I had a picture book I was working on I couldn’t fathom leaving Hark a Vagrant right away. I guess I always thought this was a book I’d make, but that really made it clear that I could.īut I couldn’t do it right then. I later called them a “test,” but at the time it was just something I was driven to do for their own sake, and as I was doing it, you could see the bigger picture emerging of what it could be. In 2014, I was just in my studio and I was compelled one day to start drawing out those comics. I’m sure it was helpful, but also it’s just the way it was.ĭoes now feel like the right time to tell this story, compared with 2014? Or, perhaps, is it a case of you being better equipped to handle it now? There were long periods then when I wasn’t working on it but it was always on my mind. I had two children, and I lost my sister Becky to cancer. In between, there were a few stops and starts. The book was in the works since 2016, I pitched it to Drawn and Quarterly in the summer of 2016. How long was this in the works? You mentioned when you closed down Hark a Vagrant way back in 2018 that you were working on a graphic novel.

I needed editors to help make this book so that it wasn’t 2,000 pages-and it’s still 500 pages, and there’s all kinds of things missing. If I started talking about the oil sands to someone, I couldn’t stop, because there was no point at which I could be satisfied I’d explained it.

Kate beaton website