OK, just a little more on 24-Hour Comics and the extreme variations -- prompted by emails from some readers:

According to

this official-sounding source,

the rules are as follows:

"As originator of the challenge, Scott McCloud has established rules for a comic to qualify: It must be begun and completed within 24 consecutive hours. Only one person may be directly involved in its creation, and it must span 24 pages, or (if an infinite canvas format webcomic is being made) 100 panels."

The latter was news to me, but as I consider only life "an infinite canvas" (though that may change profoundly in the wake of the Bush years), but what the hell. Continuing:

"The creator may think about it beforehand and gather research materials and drawing tools, but cannot put anything on paper until he is ready for the 24 hours to begin. Any breaks (for food, sleep, or any other purpose) are counted as part of the 24 hours."

Relevent to this passage of the "rules," a poster named 'kc' posted the following on cartoonist Ryan Armand's blog (see below for link, in due time):

"Is it cheating if I already have a story in mind for a 24 hour comic? It feels like I'm cheating."

Well, maybe -- you'd have to consult with Scott, I guess. For the record, when I did mine, I believed not thinking about it beforehand was a prerequisite; I've no evidence of that having been a "rule," or a rule that was later revised, but that was my understanding at the time. Scott did prepare, in that he visited a library and brought home a random stack of books for inspiration. Knowing that, I reckon the "think about it beforehand and gather research materials" was and is groovy, but I'll say this:

For me, it was liberating to not prepare or "think about it beforehand." There was a clarity that arrived, and I can say for a fact that I never, ever would have manifested/channeled/created (choose your mediation flow) "A Life in Black and White" had I meditated at all upon a possible subject or focal point. In clearing my head (a rare event), something unbidden bubbled up, and amid that a fragment of half-remembered text also drifted to the fore (from Charles G. Finney's The Circus of Dr. Lao, one of my favorite books), becoming somehow vital to the narrative destination point that presented itself.

Back to the online encyclopedia's rules:

"If the cartoonist fails to finish the comic in 24 hours, there are two courses of action suggested: stop the comic at the 24-hour mark, or continue working until all 24 pages are done. The former is known as "the Gaiman variation", after Neil Gaiman's unsuccessful attempt, and the latter is called "the Eastman variation", after Kevin Eastman's unsuccessful attempt. Scott McCloud considers both of these to be "noble failures", and he'll still list them on his site as long as he believes that the creator intended to finish the project within the specified amount of time."

Ah, noble failure; I know it well.

But at least I was a noble "success" with the 24-Hour Comic!

In seeking the most extreme variation (that was not a "noble failure" variant), the wonder of email brought this to my box this morn, as if it were the answer to my quest, courtesy of the amazing Mr. Ryan Estrada:

"My name's Ryan Estrada. I recently did a 168 Hour Comic. The reason I mention it is because the introduction to the comic is a
history of challenge comics. But not a real history, a sleep deprived crazy history full of lies. And it talks about you. You can read it..." Well,

here.

But, hey, before you jump over there, read on; it gets better.

"Recently," it turns out, was earlier this month -- just about three weeks ago. All this manic activity, in Asia and in Brattleboro, before the October 7th "24 Hour Comic Day"!

In his text intro to the Incredible 168 (actually 172) Hour Comic, Ryan writes:

"For those of you just tuning in, here's what's happening and why. In 1990, Scott McCloud invented the 24 Hour Comic. A challenge to draw a 24 page comic book in 24 hours. Many artists took the challenge, and in 2004, Nat Gertler started 24 Hour Comics Day. I was one of the thousands of people to take the challenge that day, heading up the South Korea team. Sadly, I only finished 12 pages. I decided to go into training, so I would be better off the following year. I did the first 48 Hour Comic. (If you look on the features page of my site, all of the comics with exclamation points are excerpts from the 48 hour comic). It worked out so well, I did a 72 hour comic shortly thereafter. I planned a 96 hour comic, but decided instead to go to tsunami relief in Thailand. While I was doing that, Behrooz Shahriari did a 100 hour comic, and smashed my record. This last 24 hour comic day, I succesfully finished my 24 pages. The training is complete, but now, I have a record to get back. Now, it's personal. You're going down, Bez."

Noble intentions, however base the drive ("you're going down, Bez" -- so now, it's Red Harvest in the timed-comics-marathon sweepstakes). But Ryan was in for a rude awakening; later in his profusely-illustrated blog, he writes:

"I just got an e-mail from another Ryan. Ryan Armand. He cracked a joke on Comixpedia last week that he was going to steal my thunder by doing a casually done 168 hour comic this week while I was working on this one. At least, I thought it was a joke. Apparently it wasn't. He says he finished his 168 hour comic this afternoon, after working on it a few hours a day all this week. And it's up online here. He even blogged about it... If someone is messin' with me, they're doing a real good job. And if no one is messin with me, than I say this; Ryan Armand, you are awesome. But I guess I have to keep going. I don't want to tie."

Tie? How about, you don't want to die?. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Go, Ryan!

Now, this is madness, but it's intoxicating madness, eh? You talk the talk, you gotta walk the walk.

On Ryan Armand's blog -- the relevent portion is

here

-- there's some really lively strutting still in view:

“So apparently one Ryan Estrada is making a 168 hour comic... That's like a 24 hour comic, times seven. He'll be awake the whole time maybe, and it will be a feat of iron man comic making... and I think that that is just ridiculous. To show how ridiculous and simple a feat it actually is, over the same amount of time that he spends on the comic, I too will make a 168 page comic. Except I will do it very casually, while getting plenty of sleep, spending copious amounts of time arguing on the interwebs about nothing, playing cinematic soccer games on my SNES, watch a complete japanese drama series(or two?) and maybe jogging.”

What a glorious braggart, what an imperial pig! This is hilarious. And now, what was inherently a non-competitive creative challenge (one is, after all, tidily in 'competition' with oneself in Scott's original concept) has now turned into -- Iron Cartoonist! An online arena sport!

To paraphrase David Lo Pan (to be read aloud in the appropriate reedy James Wong voice), "Two 168-Hour Comics -- what can it mean?"

So, I extend my warmest respects to both Ryans -- here's hoping you've since caught up on your sleep.

And to think, all this hyper-activity happened this month.

Ryan Armand's finished product is

on this site

-- go ahead, check it out.

I just hope we don't arrive at the first escalating-competitive-extension of the 24-Hour Comic resulting in death rather than mere bravado, wild comics that wouldn't otherwise exist (sweet nectar!) and madness. It's becoming a bit like frat-party drinking binges, and too-little-sleep and too-much-caffeine (or whatever) can, after all, take a mortal toll, too.

Long before Scott invented the 24-hour comic, much less Ryan and Ryan inventing the 168-hour-comic, Gene Day did himself in via such a route (meeting Marvel deadlines while living on coffee and air). I'd hate to see it happen again in a whirlwind of competing 475-Hour-Comic marathons -- shit, losing Gene Day was bad enough. We need every standing cartoonist we can get in this dire age. And besides, Scott would forever blame himself.

For anyone interested, Ryan Estrada's full site -- which is quite an astounding record of not only his marathon comic-creation binges and psychic purges, but also his time in Asia, is

here.

"Keep on rocking, brother," indeed!

________________________

On to other matters:

I am currently struggling with my perception of what makes a graphic novel an inherently different form, and teaching the evolution of the graphic novel (as part of my CCS ciriculum) this year.

To that end, Eddie Campbell and I have been trading some emails back-and-forth, and CCS founder (and grand cartoonist) James Sturm and I have also exchanged words a bit more emphatically; we'll see where it all ends up.

The central role of the utilitarian format of serialized periodical publication in traditional comic book form of expansive works that are conceived as (or, more to the point, evolve into) graphic novels is the most fascinating bone of contention, it seems, and one I'm relishing just now.

More on this topic on another day.

OK, here's the scoop:

From Noon to Noon, Saturday August 27 to Sunday August 28, the Brattleboro Museum & Art Center in downtown Brattleboro, Vermont hosted the 24-Hour Comics Challenge. By my current count, 49 adventurous individuals actively participated; all completed comics (though not all needed the full 24 hours, or made it to the ideal of 24 pages completed -- though most did); I will verify that count later today, after I touch base again with the good folks at the Museum (hello, Margeret!).

The participants were women and men of all ages, from all walks of life. It was an amazing, electic mix of people, from avid comics and manga readers age 16 and up to non-cartoonists their 50s -- artists, writers, poets, students, teachers, musicians, radio djs, reporters, etc. -- and the energy was unlike anything I've ever experienced. They came from the Brattleboro community and beyond: some drove up from Connecticut, Massachusetts, or in from New Hampshire (including a die-hard group from Keene who had already done their own 24-Hour Comics earlier in the summer), or came in-state from as far north as Milton and St. Johnsbury (and those are up thar). Some took the bus, some drove, some sauntered in.

There was a writer who'd never really drawn who had almost talked himself out of coming, but was glad he was there. One women told me she hadn't drawn since her 6th Grade art class (and was quite satisfied that she "still drew the way I did then!", showing me her beguiling completed pages), another was one of my son Dan's high school science teachers (hello, Mike!) who was taking the Challenge as a window of opportunity to finally put down on paper a character he'd had in his head for years. Others were clearly experienced hands, including at least three hackers using laptops to produce pages using technology that simply didn't exist when Scott McCloud invented the form -- the challenge -- fifteen years ago.

That's where I come in: I wasn't participating in the challenge, really, but I was there with the opening remarks a little before noon on Saturday and for the closing remarks at noon on Sunday. See, I had a hand in the 24-hour comic's invention: it was the gauntlet thrown down by my good friend Scott McCloud back in the summer of 1990. Scott (who was then best-known for his series ZOT and the one-shot DESTROY!; UNDERSTANDING COMICS was still a gleam in his eye and notes in his sketchbooks).

Scott and I both had bad reps for being s-l-o-w cartoonists, challenged by even the most expansive of deadlines. But Scott had seen me doing sketches, and recognized that the furious energy of my freehand sketches was somehow disconnected from the laborious glacial movement of pages across my drawing board.

So Scott, being a bit of an inventor like his father, invented the 24 Hour Comic as a challenge for he and I, a way of breaking logjams and freeing constrained energy by completing, sans preparation, an entire 24-page comic in a mere 24 hours, start to finish. Whatever we did during that 24 hour stretch -- including distractions like eating, using the bathroom, napping, walking, whatever (in my case, it included making my two kids lunch and picking them up from school) -- the clock was still ticking. We had ONE DAY, 24 consecutive hours, in which to do the deed.

Now, Scott issued the challenge as one we would both complete that August (1990). Scott also knew I wouldn't do it if HE didn't do it, so he had to go first. We were also both procrastinators by nature. Thus, Scott completed his -- the first 24-Hour comic in history -- on the last day of August 1990, between 6 AM and 11:30 PM. Unlike Scott, I had kids, so my session took a bit more strategic family planning: I sat down at 10 AM on (ahem) August 36th and worked through to 1:30 AM the next day, completing "A Life in Black and White." My own ground rules were: I would complete pages in their narrative order, only moving forward; no looking back; no corrections, no insert pages.

Scott and I were pretty pleased with the results, and happily mailed photocopies of our bastard offspring to friends and peers near and far. By the time I published Scott's "A Day's Work" in TABOO ESPECIAL and my sordid tale in TABOO 7 (both 1991, though I hasten to add Dave Sim published a preview of my story in CEREBUS), the bug had already bitten others. If memory serves, the first to jump into the breach was Dave Sim (with his fifteen-hour opus "Bigger Blacker Kiss" (October 26-27, 1990, 11:30 AM to 2:45 AM), with Rick Veitch immediately introducing a fresh permutation (drawing 24 dream comics -- transcribing his dreams from the night before -- in timed one-hour sessions, 24 days in a row), which soon spawned his RAREBIT FIENDS comics series and graphic novels. Neil Gaiman soon offered another approach, a non-artist laboring over a 24-hour period (FAXing pages to Scott and I as they were completed) to produce his marvelous 13-page "Being an Account of the Life and Death of the Emperor Heliogabolus." As Scott McCloud later wrote, "Neil was unable to finish the full 24 pages, but created as much as possible within a full 24 hour session... Having gone the distance, at least where time and physical endurance were concerned, we christened it Noble Failure Variant #1 -- The Gaiman Variation."

Before long, Scott was hearing from many, many creators who had taken the challenge. It's amazing how quickly it spun into other hands, other venues, other media: The 24-Hour Play emerged by 1995; in theater circles, Tina Fallon (co-founder of Crux Productions of NYC) is credited with creating the theatrical form, and by 1997 the event had expanded into the New York Fringe Festival's mind-boggling "240 hours of plays" -- 10 days of successive 24-hour-play challenges (creating a performance from scratch to performance in a 24-hour stretch, including performance). My daughter Maia Rose participated in one of the 24-Hour Play events when that whirlwind blew into Brattleboro (April 14-15 of 2000), at the Brattleboro Flat Street Boys & Girls Club, produced by Adrienne DeGuevara as a fund-raiser for the club (anyone interested, see The Brattleboro Reformer A&E section for Thursday, April 13, 2000, page 22). By that time, Scott told me of a 48-Hour Movie challenge that was zipping through digital filmmaking/video circles. When I taught/tutored an alternative home schooled group of Vermont and Massachusetts teenagers (2003-2004) in storytelling and cinema, I had a single assigment for them at the end of our studies: the students had to create something in one 24-hour period, a single sitting, either separately or together (they each had their own skills and expertise: writing, music, drawing, etc.). They rose to the challenge and surprised me during our final week with a completed short film, which they conceived, scripted/improvised, filmed, edited, and scored in one 24-hour session.

Scott had created something amazing and ever-adaptable.

I cannot tell you how blown away I was Saturday morning when I walked into the Brattleboro Museum to see almost fifty people spread on every table, in every corner of the galleries, eager and ready to take on the challenge... just about ten miles from where I'd drawn my 24-hour comic, in the lone little 1940s trailer-studio I had parked behind my garage at our rented Lower Dover Road home in the late summer of 1990. I was even more blown away when my wife Marjory and I bopped into the Museum 11:30 PM on Saturday evening to see the beehive still buzzing: people savoring the hospitable warm summer night working outside, with improvised lighting and drawing spaces; people inside busy at every table, in every nook and cranny, while others stretched, walked the galleries, drank inspiration from the art hanging from the walls, or took a break for a chat or a smoke outside. Come Sunday morning at 11:30 AM, I knew the twelve hours since my last visit was going to have taken a toll, but I was overjoyed to see almost the entire group still there. A few had completed their comics and gone elsewhere to eat or crash, but only a few -- at least forty folks were hanging in for the 'end gong' and final celebration. They'd DONE it! There were a couple of "Neil Gaiman Variants," but only a couple.

I can't wait to sit down and read the comics themselves -- a few eager participants made sure I left the Museum Sunday with a photocopy of their accomplishments in my hot little hands.

I'll post the names of the participants here once I confirm the final lineup with Margaret, Konstantin, and the Museum later today or early tomorrow. In the meantime --

There's an online story from the Brattleboro Reformer (it made the front page of the print edition this morning!); please note one immediately evident error, I did NOT draw the FIRST 24-Hour comic (that was Scott McCloud, natch) -- anyhoot, it's waiting for you

here!

For those interested, the Museum's website on the 24-Hour Challenge is at:

24-Hour Comic Challenge!

Konstantin von Krusenstiern is the director of the Brattleboro Museum and Art Center; Gabriel Greenberg curated the Green Mountain Cartooning exhibition (which is up through February -- check it out!) and worked with the Museum to coordinate the 24-Hour Comics event (while participating as a creator, and completing his comic in the timeframe WHILE handling much of the 'host' chores). I also worked with Teta Hilsdon, who is the Museum Office Manager, along with Margaret Shipman (who is the smiling face most often greeting visitors at the front desk) and summer intern Eliza Thomson. Also involved, one way or another, with the exhibit, sponsorship, and/or the 24-Hour Comics event were Lynn Barrett, Susan Calabria, LaVonne Betts, and Roger Wilken.

The museum's website is

here!

For info on the current exhibit "Comic Art in the Green Mountains," featuring work by yours truly (SWAMP THING and TYRANT original art), Rick Veitch, Frank Miller, James Kochalka, and James Sturm, go to

Green Mt Cartoonists

For more info on this event and 24 Hour Comics in general:

The 24 Hour Comic blog is at

24 Hour Comics

For more info and another perspective on the Brat Museum event, check out Alan David Doane's article on his visit to the Brattleboro Museum on Saturday, as the event launched -- it's at

Alan David Doane tells it as he saw it!

Nat Gertler of About Comics has become the publisher/archivist of the 24-Hour Comics scene, with the full participation of 24-Hour Comic inventor/founder Scott McCloud.

If you're interested, the main book to pick up is 24 HOUR COMICS, edited by Scott McCloud, which features my "A Life in Black and White" story, Neil Gaiman's (still among the best reads of 'em all), and seven others for a mere $11.95.

About Comics also has 24 HOUR COMICS ALL-STARS (with Scott McCloud's first-ever-24-Hour-Comics-in-history, plus 24 Hour comics by Paul Smith, Sean McKeever, Tone Rodriguez, and five others; $12.95) and 24 HOUR COMICS DAY HIGHLIGHTS 2004 (24 stories including Josh Howard and Christian Gossett, about 500 pages, $24.95). There's a new volume coming out in October: 24 HOUR COMICS DAY HIGHLIGHTS 2005 (same format and price as 2004).

Go to

About Comics

Of course, you can still purchase my own 24-hour comic in its original publication in TABOO #7, or its initial reprint in SPIDERBABY COMIX #2, from my standing website:

SR Bissette Comicon site

(Check the menu bar on the left of that site's homepage, and you'll find 'em there.) It's old, creaky, and sorely in need of a revamp -- which will be up SOON!

More later!