as well as the way it still made Dee an almost sympathetic character. With that and Morpheus' aloofness and tendency towards petty vindictiveness, issues of morality and justice were clearly going to get a workout in this series.
And of course I too was lost after reading "The Sound of Her Wings." It always made me angry when people emphasized the whole 'Death as sexy babe' thing and failed to notice that she was, in fact, just a normal person (for the Endless) with a tricky job and the sense of empathy that you'd likely have no choice but to develop if you were in her shoes. After so much horror in the earlier storyline, both gothic and modern, it was so amazing to close the first volume with such a gentle, sensitive story that leaves you feeling unreasonably happy about life (and death.) It's an issue I can go back to any time I'm feeling blue for an immediate joy infusion.
Neil Gaiman may have still been figuring out how this thing was going to work, but all the important pieces were already there.
Looking at the idea of characters being stripped of their coping mechanisms, the obvious one is Morpheus having his tools taken away from him. Then there is Alex and the young people losing interest in him and his new age hokum.
Jack; I like your point! When Dream is locked away, does humanity create its own coping mechanisms to take the place of true dreams? If so, then why does Unity fall asleep; isn't that a coping mechanism?
Right, and...dang it, there are other things I can't mention because they're spoilers for future books.
Is it coping mechanisms to deal specifically with Dream being imprisoned, or it is just how humanity deals with all change? Try to cling to the past, recreate what we once had, etc?
This is my third time reading, and I'm surprised to find how much of the book is classical Horror. I almost never read or watch horror as a genre, I don't like it. But I love this, even though sometimes it's on the edges of what I can stand.
But I almost breezed by a great note in the Afterword of Vol. I: "'24 Hours' is an essay on stories and authors..." WHAT. Suddenly the Diner scene makes a little more sense -- John Dee is playing author, and Gaiman is playing with how authors and characters relate to each other.
I can't tell if that makes it less awful or even more sinister.
Oh, that's interesting! It's almost the reverse of Misery. After reading that book, I suddenly realized that in the back of their minds, every author probably looks at every fan and wonders if they're going to turn into Annie Wilkes. This is the reverse; the author who uses his power to control and harm his audience. To what extent is that possible in the real world? Books can have a real impact, but could an author do actual harm?
Also on the theme of imprisonment and escape -- part of the worst damage done in the diner scene (I think) is because we are seeing people set loose from the social boundaries and illusions that keep them in check.
Freedom is not always good. Freedom leads to that awful chaos. I think it mirrors John Dee's return to Arkham a little, how the world is grateful to return to sleep and then to its structured confined waking ways.
And this notion returns and returns in the series, too.
I think it's less about the audience, Joi, and more about characters. An author has total power over his characters, and can put them through anything he feels pleased to see.
Oh, of course. Heh. Got kind of carried away there.
On that note, does an author have responsibility to his characters? It could be argued that Bette is every bit as manipulative of her characters. She forces them all into happy endings, with no regard for who they are. She's "already married [Judy and Donna] off to fine young men," despite them being in a relationship with each other.
What is the relationship between stories and dreams? John Dee tells his "stories" through the materioptikon, which makes dreams into physical reality. Is there a difference at all? Are stories just dreams that have been set down in a physical form?
I think some of the people are stuck sleeping, not as a coping mechanism, but because they got "broken" in some way during their dream. Take a look at what she was dreaming of when Dream was captured, oppose to the others.
And speaking of coping and "24 Hours", I've read this series many times. And this, like with many stories that I love, I could recite any of the details of the stories.
Except "24 Hours". I had no memory of that book at all.
Thank you for pointing out the idea of setting people free from social boundaries. I don't always think of the idea that people are limited in the way they act by society, but that's a talk for another time.
What are the thoughts on John Dee's punishment? Fate worse than death? Not nearly what he deserved?
This time, I saw it as Dream regaining something (humanity? compassion?) from the restoration of his soul.
Or did it relate to what he talked about in the 'Sound of Her Wings', that he felt empty once everything was reclaimed. Although that statement felt like it was full of the half-truths and lies we tell ourselves after our actions. (Which Death rightly called him out on)
Did it come from guilt for the initial punishments? Going back to the earlier statements about his soul, his reactions do seem to become gentler the more items he recovers. Is he rebuilding himself, or just gaining emotional distancing from the rage of imprisonment?
How about the use of other 'timeless' characters and stories?
The story of the first crime,and the three sisters, for example. How does relating similar stories across multiple times and cultures impact their meaning?
I think as an author it's nice to be able to draw on characters we already know, like the three sisters (who recur often) and Biblical characters -- and DC characters and literary tropes. The characters arrive ready-made with the kind of weight and backstory that any author wishes they could access without establishing.
Cain and Abel on their own are not that sad, but we already know their story, and so everything they do is poignant.
That's not to say it's cheating to use archetypal characters like this. Sometimes authors (especially in comics) access these beloved or revered legendary characters, and I roll my eyes and get irritated that they don't just do the work themselves of establishing a Hamlet or a Sisyphus or a Medea. But when Gaiman does it, I don't mind, perhaps because his *new* characters are so good, and the old ones are a sort of resting place for the mind, signposts we use to navigate.
Same goes for Fables, one of my other favorite comic series. They make great use of legends we know, and they have fun turning them on their heads.
I think there's a difference between grabbing a mythic or archetypal figure and sticking them in a work as a shorthand for something, and weaving those stories and characters into something that takes them for what they are. Gaiman understands the power and imagery of myth very well (something that I think came through extremely well in "Ocean at the End of the Lane").
This might be a better topic for later books, as they get into some details about things that are just hinted at in this story, but I'm going to try to cover some of them within the framework of just talking about this chapter
I'm taking some of this from outside of book one, but I do think one of the things that makes Sandman different in this way, is the idea that it's not the people that are mythic, it's the stories.
The 'Mythic Heroes' of the past were just people trying to get by, and it's the universal ideas, the stories that we attach to them to both elevate them and make their events relate-able, that make these people heroes and villains.
And in turn, this stories travel to the dream, and become a personification of our hopes and fears, and as we culturally change this stories. For example, Lucien refers to the Raven Woman, who later is reshaped (returned?) as Eve in "Sound and Fury" Cain says "....It's been getting slowly stranger...I've tried not...." Suggesting that as the world changes, it's affecting him as well. The Maiden refers to the 3 as Florence, Mary and Diana, referring to the Motown group, the Supremes, capping off quite a historical list of the three sisters though out history, making a bad pun, and at the same time, suggesting that pop culture can be as powerful to shaping them as history.
And with that, comes a reminder from the author that we can all be a hero (or a villain) by our own actions, but it's not for us to make that judgement, that label will be put on us, based on how we are judged.
And I think that's why it works when Gaiman does it. It's like he makes the promise, "there's a very specific reason I'm using these, you'll see why in a little bit." Maybe it's because he introduces them as characters before he puts the label on them.
I think the most immediately important role that Cain & Abel, Hekate, et. al. play in SANDMAN is establishing that the domain of Dream extends far beyond sleep and the unconscious experiences that accompany it. Dream, for our purposes, means the stories we tell ourselves and each other, consciously and unconsciously, willfully and unwillfully. Leading off with such archetypal characters illustrates that point cleanly.
It also establishes that the subjects of stories and imagination can "live" in the Dreaming as a rule. Once that context is in place, Gaiman is free to flesh out Dream's realm with more of his own inventions without explaining them, like Lucien in this volume.
As for Cain and Abel specifically, I think there's a lot of depth there. Consider specifically how Abel introduces himself: "I'm ABEL, my lord. From the, hmm, FIRST story. The, er, VICTIM." First story? The surface reading is Genesis. But in that interpretation, either the Creation and Fall don't count, or it all gets lumped together. Nor do we have reason to believe the Bible should get special treatment where stories are concerned. No, I think it goes much deeper than that.
The Sisters established that these characters appear in many forms, as does Dream himself in his appearances to mortals (e.g. Nada, Martian Manhunter in this volume). Cain and Abel should be no different. They are Cain and Abel; they are Punch and Judy; they are Ren and Stimpy.
I'm inclined to think the "first story" being suggested is much more… primitive: "There are two characters, and one does unto the other." There's Cain's version, which they act out endlessly. And there's Abel's version, which he confesses to Irving.
And yet, though they act here more like a Punch and Judy comedy, Gaiman introduces them with their much more tragic names. There's also the connection to Death to perhaps consider: Cain, so the story goes, the first human to be born; Abel, so it goes, the first to die.
I was surprised how much of Neil's growth as a story teller that shows through this volume. The first few chapters are very rough, even though there are compelling moments in them. The last couple of chapters, especially 24 hours, are much stronger and feel very complete to me.
Re. Cain and Abel being the First Story -- I have lately heard an interpretation of Cain and Abel that is about the hunter-gatherer society being left behind for the agrarian society, essentially the dawn of crop cultivation and the end of nomadism.
Abel brings an offering of meat, and God prefers it. But Cain brings an offering of vegetables, and in the end, he wins, by committing the first murder, though he is cursed to toil the ground fruitlessly. The end of the hunter, the beginning of the ploughman. Cain is cursed, but he is also described as the first city-builder.
It has also been suggested that it's an allegory for the extinction of Neaderthals at the hands of Homo Sapiens, a tale of the species' guilt passed down.
Yeah, this was partially the idea I was trying to express- in the way that every culture has a "thunder", a "mother", "trickster", "hunter", all the stories about them are different and yet the same. Each facet of the tale applies something a little different. Gaiman also plays with this idea a bit in "The Books of Magic"
The use of Cain in Beowulf is interesting as well, Beowulf is marked as one of the starts of Christian influence in Medieval literature. Cain is cast as the ultimate sinner, and all demons are descendant from him. In previous tales, this role would be filled by someone such as Loki, who in norse tales, was the mother to many vile creatures, but also to others, such as Odin's horse.
Modern tales have played with this concept as well, The World of Darkness RPG and Anne Rice's Vampires also played with the idea that Cain was an originator of Vampires.
This wasn't his first comic work, but I think this was the first one where he had a new monthly book to work on, rather than an intentional limited series, or taking over a book for another author.
So this was his first blank slate, that was open-ended from the start.
Also, Cain and Abel might have been the first story that humans would tell themselves. Adam and Eve, on a literal reading, wouldn't have known about their own creation, so it would have been God's story. But Cain could tell his own story to other humans. Not entirely sure I buy this, just a thought.
Oh, I just realized something! I can't say much without being spoilery, but it seems REALLY fitting that the first story should be about family turning on each other. Family spilling blood.
Heh, cute that Cain is a father of monsters in his own way here: "Purveyor of penny dreadfuls, shilling shockers, blood and thunders and fust-rate nightmares."
As for Pellegrino's idea that the C&A story recounts the extinction of Neanderthals, it seems awfully farfetched to me from a historical perspective. But it's a cute enough connection to maybe inspire a story of its own.
Hm. Cain and Abel have pointed ears. Perhaps it's just an affectation the artist chose to denote inhabitants of the Dreaming (Lucien's ears are also pointed). But perhaps it's something to remember when we get to the faeries?
(While I'm thinking of the art, I was going to say that Cain in panel 1, pg. 60 (of the Comixology eBook) felt like it might be an homage to something, but it just occurred to me that it probably looks familiar because he's holding the same pose as an Auratog. Don't mind me. :P)
@Joi: I'd counterargue that Adam & Eve might not be able to give a firsthand account of their creation, but they should know the story of their disobedience well enough.
Regarding the first story being about the first murder, and what that says about humanity, I'd answer that it reflects two vital facts about us: that we are social, and that we are mortal. Social, and so two characters will interact. Mortal, and so one possible great extreme consequence of that interaction is death.
Going back to "24 Hours": Is Dee a good storyteller? He takes his characters for several rides, but he gets bored with them. Does he actually give them an ending?
And Bette, as we're repeatedly reminded when we're introduced to her, keeps her stories a secret. And when she becomes an author, plans to keep her waitressing a secret. It seems to me like Gaiman may be making a statement about (good) storytellers and transparency.
"We are social, and we are mortal." I love it, @svithrir.
I don't think Dee is necessarily a good author. But I do have a notion from my own fiction that the boredom and the experimentation on his subjects is the temptation of any author! "They fail to please me. Let me try something else."
I also like that the commonality between Bette and Dee is the way they impose narratives on their subjects in the diner. Bette plans to give them all happy endings, but *her* happy endings, even when it erases who they are (the lesbian couple). Dee simply wants puppets to play with. But the impulses are not so different, and I like how Gaiman uses them as foils for one another.
The artist/author as puppeteer will come up a lot, I think, since Morpheus balances on this line very often. He seems to want his subjects to make choices though, at least sometimes, and he is disturbed when they choose what displeases him (Nada, Orpheus).
Morpheus as author, period, is also something I'm thinking about a lot. Or perhaps governor of the world authors try to access? Both story and the stuff of imagination? His home is sometimes called the Heart of Story as well as the Heart of Dreaming.
@Marian The Sandman was not Neil's first comic/graphic novel. He had done several in the UK with Dave McKean: Violent Cases, Signal to Noise. His first DC series was Black Orchid just before The Sandman. Here is a link to a fairly comprehensive bibliography of his work. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_Gaiman_bibliography
Here is the writeup I've been working on. It is not my intent to derail the current discussion. I am also making an active attempt to not spoil anything in the upcoming Sandman books.
Following the discussion questions I have some opinions on who the Narrators might be. There are four distinct narrators in the Sandman 1-8 that I can identify(This does not include inner dialoge/thoughts):
Destiny's Book, Past The first narrator in the story the words written in Destiny's book, specifically events and dates that have happened in the past. Note the aged paper edges and the darker yellow to bright yellow fade. Expositional and straight to the point. Any seeming flourishes are simply skilled writing. From what can be read in the 1-8 This narrator does not speak in the first person. Events in Sandman 1 take place in the past, while 2-8 take place in the present.
Destiny's Book, Present Same tone as Destiny's Book in the past. The color of the box is the same and without the aged paper edges. We haven't formally met Destiny, but we can infer from this one panel that he has a book, a cool (almost as cool as death, dream) sounding name, and a book that seems to be telling/writing a story in real time.
Unknown Narrator Maybe another sibling of Morpheus? At this point in the story we cannot tell. We might revisit this another week.
Doctor Destiny's Materioptikon What used to be Morpheus' Dreamstone it became Doctor Destiny's Materioptikon. A powerful observer, this narrator describes Dee and Bette in the third person. The narrator also seems to know much about Bette's writing. Daydreaming → Writing → Story. Maybe at this part of the story so far it is a bit of a stretch to say this but I'll have more evidence for this in a (nearly forgettable but fun) panel coming up in a few weeks.
Side notes: I love that the people in the restaurant are described as flies. Fruit flies are known to only live for 24 hours. And at the 24th hour Dee eats a fly, much like how he devoured his other flies.
In comics I tend to take the who the narrator is for granted. I'll be trapped into reading it as an Exposition box explaining that "Spiderman gives chase!" in "New York, 1991." Reading it like Narrator box is God Author and a means to an end. This post was a fun exercise that I might want to continue in the following weeks.
Opinions on the story itself? I like that 1-8 played it safe and simple. Establish the tone, characters, and setting. The Arc is rather simple and Morpheus, practically a god, is made relateable. Cameo's to draw in a a comic book fan audience while keeping the cameo's restrained as to not alienate. We have our protagonist at his lowest and by the end of the arc triumphant.
That went nowhere... I just like how simple the story starts, and how complexities grow from this foundation.
Good call on Destiny for the yellow narration boxes. I'll just point out that the edge differences are more likely to be a quirk of the artists, rather than an intentional change in voice. (Though the events of issue 1 begin in the past, they are still narrated mostly in present tense as they happen.) The torn-paper edges appear to all be in the early issues with Sam Kieth on pencils; the straight edges come after Mike Dringenberg took over.
The pink narration in "Sound and Fury" is interesting indeed. Repeated entreaties to "listen," clearly a distinct voice from Destiny. (Anyone with an older edition able to share how the original coloring compares?)
Speaking of text boxes, a quick observation on Todd Klein's lettering. Did you notice that Dream's speech is unique? It's not just the white-text-on-black that sets him apart. Whereas all other speech and captions are rendered in more comics-typical all-caps, Dream speaks in sentence case. An interesting choice.
Decided to make a list of all the possible imprisonments in Volume 1. Here's what I have:
1. Dream, in Burgess' house. 2. Alexander Burgess, unable to escape his father's influence 3. Alexander Burgess, again, locked in constant waking 4. Ellie Marsten, locked in sleep 5. Daniel Bustamonte, locked awake but nonresponsive 6. Stefan Wasserman, locked in waking 7. Unity Kinkaid, locked in sleep 8: John Dee, locked in Arkham Asylum 9. Rachel's father and the intruder, trapped in the dreams in the house 11: Nada, trapped in Hell 10: Rachel, trapped in her addiction to the dream sand 12: Choronzon the demon, after losing the battle in Hell 13: Scott Free's dream of being trapped by "Granny" 14: Rosemary, carjacked by John Dee 15: Dream's essence, locked in the Materioptikon 16: The diners, trapped by John Dee
Somewhat dubious, but listing it anyway: 17: Cain and Abel, locked into their story of murder forever.
The only story in the whole volume that does not have an imprisonment of any kind (that I can see, anyway) is "The Sound of Her Wings," which fits with the idea of Death being a gift, a friend.
I feel a little out of my depth here. I just finished reading this all for the first time, and I'm blown away by what you guys are talking about in relation to it. I will say though that I'm wishing I had the afterwards to read as well as the issues themselves; the idea of the diner scene being allegorical of the relationship between an author and characters resonates pretty strongly with me, and it's something I may have to explore now in my own writing, just to get a proper feel for it. I would never have picked up on that on my own!
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But then I got to the end of the volume and read "The Sound of Her Wings" and knew I was going to have to finish the whole set, no matter what. The story was funny, and sad, and beautiful, and I couldn't get it out of my head.
After several readings, it strikes me just how much of the end of the story is set up in this first volume. It seems to me that Sandman is, in many ways, a classic tragedy. I'm not sure things could unfold any differently than they do, given the natures of the characters involved. They make their own choices, of course, but it leads to the same end. I wonder if this is tied in with the themes of escape? Maybe we only escape to go back. John Dee goes back to Arkham. Dream returns to the Dreaming. Cain and Abel repeat their story over and over again. The story changes, but it's still the same story.
While issue 1 still feels the weakest to me, there are several parts to this tale that still really have an effect on me. Abel's final page is incredibly sad, and issue 3 made me an instant Constantine fan. As a new comic reader at the time, the Dee storyline amazed me with its nastiness--as well as the way it still made Dee an almost sympathetic character. With that and Morpheus' aloofness and tendency towards petty vindictiveness, issues of morality and justice were clearly going to get a workout in this series.
And of course I too was lost after reading "The Sound of Her Wings." It always made me angry when people emphasized the whole 'Death as sexy babe' thing and failed to notice that she was, in fact, just a normal person (for the Endless) with a tricky job and the sense of empathy that you'd likely have no choice but to develop if you were in her shoes. After so much horror in the earlier storyline, both gothic and modern, it was so amazing to close the first volume with such a gentle, sensitive story that leaves you feeling unreasonably happy about life (and death.) It's an issue I can go back to any time I'm feeling blue for an immediate joy infusion.
Neil Gaiman may have still been figuring out how this thing was going to work, but all the important pieces were already there.
Is it coping mechanisms to deal specifically with Dream being imprisoned, or it is just how humanity deals with all change? Try to cling to the past, recreate what we once had, etc?
But I almost breezed by a great note in the Afterword of Vol. I: "'24 Hours' is an essay on stories and authors..." WHAT. Suddenly the Diner scene makes a little more sense -- John Dee is playing author, and Gaiman is playing with how authors and characters relate to each other.
I can't tell if that makes it less awful or even more sinister.
Freedom is not always good. Freedom leads to that awful chaos. I think it mirrors John Dee's return to Arkham a little, how the world is grateful to return to sleep and then to its structured confined waking ways.
And this notion returns and returns in the series, too.
On that note, does an author have responsibility to his characters? It could be argued that Bette is every bit as manipulative of her characters. She forces them all into happy endings, with no regard for who they are. She's "already married [Judy and Donna] off to fine young men," despite them being in a relationship with each other.
Speaking of crime and punishment, the focus on Bette early in that chapter almost makes Dee's diner treatment a punishment especially for her.
Except "24 Hours". I had no memory of that book at all.
Thank you for pointing out the idea of setting people free from social boundaries. I don't always think of the idea that people are limited in the way they act by society, but that's a talk for another time.
This time, I saw it as Dream regaining something (humanity? compassion?) from the restoration of his soul.
Or did it relate to what he talked about in the 'Sound of Her Wings', that he felt empty once everything was reclaimed. Although that statement felt like it was full of the half-truths and lies we tell ourselves after our actions. (Which Death rightly called him out on)
Did it come from guilt for the initial punishments? Going back to the earlier statements about his soul, his reactions do seem to become gentler the more items he recovers. Is he rebuilding himself, or just gaining emotional distancing from the rage of imprisonment?
The story of the first crime,and the three sisters, for example. How does relating similar stories across multiple times and cultures impact their meaning?
Cain and Abel on their own are not that sad, but we already know their story, and so everything they do is poignant.
That's not to say it's cheating to use archetypal characters like this. Sometimes authors (especially in comics) access these beloved or revered legendary characters, and I roll my eyes and get irritated that they don't just do the work themselves of establishing a Hamlet or a Sisyphus or a Medea. But when Gaiman does it, I don't mind, perhaps because his *new* characters are so good, and the old ones are a sort of resting place for the mind, signposts we use to navigate.
Same goes for Fables, one of my other favorite comic series. They make great use of legends we know, and they have fun turning them on their heads.
I'm taking some of this from outside of book one, but I do think one of the things that makes Sandman different in this way, is the idea that it's not the people that are mythic, it's the stories.
The 'Mythic Heroes' of the past were just people trying to get by, and it's the universal ideas, the stories that we attach to them to both elevate them and make their events relate-able, that make these people heroes and villains.
And in turn, this stories travel to the dream, and become a personification of our hopes and fears, and as we culturally change this stories. For example, Lucien refers to the Raven Woman, who later is reshaped (returned?) as Eve in "Sound and Fury"
Cain says "....It's been getting slowly stranger...I've tried not...." Suggesting that as the world changes, it's affecting him as well.
The Maiden refers to the 3 as Florence, Mary and Diana, referring to the Motown group, the Supremes, capping off quite a historical list of the three sisters though out history, making a bad pun, and at the same time, suggesting that pop culture can be as powerful to shaping them as history.
And with that, comes a reminder from the author that we can all be a hero (or a villain) by our own actions, but it's not for us to make that judgement, that label will be put on us, based on how we are judged.
And I think that's why it works when Gaiman does it. It's like he makes the promise, "there's a very specific reason I'm using these, you'll see why in a little bit." Maybe it's because he introduces them as characters before he puts the label on them.
It also establishes that the subjects of stories and imagination can "live" in the Dreaming as a rule. Once that context is in place, Gaiman is free to flesh out Dream's realm with more of his own inventions without explaining them, like Lucien in this volume.
Adding a reply function to the forums here, so we can all reply to more specific posts and nest comments.
And here's a video welcome from me! With notes on why I started this.
Yes my bathrobe has polka dots. Every good bathrobe does.
The Sisters established that these characters appear in many forms, as does Dream himself in his appearances to mortals (e.g. Nada, Martian Manhunter in this volume). Cain and Abel should be no different. They are Cain and Abel; they are Punch and Judy; they are Ren and Stimpy.
I'm inclined to think the "first story" being suggested is much more… primitive: "There are two characters, and one does unto the other." There's Cain's version, which they act out endlessly. And there's Abel's version, which he confesses to Irving.
And yet, though they act here more like a Punch and Judy comedy, Gaiman introduces them with their much more tragic names. There's also the connection to Death to perhaps consider: Cain, so the story goes, the first human to be born; Abel, so it goes, the first to die.
Abel brings an offering of meat, and God prefers it. But Cain brings an offering of vegetables, and in the end, he wins, by committing the first murder, though he is cursed to toil the ground fruitlessly. The end of the hunter, the beginning of the ploughman. Cain is cursed, but he is also described as the first city-builder.
It has also been suggested that it's an allegory for the extinction of Neaderthals at the hands of Homo Sapiens, a tale of the species' guilt passed down.
The use of Cain in Beowulf is interesting as well, Beowulf is marked as one of the starts of Christian influence in Medieval literature. Cain is cast as the ultimate sinner, and all demons are descendant from him. In previous tales, this role would be filled by someone such as Loki, who in norse tales, was the mother to many vile creatures, but also to others, such as Odin's horse.
Modern tales have played with this concept as well, The World of Darkness RPG and Anne Rice's Vampires also played with the idea that Cain was an originator of Vampires.
Sorry, got a little distracted there.
So this was his first blank slate, that was open-ended from the start.
As for Pellegrino's idea that the C&A story recounts the extinction of Neanderthals, it seems awfully farfetched to me from a historical perspective. But it's a cute enough connection to maybe inspire a story of its own.
Hm. Cain and Abel have pointed ears. Perhaps it's just an affectation the artist chose to denote inhabitants of the Dreaming (Lucien's ears are also pointed). But perhaps it's something to remember when we get to the faeries?
(While I'm thinking of the art, I was going to say that Cain in panel 1, pg. 60 (of the Comixology eBook) felt like it might be an homage to something, but it just occurred to me that it probably looks familiar because he's holding the same pose as an Auratog. Don't mind me. :P)
@Joi: I'd counterargue that Adam & Eve might not be able to give a firsthand account of their creation, but they should know the story of their disobedience well enough.
Regarding the first story being about the first murder, and what that says about humanity, I'd answer that it reflects two vital facts about us: that we are social, and that we are mortal. Social, and so two characters will interact. Mortal, and so one possible great extreme consequence of that interaction is death.
And Bette, as we're repeatedly reminded when we're introduced to her, keeps her stories a secret. And when she becomes an author, plans to keep her waitressing a secret. It seems to me like Gaiman may be making a statement about (good) storytellers and transparency.
I don't think Dee is necessarily a good author. But I do have a notion from my own fiction that the boredom and the experimentation on his subjects is the temptation of any author! "They fail to please me. Let me try something else."
The artist/author as puppeteer will come up a lot, I think, since Morpheus balances on this line very often. He seems to want his subjects to make choices though, at least sometimes, and he is disturbed when they choose what displeases him (Nada, Orpheus).
Morpheus as author, period, is also something I'm thinking about a lot. Or perhaps governor of the world authors try to access? Both story and the stuff of imagination? His home is sometimes called the Heart of Story as well as the Heart of Dreaming.
Here is a link to a fairly comprehensive bibliography of his work.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_Gaiman_bibliography
Following the discussion questions I have some opinions on who the Narrators might be. There are four distinct narrators in the Sandman 1-8 that I can identify(This does not include inner dialoge/thoughts):
Destiny's Book, Past
The first narrator in the story the words written in Destiny's book, specifically events and dates that have happened in the past. Note the aged paper edges and the darker yellow to bright yellow fade. Expositional and straight to the point. Any seeming flourishes are simply skilled writing. From what can be read in the 1-8 This narrator does not speak in the first person. Events in Sandman 1 take place in the past, while 2-8 take place in the present.
Destiny's Book, Present
Same tone as Destiny's Book in the past. The color of the box is the same and without the aged paper edges. We haven't formally met Destiny, but we can infer from this one panel that he has a book, a cool (almost as cool as death, dream) sounding name, and a book that seems to be telling/writing a story in real time.
Unknown Narrator
Maybe another sibling of Morpheus? At this point in the story we cannot tell. We might revisit this another week.
Doctor Destiny's Materioptikon
What used to be Morpheus' Dreamstone it became Doctor Destiny's Materioptikon. A powerful observer, this narrator describes Dee and Bette in the third person. The narrator also seems to know much about Bette's writing. Daydreaming → Writing → Story. Maybe at this part of the story so far it is a bit of a stretch to say this but I'll have more evidence for this in a (nearly forgettable but fun) panel coming up in a few weeks.
Side notes: I love that the people in the restaurant are described as flies. Fruit flies are known to only live for 24 hours. And at the 24th hour Dee eats a fly, much like how he devoured his other flies.
In comics I tend to take the who the narrator is for granted. I'll be trapped into reading it as an Exposition box explaining that "Spiderman gives chase!" in "New York, 1991." Reading it like Narrator box is God Author and a means to an end. This post was a fun exercise that I might want to continue in the following weeks.
That went nowhere... I just like how simple the story starts, and how complexities grow from this foundation.
The pink narration in "Sound and Fury" is interesting indeed. Repeated entreaties to "listen," clearly a distinct voice from Destiny. (Anyone with an older edition able to share how the original coloring compares?)
Speaking of text boxes, a quick observation on Todd Klein's lettering. Did you notice that Dream's speech is unique? It's not just the white-text-on-black that sets him apart. Whereas all other speech and captions are rendered in more comics-typical all-caps, Dream speaks in sentence case. An interesting choice.
1. Dream, in Burgess' house.
2. Alexander Burgess, unable to escape his father's influence
3. Alexander Burgess, again, locked in constant waking
4. Ellie Marsten, locked in sleep
5. Daniel Bustamonte, locked awake but nonresponsive
6. Stefan Wasserman, locked in waking
7. Unity Kinkaid, locked in sleep
8: John Dee, locked in Arkham Asylum
9. Rachel's father and the intruder, trapped in the dreams in the house
11: Nada, trapped in Hell
10: Rachel, trapped in her addiction to the dream sand
12: Choronzon the demon, after losing the battle in Hell
13: Scott Free's dream of being trapped by "Granny"
14: Rosemary, carjacked by John Dee
15: Dream's essence, locked in the Materioptikon
16: The diners, trapped by John Dee
Somewhat dubious, but listing it anyway: 17: Cain and Abel, locked into their story of murder forever.
The only story in the whole volume that does not have an imprisonment of any kind (that I can see, anyway) is "The Sound of Her Wings," which fits with the idea of Death being a gift, a friend.
Dream, trapped by his Despair for his life.