Here's the second letter as replied to on page 277.
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10th March 2004
Dear Dave
I was going to save writing a letter until I'd read Cerebus 300 (not long now I hope). I decided against it as I don't think I'd have anything much to write about it other than some useless platitudes along the lines of "congratulations for doing it". It's going to take me ages to get out of that last 100 issues all that I think I ultimately will do. I need especially to read the "Bible according to Dave" double issue 289/290 a few times before even attempting to get any coherent thoughts together on the series as a whole. I've not been devoting any time to rereads of the series these last few years which I fully intend to do now. It's been hard going a lot of the time and I've been too lazy – sorry.
I decided to write now simply to congratulate you on your letter spread out over various issues of the Comics Journal these last few months. It was so reasonable and, while not exactly succinct, summed up a lot of your ideas in what was, to my mind, much greater force than I've seen before. Your notes in the back of Cerebus seem almost designed to make people come out with a gut response of "whoa, he just can't say that" without actually reading what you're saying (which I have been guilty of myself
–
thank-you for the thoughtful response to my rather rude piss-take of Tangent, for which I apologise unreservedly, by the way). When you get a response to Tangent (per Cerebus 299) or your views in general (per TCJ) and you give a rational, point by point rebuttal to all the ill-thought out charges then you are supremely convincing. The bit about Jeff Smith particularly where you point out that, actually, he was the one to threaten the violence in the first place was masterful.
It's certainly made me rethink my reaction to the series as a whole. I think I get it now – it's the truth as you see it. It's not primarily designed to be an entertaining story (although of course it is) but a summation of your worldview set out for consumption by the masses. I still don't "get" a lot of it - the end of Going Home, for example, as I said in my last letter to you - but I'm going to work at it. Looking forward to it actually, the only thing is those bloody books are so heavy I'm going to wear myself out dragging them to and from work every day so I can read them on the train.
Regards
