Melmoth

Cerebus #6

by Dave Sim, Gerhard

Reprinting Cerebus Issues 139-150

More than 11 years into a 25-year project of chronicling the life of a single main character, Dave Sim took a small detour (of sorts), put his main character Cerebus on the sidelines, and told this story of the last days of Oscar Wilde. Some Cerebus readers think this book is a needless distraction from Sim's master epic; others think this is one of Sim's finest achievements, and that by combining and slightly altering the very real letters of Robert Ross to More Adey (originally printed in the Collected Letters of Oscar Wilde), Sim was able to add a depth and breadth to his fiction never before possible. Either way, Sim and exquisite background artist Gerhard are in fine form as they weave this tale of Wilde into their fictional landscape of a new matriarchal establishment.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Fantasy, Fiction, Graphic Novels Comics, Comix, Comic Book

260 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 1991

About the author

David Victor Sim is a Canadian comic book, artist and publisher, best known as the creator of Cerebus the Aardvark.

Reviews

[Baba · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some consider this volume genius, other consider it an anomaly in this series; Sim and Gerhard retell the death of Oscar Wilde via the death of their Oscar/'Melmoth' character. I have got to hand it to the creative team for the different and improving artistic themes of this series, but other than that I believe a non-parody real interpretation of the demise of Oscar Wilde as a stand-alone would suffice. Elsewhere Sim's rants and world view in the editorials and letters place feel like brazen unapologetic misogyny wrapped in a feint of being anti-feminism. A 5 out of 12, Two Stars for this one.

2025 read

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Melmoth, then.

Throughout Jaka’s Story, Dave Sim had faced a barrage of complaints that there wasn’t enough Cerebus / action / advancement of the overall storyline / mystical woo (delete as appropiate). So, ever cognisant of the needs of his audience, he gave them twelve issues of Cerebus clutching Jaka’s doll and sitting almost catatonic outside a cafe while, up the hill, Oscar Wilde is slowly and painfully dying. That’s it. There are cameos for passing characters from Church & State while Cerebus is occasionally dusted, but Oscar’s death is the focus of this one. It’s told in the same text panel and image style as the “Daughter Of Palnu” extracts in Jaka’s Story, using actual letters from Robert Ross and Reginald Turner describing the last days of the real Oscar Wilde. The mood of the book is stately and sombre. It is a study of a man on the edge of the abyss, unflinching without being graphic or voyeuristic. As you might expect, it is dark and disturbing, with all the emotional heft a serious consideration of the subject deserves. That’s not to say there is no light relief. Mick and Keef are back for a few pages, and the Roach’s latest incarnation as normalroach is an hilarious study in repressed anger, but you won’t be closing this one with many chuckles.

Given that this story takes us up to the exact halfway point of the saga, it’s easy to draw comparisons with what we know about Cerebus’ death, which at this point Dave had been promising for several years would occur in the very last issue. In his final days, Oscar is far from alone, unmourned and unloved. A great deal of the emotional power of the book is in the sadness and confusion of Robbie and Reggie, and their helplessness in the face of the inevitable. With the text taken from other sources, Dave can concentrate on the art, which is just wonderful. The character sketches are superb, and Gerhard has upped his game even further on the backgrounds. For such a slow, small story, there is a real cinematic feel, a sense that the events on the street are being viewed through a camera which simply records what it sees, sometimes panning up and down the hill, from Dino’s Cafe to Oscar’s hotel and back. A powerful, haunting work.

This is, believe it or not, where I started reading Cerebus. Probably not the best jumping on point, but even with little knowledge of the background, the quality of the work was evident. It was autumn 1990, and I’d just started at Nottingham University. There was a basement in the Virgin Megastore with a comics concession in, and I eagerly fell on it, as exactly the sort of thing I’d been starved of growing up in the deep South West. After I’d been in a few times buying pretty much whatever DC put out with a Mature Readers tag, the bearded guy behind the counter said “you might like this”, and slipped a random issue of Jaka’s Story into my bag, explaining that the new storyline, Melmoth, was starting imminently. I read it, didn’t really understand what was going on, but liked what I saw, and started buying the monthly issues regularly. That was Mark Simpson. Over the next few years, he, and his co-worker Stephen Holland, introduced me to so many great comics. After that, Mark and Stephen went on to open Page 45, and blew me away with their vision of what a comic shop could and should be. I kept in touch once I’d left the East Midlands (Mark and Stephen both ended up coming along on my stag night), and I’ve bought my comics from them for quarter of a century now. Well, only Stephen for the last ten years or so. One night in 2005, Mark went to sleep and just didn’t wake up. There’s a nice piece about him on the Page 45 website: http://www.page45.com/world/about/mar... . As if this book wasn’t suffused enough with death, I’ll always associate it with Mark, just for that simple act of kindness (which, let’s face it, was also a pretty good business decision, as it led directly to me spending hundreds and hundreds of pounds on the rest of Cerebus). Rest in peace.

My usual random observations

– Something that struck me this time is the sequence where Cerebus sees the chained Astoria in the middle of the road, and then seems to swap places with her again, as happened in C&S. This is a pivot, and it’s after this vision that he starts to (slowly!) emerge from his catatonia. It also seems to have affected things in the outside world – it’s after this, for instance, that the waitresses change, which I don’t think is otherwise explained or commented on. I’m not entirely sure what is going on with this swapping.
– those are some very pigeony pigeons.

– what an epilogue. After almost forty issues of Cerebus doing very little, this explosion into action kickstarts the second half. The next couple of books are Cerebus back in high gear, and it starts here.

– In the afterword, Dave talks about having to excise one of Oscar’s comments, as he could find no workable equivalent for “Jew” and didn’t want to face a deluge of mail questioning the existence of Judaism in ancient Estarcion. Just remember that when we get to Latter Days.

[Little Timmy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Well this volume was a let down. Cerebus barely appears in the book. Not recommended unless you just are a completist for the series. I just flipped through and read the few pages Cerebus was on.

[Drew Canole · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn't really get much from this story. It's about the final days of Oscar Wilde, first and foremost; and I'm just not very interested in that. Especially considering the story didn't delve into his persecution.

The story of Cerebus is in the background. He spends all his time depressed about Jaka.

[The_Mad_Swede · Rating 4 out of 5]

Collecting issues # 139­–150 of Dave Sim's 300 issues limited series Cerebus the Aardvark , this volume follows directly after the final events in Jaka's Story and positions Cerebus in an even more passive and less central role. Instead, Sim turns to what seems to be a pet project of his own devising ­ telling the story of the last days of Oscar Wilde. Naturally, Sim's situates the character in his fictional Estarcion, but he both makes it clear that the Wilde-like character Oscar from the previous story arc (the author of the "read" "Jaka's Story") is just a namesake of this other Oscar a.k.a. Melmoth, and he bases his story upon the known facts of Oscar Wilde's last days. He does so not only by using an obvious intake of Wilde biography available, but actually using available correspondences written by the people close to Wilde at the time, only changing the text slightly where absolutely necessary (e.g. changing place names to match Estarcion places and making sure that no anachronisms sneak into the temporally much earlier world of Estarcion (compared to Wilde's 19th century). The result is an interesting tale, beautifully illustrated, but it lacks a sense of immediacy in that the story not only pushes Cerebus into a very absent role, but it's linkage to the greater story and the world of Estarcion is somewhat weak. It is not that it does not, it is rather a question as to what this has to do with Cerebus. Now, Jaka's Story admittedly placed Cerebus in a similar position, but Jaka was already an established character and part of the Cerebus' fictional world. Focusing on her made much more narrative sense than this sudden introduction of an entirely new character with a story rather separate from previous events altogether. As such I can imagine a lot of people reading the original comics as it was published being somewhat frustrated with this storyline even given its definitive strengths, and I would put this down as the main reason as to why I do not rate this volume as highly as the preceding two.

[Hamish · Rating 3 out of 5]

So this one is a Cerebus volume in name only. I mean, there's a prologue and an epilogue and a minor subplot that (kinda) advance the plot, but the rest is the illustrated death of Oscar Wilde. Sim uses selected quotes from letters detailing Wilde's final days and draws accompanying panels. It's kind of sad and moving and effective, and it's done well and tastefully. But taken within the context of the series, it's a pretty bizarre left turn that comes out of nowhere and doesn't really fit in at all. For what it is, it's pretty good though.

The prologue and epilogue kind of illustrate the best and worst of Sim's method. The prologue is a full issue (that's 20 pages) of the Roach (in disguise) being annoyed by a rude waitress and a Cirinist officer. It's this really silly sight gag stretched out for a whole issue (and if you were reading this as it came out, that's all you got for a month!). It's barely funny for a page and I can't see what artistic or narrative value it has for 20 pages. I guess it's to show that Cirinism sucks. Whatever. The Epilogue is the polar opposite. Yes it moves in slow motion, but in a way that draws you in and is completely riveting. After reading that sequence, you sure as shit want to go get the next volume in the series ASAP (spoiler: you'll be disappointed).

Also the plotting is a little unclear/sloppy as per usual. The Oscar here is the same one as in the previous volume, right (EDIT: I just realized this is not true. It's a totally different Oscar. Why create an Oscar for your series and then dedicate an entire volume of it to a different Oscar? Baffling.)? But there he gets sentenced to two years hard labor and here he's out. But the Cerebus subplot seems to pick up immediately from the previous volume, so how's that work? Also it's super unclear that the reason Cerebus is so shell-shocked is because he thinks Jaka is dead. I had to read that elsewhere to understand. Why does he think Jaka is dead?

[Sean Samonas · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is where we start to see that it is a mistake to tell everyone that you are going to do a 300 issue run of a comic series. See, I get the feeling at some point here that Dave really just got bored with writing Cerebus and wanted to do something else.

Like a biography comic on some of his favorite authors. Oscar Wilde's death is long and boring. It has nothing to do with the actual plot (hey remember that silly old thing?) and really is just an exploration of the death of a man.

Is it bad? No, not really. But I didn't buy a Cerebus book to read about the death of Oscar Wilde. I bought it to read about the adventures of an aadvark Conan the Barbarian parody. This is the dissonance I referred to (if I didn't I really should have) in my review of the first book. As a kid, I didn't understand any of this stuff. I just saw a cool picture of an aardvark fighter and I wanted to read about that.

The most frustrating thing about the entire run of Cerebus is that occasionally you see glimmers of interesting stories littered about. And you really want to hear about those stories, but Dave is saying, "No, no...this is important. I want you to hear about Oscar Wilde's death."

To sum up, Cerebus sits in a chair and does nothing. That is about all that is contributed to the over-arcing storyline. Oh right, at the end he actually does something and we pretty much slide right on into the next book.

Also, we get the first rumblings of Dave chauvinism and utter disdain for woman having any sorts of rights. The waitress in this book is the first real example of the author leaving behind any semblance of reality and simply creating a complete caricature of how he perceives feminists and their ideals.

[Luc]

Probably one of my least favourites of the Cerebus series. As I mentionned before in other review, I think Dave Sim is an asshat but with this book he became a self-indulgent asshat by telling us not a story on his main character but a retelling of the death of Oscar wilde from the many biographies he has read on the man.
Now I'm sure that the life of Oscar Wilde is a fascinating subject and I should totally buy a book on the subject to read one day but I was pretty sure when I bought this book that it was about Cerebus. Turns out I must have wrong. Oh! we see Cerebus througout the book. Mostly n a catatonic state articuating the eventual monosyllable but he's so immobile that construction workers even mistake him for a statue at one point.
Also, for a character that Sim described as a "homosexualist", a big no-no thing to be in his world, he sure makes spend a lot of time for not whole lot of payback. Sure, some of Wilde's witticisms are scattered in the bits where he is still lucid but, again, I wanted Cerebus in this book, not Oscar Wilde.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

to me, in retrospect, the real turning point in the series happens with book 5, "jaka's story." in dave's introduction he states that he was in love when he drew it, out of love when it was finished. i think this perspective ultimately had a course-changing impact on the series in the long run (as it became apparent a few more books on down the line with his famous "rants").

"melmoth" is a brief excursion into the death of oscar wilde that confusingly (for me) crosses his other oscar character from book 5. why two oscar characters? i've always wondered about the placement of the "fake" oscar vs. the "real" oscar in the series.

anyway, it really hits the fan at the end of this one. dave is nearing the top of the mountain and he's getting ready to jump off. but before he does...holy cow.

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dave Sim goes off on a Oscar Wilde admiration tour in this one.
Dave Sim has finished developping his art-style, here we see the Cerebus illustrated in pretty much the way we will see him for the rest of the series. The Cerebus the barbarian story-arc that preceeded this managed to hook us in, now time to reel us in with the actual story.
Still, had Cerebus "the Barbarian" not come before this, I doubt very much this would be the sort of story that would have hooked me, so in a way, I'm very happy Sim had his "growing-pains" during his 25 first issues... it allowed me to grow along with him.

[C. · Rating 4 out of 5]

A touching and intimate retelling of Oscar Wilde's death. Why is this in the middle of the Cerebus plot? Because Oscar Wilde was a character in the story. Obviously. As good as this is, this is where Sims starts to, as they say, loose the plot. As in, he really never gets back to a plot for a very, very long time.

[A.D. Jameson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Along with Minds, this might be my favorite volume of Cerebus.

[Tom Ewing · Rating 4 out of 5]

Melmoth is the first of the really 'difficult' books of Cerebus, a dual narrative in which Cerebus sits outside a bar, almost catatonic (at one point a character literally dusts him) while Oscar Wilde dies. The Wilde scenes are drawn from - and narrated with - the real letters of Wilde's friends, written as he lay dying in Paris. Dave Sim doesn't alter the names but he changes geographical and religious details to fit Cerebus' world. In some parts of the story, Cerebus is prominent - we even see a few old characters from Church And State, like Princes Mick and Keef or Bishop Posey. In others, the comic is entirely given over to the Wilde material, which is told mostly in the style Sim was coming to use more and more - text laid alongside beautifully composed illustrations.

I put 'difficult' in scare quotes because Melmoth's reputation as a tough read mostly dates from when it was coming out monthly. There's rarely if ever been a 'graphic novel' more unsuited to monthly serialisation, and this was at a point where Cerebus' overall reputation was glowing. Sim's personal profile in the comics industry, as godfather of a creator's rights movement and as hard-partying convention regular, was also sky-high. And he was putting out a comic in which, month to month, almost nothing happened.

The sheer inertia of reading Melmoth monthly is impossible to recapture, which is in some ways a shame for a book about the horror of helpless waiting for something to happen. It's possible to draw a link thematically between the Cerebus and the Oscar material but, as is often the case with Sim, the ties are much more on the level of pacing and the reading experience. The characters in the Oscar material are in agony, clutching at straws but increasingly resigned to nothing happening - Sim knows most monthly readers won't be empathising with Wilde's friends, but they can experience those feelings themselves as what they most want to happen (Cerebus to get up and do something) is similarly withheld. They get the catharsis they want in the Epilogue to Melmoth, but only after Oscar's story has run its course.

That Epilogue is also issue 150 of Cerebus - the halfway point of the comic. And this also explains some of Melmoth's structure - explains, maybe, its existence in the first place. With Cerebus, Sim had given himself complete creative freedom with two major restrictions - the comic would come out regularly, on time, in a way that didn't allow for side projects of any real length, and the comic would last 300 issues exactly.

Melmoth is a workaround for both these restrictions. My broad hypothesis: Sim's inclusion of Oscar Wilde as a character in Jaka's Story sparked the desire to do something about his final days and death (which necessitated creating a second in-world Oscar!). Cerebus' schedule meant that would have to be done in the pages of the comic, whose plot in any case called for a period of catatonia as Cerebus thinks he's lost everything. The 300 issue structure created a neat break point at #150, and also - given that #300 would end with Cerebus' death - allowed Sim to prefigure that. It's all extremely neat: Melmoth is the length it is because that's how many issues Sim had to play with before the halfway point, and it's the kind of story which could easily have run an issue or two shorter or longer.

All of which avoids the most important question: does it work? I think it does. Or rather, I think both the narratives work even if their juxtaposition makes largely tonal sense. Read as a 240-page whole Melmoth is one of the more accessible parts of Cerebus, even if a new reader wouldn't exactly know where everything fits. The pacing of the Cerebus sections is beautifully done, with almost nothing changing month by month but a slow arc towards awareness and awakening showing through the whole. The Oscar material works too as a formal experiment, a sombre high point in Sim's realist mode, and it helps enormously that the language feels (and is) genuine, rather than clever Sim pastiches.

But, you might say, why do an illustrated graphic retelling of the death of Oscar Wilde in the first place? To which the only possible answer, especially given the tenor of the time, is: why not? Sim was preaching self-publishing as the only way to ensure complete creative freedom. All around him, meanwhile, cartoonists and writers were tackling their passion projects (often for publishers, much to Sim's chagrin) - his friend Chester Brown, for instance, was busy adapting the Gospel of Mark. Alan Moore was starting up From Hell. And Dave Sim had shackled himself to a 300 issue comic about a talking aardvark. Melmoth is the moment where Sim sets out to demonstrate - to his own liking, if not the market's - that "a 300 issue comic about a talking aardvark" really can include anything he wants it to. And he proved the point. Even if nobody in 1992 understood what "Cerebus can include anything Dave Sim wants" might really entail.

[Rex Hurst · Rating 4 out of 5]

With this volume we reach the halfway mark for Cerebus. It collects issues 139-150 out of a total of 300. As with Jaka’s Story, Cerebus becomes a background character in this volume, spending the time staring into space on a patio and eating raw potatoes. The art has certainly matured here. It is much less cartoony, expressing a greater depth of emotion, detail, and versatility than ever before. This is demonstrated in the last twenty pages of the book.

The story’s main focus is on the death of Oscar Wilde. For continuity’s sake the Oscar in this story is not the same as the Oscar from Jaka’s Story, though they are based on the same person at different points in his life. The one presented here is Oscar Melmoth- Melmoth being Wilde’s traveling name when traveling Europe. This was during his unofficial exile from Victorian society following his two year stint in jail for “gross indecency with men.”

While reaching for this novel, the author has commented on he has found no dispassionate biographies of the man. That each one displays as much, if not more, on the beliefs and politics of the author as it does about the life of Oscar Wilde. Often they cherry pick information to help form their narratives and ignore those which might contradict it. In one biography he is the Literary Giant, brought low by mediocre vermin. In others he the Predator, a corruptor of youth and of middling talent. And in this the author here is not much different, he only varies in his execution.

For the most part, apart from the visuals, he presents the final days on Oscar Wilde in the words of Robert Ross and Reginald Turner, his two friends who were with him at the end. He quotes exclusively from their correspondence at the time of his death, adjusting only the place names to fit in with the geography of the series. In Melmoth, Wilde is the Dying Martyr, riddled with debt and rife with illness. The reader cannot help but be moved by his plight. If not for the help of his friends, he would’ve ended up dying in a gutter on a dingy street.

Included as an appendix are copies of the documents the author used to assemble Melmoth’s story, along with reflections by Sim on the quality and accuracy of the material. It is quite interesting for those who want to learn a bit more on the historical events surrounding Oscar Wilde.

Throughout the novel Cerebus is in a state of shock. Having learned from the Judge that his life will be a forgotten failure and believing that Jaka, his true love, is dead, he wanders to a lonely inn and offers the owner a gold piece in exchange for room and board for the rest of Cerebus’s life. When Cerebus was pope, as we remember from Church and State I and II, he demanded that everyone turn all of their gold over to him, which collapsed the economy. After Cirin’s forces moved in the confiscated the gold, but none of it has been distributed in the city (there will be more on where the money went next volume), so the offer of a single gold piece is like offering a motel owner ten million dollars to stay in a room forever. His solitude ends violently (of course it does, this is Cerebus) when he discovers Jaka is alive and the book concludes in one of the best fight scenes in the series.

We see several characters from the past and their degradation and imprisonment under the new Cirinist rule the city-state of Iest. They are all forced to wear a similar outfit and have their hair cut to a particular style. One designed not to arouse sexual impulses as part of the Cirinist sex-negative philosophy. We encounter the Roach, a once powerful if idiotic character, now reduced to a hate filled mass of anger which he dares not show. The character is shown here as wearing horn rimmed glasses and a beige suit and some people not familiar with indie comics from the 80s may not realize that he is parodying the character of Normalman, which was published by Aardvark-Vanaheim comics at one point.

[Dominick · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an odd book. It juxtaposes an account of the death of Oscar Wilde, the entire text of which is drawn from correspondence written by Robert Ross and Reginald Turner, with some modifications to shoehorn the account into Cerebus's world (e.g. changing references to Paris to Iest). with Cerebus's near-catatonic response to the loss of Jaka. Basically, Cerebus spends most of the narrative sitting in front of a pub, clutching sword and Missy (symbols of the masculine and feminine), barely speaking. Why the death of Oscar Wilde (not the same Oscar we met in Jaka's Story, the text makes clear) is shoe-horned into the story of Cerebus is not at all clear, nor is what relationship, if any, there is between Oscar's impending death and Cerebus's near-catatonia at all clear, apart from the fact that Oscar declines into death whereas by the end Cerebus is revivified. One might imagine a link between the unflinching representation of Oscar's slow decay across the 12 issues collected here with Cerebus's excruciatingly debilitating old age in >i>The Last Day, I guess, and contrast Cerebus's re-emergence as the protagonist at the end here with the abject failure of his similar attempt to reclaim power at the end of The Last Day, but that's not a reading that would have been available to the first readers for literally years. Sim's and Gerhard's illustrating skills are nevertheless very much on display here, with the overtly comic pages featuring Cerebus juxtaposed with what amount to illustrations for text, rather than comics proper (for the most part, anyway; there is the occasional comics page in the Oscar sections). Overall, though, this is a mixed success.

[Jeff · Rating 3 out of 5]

Melmoth is a curious volume, presenting a dramatic version of the last days of Oscar Wilde in comics form, while just barely managing to squeeze that story into the larger Cerebus narrative concerning the anthropomorphic aardvark for whom the series is named.

Dave Sim was one of the true iconoclasts of the comics scene in the 80's and 90's, a difficult personality who published and distributed his own work. That immense creative freedom served him well at times, but at other times his personal obsessions overwhelmed his storytelling abilities. Melmoth falls right in the middle of that conundrum, as the deeply-researched retelling of Wilde's final days of life has an undeniable dramatic power. But the author's need to try and fit that digression into his primary story arc (which really has nothing at all to do with Oscar Wilde) makes for an awkward fit.

Despite that, it's worth mentioning the impressive visual backgrounds created by Sims' creative partner Gerhard. Those very detailed renditions of furniture, buildings, cityscapes, etc are truly beautiful, and even when Sim's tale seems to be fighting against itself, the sheer visual splendor of Gerhard's backgrounds are always rewarding on their own merits.

[Gilly Singh · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this volume for what it was. Cerebus plays a negligible role in the narrative but, his stunned, depressed lurking in the background builds a sense of anticipation for when Cerebus will begin to act again. After 2 volumes in which he played a secondary character (at best) the conclusion of Melmouth is like an earthquake, shaking off the curiosity and whimsy which had since clouded up the whole saga.

You can see where Dave Sim's views on women begin to hinder his ability to write complex female characters in this volume. His artistic bent also veers towards pretentiousness whilst just about avoiding fully falling into that trap.

If you have made it up to this volume in the saga, I would recommend still soldiering on but, I do wonder how much longer Sim's narrative will be able to hold the interest of all but the most die hard of readers and completionists.

It took me less than 2hrs to read in total.

[Tony Calder · Rating 3 out of 5]

Melmoth picks up two issues after the end of Jaka's Story - issues 137 and 138 are not in the reprint series. They are an epilogue to Jaka's Story and Cerebus doesn't appear in either of them.

Probably the most significant think about this part of the story is that it brings the story to its half-way point - numerically, at least. Written at a time when Dave Sim and Gerhard were struggling (a bit) to get back onto their monthly schedule, this story is the author's take on the death of Oscar Wilde - a character introduced during Jaka's Story. Cerebus does appear, but really doesn't do much until the final issue, which sees a kind of rebirth of the character and resets a lot of the changes to Cerebus that had been occurring since High Society (some 10 years earlier).

The artwork, as always, is exceptional.

[Rockito · Rating 5 out of 5]

There's an issue of Silver Surfer by Jim Starlin where the former's knocked out the whole way through. This happens to be one of the best stories under Starlin's tenure on The series. He got away with that because it was a prologue of sorts for the Infinity Gauntlet story. In a similar manner, Cerebus is catatonic during the whole chunk of Melmoth. Considering the mindset of the average comic-book reader, it doesnt surprise me why a lot of people drop Cerebus here, way before Dave's "manifesto". The story is a nice homage to somebody who passed away, while also analizing how society's mindset can Tag even the most talented as expendable out of bigotry alone, and it does all this without being self-indulgent(although I doubt Dave could do the opposite regarding this matter). Highly recommended.

[Thomas Radigan · Rating 3 out of 5]

...the story of the death of Oscar in pictures. Yes, Oscar is meant to largely mimic Oscar Wilde the writer, and while Cerebus is sitting comatose, thinking Jaka dead, and Archbishop Posey is martyred, still believing in Cerebus, the story basically tells how Oscar, now ill from imprisonment, checks into a hotel under a pseudonym and dies...based on how it happened with the real-life Oscar Wilde.

What does this story have to do with Cerebus itself? Dave Sim undoubtedly wanted to start becoming a great artist rather than merely a cartoonist doing a comic series about a talking aardvark. Indeed, though Cerebus would end up using his sword once more against the Cirinists, Cerebus has quite departed from its roots as a parody of Conan The Barbarian, and the humor would gradually disappear from the series.

[Rob Marney · Rating 3 out of 5]

This illustrated narration of the death of Oscar Wilde is great, a heartwrenching tale of grief and loss and the ruin of a debauched man. I'm here for Dave Sim and Gerhard adding flair to a biography with inky blacks and stately fonts and excellent faces. The comic prologue is also quite droll, and the epilogue leaps into action in a very satisfying payoff.

Unfortunately, the other half of this story is basically deleted scenes from Church and State, with Cerebus meeting unfunny minor characters, taking ten pages to arrive at a simple punchline, and generally doing nothing. The juxtaposition of the insipid Cerebus story with a real person's death is artistic, but that doesn't make it any easier to read.

[Leif · Rating 4 out of 5]

Moving and extremely sad portrayal of Wilde's last days.

Incredible artwork from Sim and Gerhard.

Not as much a "Cerebus" story, but a neat diversion. If you are only interested in the aardvark, you can just read the few bits he is in.

In my opinion, although not integral to the overall plot, this arc proves Sim's legitimacy as a comic writer of the highest order. Say what you want about Sim's beliefs, his work in all of Cerebus makes for one of the best examples of graphic storytelling that you are likely to come upon.

[Andrew Barnett · Rating 4 out of 5]

Melmoth is unlike anything else in Cerebus. It is an intimate look at Oscar Wilde. It has haunting and beautiful moments. It is still funny at times like the rest of Cerebus. Sim really has a grasp for voices in characters- and his voice for Wilde in particular, especially when he banters, is terrifically written. This isn't my favorite Cerebus by a long shot...it is missing something...but I am having a hard time putting my finger on what that something is. It might just be that I wanted more Cerebus.

[Clint · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is not the place to start. If you, like me, had heard intriguing things about Cerebus and stumbled into this volume; put it down. This is largely an aside and a very trying one at that.

That said, even though I had to force my way to the finish with this volume, it didn’t sour me on the character or series. I will try again, starting at the beginning (and skipping this one when/if I get to it).

[Diego Dotta]

First time reading something from these authors. I was astonished by the shadows, loved it. I was quite ignorant about Oscar Wilde as well (still). I feel I didn’t get several parts and links between the 2 parallel stories because I didn’t read the previous volumes. :/ overall, I thought the drawings were amazing but the story could be better.

[John · Rating 2 out of 5]

The main story is the story of the last days of Oscar Wilde, transposed to the fictional fantasy setting of Cerebus. The side story actually features Cerebus, but mostly in a near catatonic state.

Fortunately, it doesn't take very long to read, and is not badly written. The art is excellent as usual.

[Martin Maenza · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was not feeling this one at all.

[StrictlySequential · Rating 2 out of 5]

Sixth Printing = June 2000

Unless you care about the intimate details of Oscar Wilde's DEATH- this is not for you. SKIP IT.

The Oscar Wilde dying part takes over the whole story and has become very pondersome by the half-way point. What on earth is he trying to say with the whole thing? And why can't we get anything else in more than snippets? What a waste of three years of the poor readers' time. Thankfully, I finished it in mere days. I didn't know what I was in for.

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’m not 100% sure I ever finished this.

I kept buying the books after this point but as Sim got stranger and stranger I just gave up. I wonder if I’ll ever finish it some day?

[Ed Erwin · Rating 3 out of 5]

I originally read this as the first of the Cerebus books I read. I just re-read it now that I'm reading them in order. I didn't like this volume much either time. It mostly tells the story of the final days of Oscar Wilde's life, through quotes from letters by his friend who was present, but with a few small details changed so that it could be taking place in Cerebus' world.

Oscar Wilde was an interesting guy. The tragic story of his imprisonment which lead to his death is interesting. But the last few days of his life are not that much different from those of anyone dying of illness. I don't understand what this was doing in the middle of a story about a warrior aardvark! (The aardvark in question does very little at all in this volume.) Maybe this would have made more sense if set in the real location of the story and published outside of the Cerebus cycle.

The previous volume, Jaka's Story, also included a version of Oscar Wilde, and that story was great! In that case his character made more sense as a part of the story: he was fictionally writing the book "Jaka's Story", and rebelling against the ruling matriarchy.

There is still plenty of excellent graphics, so it is still worth reading as a part of the series, but you could easily skip it and miss absolutely nothing about the overall ongoing story.