Brief Lives
E447148
Brief Lives is a major story arc in Neil Gaiman's The Sandman that follows Dream and his sister Delirium on a quest to find their long-lost brother Destruction, exploring themes of change, mortality, and responsibility.
All labels observed (1)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Brief Lives canonical | 9 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T4506410 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Brief Lives Context triple: [The Sandman, notableStoryArc, Brief Lives]
-
A.
Three Lives
Three Lives is a 1909 modernist short story collection by Gertrude Stein that experiments with language and narrative in portraying the inner lives of three working-class women.
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B.
Two Lives
Two Lives is a memoir by Reeve Lindbergh that reflects on her complex family legacy and the contrasting lives of her parents, aviator Charles Lindbergh and writer Anne Morrow Lindbergh.
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C.
A Life
A Life is the autobiographical memoir of influential film and theatre director Elia Kazan, in which he reflects on his career, personal life, and controversial political choices.
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D.
Parallel Lives
Parallel Lives is a series of biographies by the ancient Greek writer Plutarch that pairs the lives of famous Greeks and Romans to draw moral and character comparisons.
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E.
Afterlives
Afterlives is a historical novel by Nobel laureate Abdulrazak Gurnah that follows intertwined lives in German-occupied East Africa and its aftermath, exploring themes of colonialism, memory, and survival.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Brief Lives Target entity description: Brief Lives is a major story arc in Neil Gaiman's The Sandman that follows Dream and his sister Delirium on a quest to find their long-lost brother Destruction, exploring themes of change, mortality, and responsibility.
-
A.
Three Lives
Three Lives is a 1909 modernist short story collection by Gertrude Stein that experiments with language and narrative in portraying the inner lives of three working-class women.
-
B.
Two Lives
Two Lives is a memoir by Reeve Lindbergh that reflects on her complex family legacy and the contrasting lives of her parents, aviator Charles Lindbergh and writer Anne Morrow Lindbergh.
-
C.
A Life
A Life is the autobiographical memoir of influential film and theatre director Elia Kazan, in which he reflects on his career, personal life, and controversial political choices.
-
D.
Parallel Lives
Parallel Lives is a series of biographies by the ancient Greek writer Plutarch that pairs the lives of famous Greeks and Romans to draw moral and character comparisons.
-
E.
Afterlives
Afterlives is a historical novel by Nobel laureate Abdulrazak Gurnah that follows intertwined lives in German-occupied East Africa and its aftermath, exploring themes of colonialism, memory, and survival.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (48)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
The Sandman story arc
ⓘ
comic book story arc ⓘ |
| associatedWithFranchise |
The Sandman (comics)
ⓘ
linked to:
The Sandman (comic book series)
|
| chronologicalPosition |
occurs after the story arc "Fables and Reflections"
ⓘ
occurs before the story arc "Worlds' End" ⓘ |
| countryOfOrigin |
United States
ⓘ
linked to:
United States of America
|
| creator | Neil Gaiman ⓘ |
| exploresConcept |
abandonment of duty
ⓘ
the burden of immortality ⓘ the cost of responsibility ⓘ the inevitability of change ⓘ |
| featuresCharacter |
Death
ⓘ
Desire ⓘ Despair ⓘ Destiny ⓘ The Endless ⓘ |
| firstPublicationDecade | 1990s ⓘ |
| focusesOnCharacter | Destruction ⓘ |
| hasCollectedEdition |
The Sandman: Brief Lives graphic novel collection
ⓘ
linked to:
The Sandman: Brief Lives trade paperback
The Sandman: Brief Lives trade paperback ⓘ |
| hasGenre |
dark fantasy
ⓘ
horror ⓘ mythology-based fiction ⓘ |
| hasTone |
melancholic
ⓘ
philosophical ⓘ |
| language | English ⓘ |
| mainCharacter |
Delirium
ⓘ
Dream ⓘ |
| medium | comic book ⓘ |
| notableFor |
depicting the reunion of most of the Endless
ⓘ
marking a turning point in Dream’s character development ⓘ showing Destruction’s philosophical reasons for abandoning his realm ⓘ |
| partOf |
The Sandman
ⓘ
linked to:
The Sandman (comic book series)
The Sandman main continuity ⓘ |
| plotSummary | Dream and Delirium search for their missing brother Destruction, who abandoned his realm. ⓘ |
| publisher |
DC Comics
ⓘ
Vertigo ⓘ |
| seriesNumber | seventh major story arc of The Sandman ⓘ |
| setIn |
realms of the Endless
ⓘ
various locations across the mortal world ⓘ |
| theme |
change
ⓘ
consequences ⓘ family ⓘ freedom ⓘ identity ⓘ mortality ⓘ responsibility ⓘ |
| workInSeriesNumber | The Sandman issues #41–49 ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Brief Lives Description of subject: Brief Lives is a major story arc in Neil Gaiman's The Sandman that follows Dream and his sister Delirium on a quest to find their long-lost brother Destruction, exploring themes of change, mortality, and responsibility.
Referenced by (9)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.