Keskustelujen arkisto

HARRY FLUKS (and WILMER RIVERS),
re Bob Gregory stories:
great detective work & thanks for letting us know!
Even though I belong to the mainstreamish mostlyBarksians
(limiting discussion now to pre-1970 Duck stuff)
I am willing and able to let some of the nonCB material
enter my heart, mind and house. And indeed _all_ of
the stories you mentioned, written by this unknown-to-me
Bob Gregory and drawn by Strobl, are among those I
instantly recall from having read them many many years ago,
and among those with endearing lasting literary quality:
<<
W DD 65-01 18 BGy TS JL DD T:One For The Whammy
(the one Wilmer was talking about - reprinted in DD 240)
W DD 68-01 21 BGy TS JL DD T:The Fabulous Fiddlesticks
("The Golden Gate bridge in Venice? Why not?")
W DD 73-01 16 BGy TS JL DD T:Riverboat Shuffle
("I'll never understand the bill of the tea house")
W DD 74-01 14 BGy TS JL DD T:Dive To Danger
>>
And the Gregory/Barks story in XmasParade 9/1958 is also
wonderful and Xmas-charming -- and not, I admit, among those
where I am led to thinking that "this is not a Barks script!".

In addition to lavishing well-earned praise upon Mr. Fluks,
who has improved my mood with his tea and his reminding me
of these old and well-told non-Barks Duck stories [Angus mowing
the lawn, the Italian bridge builders and Scrooge playing the violin,
the creative complaints of the riverboat passengers], in the middle
of my professorial hard day's night of work, I ask:

. What else is known about writer Bob Gregory?
. Did he script stories with many artists (besides Stobl and Barks)?
. Are there other Gregory/Barks combinations
(besides "One moose -- two meese!")?
[This point, not only a play of linguistics but important to the flow
of the story, caused problems for the Norwegian translator in 1959,
and must have left an indelible long-lingering disturbing mark of
dissatisfaction in the minds of a generation of Scandinavians.]
. Where is the Becattini index?
. About how many of the Strobl-art stories were also written by Strobl?
More than half of them?

Nils Lid Hjort

BJORN-ARE:
Why would you think Stonehenge would be better preserved in the 6th century?
It was 3600 years old by then, rather than 4500-5000; not much of a
difference. But it wasn't "preserved" at all in the 6th century... nobody
was paying any attention to it. Very few tourists in England in those days
(and I'm not trying to be facetious -- there were lots of tourists further
south around the Mediterranean in those days, as well as a thousand or so
years earlier.... but England was too barbaric for tourists.) But the fact
is that I DID show Stonehenge to be in better shape when the Ducks went back
to the 6th century. Compare the two similar aerial view panels and you'll
see that there are more monoliths standing in the 6th century. But you
didn't notice, and neither did the Ducks. Hah -- gotcha.

NILS:
How strict is my "Barks only" attitude. I would say it's more like "Barks
strictly, and other writers if it fits and makes sense". For example, in the
"Lo$", if another writer had ever decided something about $crooge's past,
and if it fit logically into Barks' view (such as Strobl's <art only,
writer=?> of how $crooge earned his first Dime, or Grandma Duck's first
name, etc.) I saw no reason to change it. It had already been established
and was fine -- I sought to change nothing that had previously been
established, unless it just didn't work.
The other matter you mention -- yes, as I freely admitted in interviews and
on here years before you joined us, I "swiped" bits of that U$ story that
appeared in DD #51 for use in my "Last Sled to Dawson". (In fact, it was
even so stated in the accompanying text piece when the story was printed.)
That was my favorite non-Barks story when I was little -- I was fascinated
by the references to $crooge's frontier past (the seeds of "Lo$" were in me
then!) and I especially LOVED the image of the lost sled showing dimly
through the glacial ice when the iceberg "calved" (broke off). I was
arrogant enough, perhaps, to think I could take those two great elements and
build a better story around them... readers would have to judge as to
whether I succeeded. (I think I might have -- that is still my single
favorite of my own stories, despite my awful art... and many a burly old
Duckfan has told me they wept at the final scene.)

--------------------------------
End of Disney comics Digest V96 Issue #110
******************************************

DON:

Hm, I seem once again to have managed to make an unclear statement, as we always
get into these discussions whenever I unlurk.

> Why would you think Stonehenge would be better preserved in the 6th century?
> It was 3600 years old by then

Yeah, I know its at least that old (and not constructed by Merlin's magig as I believe one
legend has it). When I was there some years ago I read through the guide books and
the drawings at the site showing how it may have looked like at various stages of its
construction.

> But it wasn't "preserved" at all in the 6th century... nobody was paying any attention to it
>... I DID show Stonehenge to be in better shape when the Ducks went back to the 6th
> century. Compare the two similar aerial view panels and you'll see that there are more
> monoliths standing in the 6th century. But you didn't notice, and neither did the Ducks.
> Hah -- gotcha.

Nope, no way sir. I did spot that you had it looking some stones better in your drawings
of the 6th century site. That's the whole reason behind the "even" bit in my question:

"BTW, are you sure Stonehenge didn't look even better preserved in the 6th century?"

So, as you in fact h a d made it better preserved (even though it was not consciously
preserved by anyone, except the occasional secret druids still visiting the place, which
may explain why you made the area look somewhat like a well kept English lawn), I
wondered why it wasn't drawn e v e n better preserved.

So are you sure, do you have any sources for how it may have looked like in the 6th
century, or is it just (good) speculation?

And when will Prince Valiant enter the story, as a reminder to us all of Barks' fondness of
Foster?

Bjo/rn Are
(Email removed)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The Weaver in the Web that he made

- "Our minds were moving parallell
Because they never met"
-------------------------------------------------------------------

Hi!

KATHY FITZPATRICK:
You said: ".. visited your web page. Fantastical!"
Well, thank you very much! And yes ... it's still under construction!
I've only finished Europe and parts of America and Australia ... I mean
Australasia (sorry Greg! ;-).

One more thing: I don't understand this. You sent this message only to me
and I saw it in the Digest today! If you look in the little header in the
digest, you can also see that it's only addressed to me! (I have both a
normal and digest account of this list, and I didn't get the letter the
normal way, through the list!)

More strange things have been going one with me. I got two letters
from Bjorn Are Davidsen today and yesterday. Both with NO header and NO
subject. There was a lot of garbage in, and it was sent by UNKNOWN with
emailadres UNKNOWN! Really weird! Have others got this problem?

Bye!

Arthur de Wolf

In a message dated 96-05-24 08:19:44 EDT, you write:

> What else is known about writer Bob Gregory?
>. Did he script stories with many artists (besides Stobl and Barks)?
>. Are there other Gregory/Barks combinations
> (besides "One moose -- two meese!")?
> [This point, not only a play of linguistics but important to the flow
> of the story, caused problems for the Norwegian translator in 1959,
> and must have left an indelible long-lingering disturbing mark of
> dissatisfaction in the minds of a generation of Scandinavians.]
>. Where is the Becattini index?
>. About how many of the Strobl-art stories were also written by Strobl?
> More than half of them?
>
>Nils Lid Hjort

Bob Gregory born in 1921 and is the father of Roberta Gregory/ He begain
working for Western (creators of Dell comics) in 1958. He generally wrote
and drew his stories. He did Disney comics 1959-1984, Hanna-Barbera comics
in the 1960s, DePattie-Freleng comics in the 1970s, and Warner Bros, MGM, and
Walter Lantz comics. He is best known as the writer/penciller of (all?) the
Donald and Daisy comics of the 1970-1973 period.
((( Information (c) Jerry Bails 1996 from the Whos Who of American Comic
Books. Alberto Becattini and Steven Rowe, Senior Editors. For Information
on the Who's Who, e-mail (Email removed) )))
I would guess that Tony Strobl wrote no comics. He pencilled the stories
only.\

Steven
Rowe

ROSA, KROISOS, Friends of Lydia
[including Havas, T. Odd, Even, Kirkhe, Washington, Jackson, Hitler]:
Being generally interested in music, lyrics, poems, Marx,
pre-medieval scales [doric, frygian, lydian, mixolydian,
and the church and plagiat versions!], and of course in the
footnotology of footnotes, I am not complaining about the list's
recent and surprising excursion into song publishing terrain.

We should probably not perpetuate this into total obscureness,
however -- as more than one person [well, actually, two!] have
mentioned to me, we should be more seriously concerned with what
Lydia-singing does to our Donald. We need more depth and soul-baring
and despair and real emotions and humanness and complex behaviour
in Donald... And for me, this would perhaps mean: like in the best
of Barks, Strobl and Taliaferro. A simplistic slogan from the
local powerful branch of the
Self-Appointed Scandinavian Academic Overseers
of Literary Quality and Advancement and Continuation of
Barksian Absolute Quality in Modern Duck Publishing
(S.A.S.A.O.L.Q.A.C.B.A.Q. in M.D.P.)
committee (which I founded this minute) is:
"Barks is more than the long Scrooge stories --
Don't forget the Donald of the Barksian 10-pagers!"

Well, I'll allow myself making one more Lydia-related observation:
I finally got a copy of the Norwegian edition of the Kroisos story
[thanks!, list-member Nils V.J.; Extra 1/1995, same in the other
Nordic countries, I guess]. Here there is _much more_ of the Lydia song,
like Rosa intended! They have obviously translated from the original
Rosa text rather than from the final American official product
(WDC 601-603). The translation is also quite good, imvho; see below.

DON:
do you have a general preference, one-shot versus divided-in-parts
(typically three, like here, and like Gallia)? Do you get to have
a personal say in this? Here, presumably, the Kroisos story could
have been in the UScrooge series, as a one-shot. The readers of the
American edition now miss out some flow-of-story relevant art on page 17,
for example.

Nils Lid Hjort

========================Appendix:==============================
American version: Norwegian version:
[Professor Fothring-Smythe,
alias Don Rosa: "Smultringsrud"!]
p. 3:
Lydia, oh Lydia, Lydia, aa, Lydia,
Say, have you met Lydia, kjenner dere Lydia?
Lydia the tattooed lady, Lydia, den tatoverte dama!
Mannfolk faller om87 som fluer
naar de skuer hennes buer!
p. 5:
Say, have you met Lydia, Kjenner dere Lydia?
Lydia, den tatoverte dama...
p. 10:
Lydia, oh Lydia Ta en titt paa Lydia,
That encyclopedia den tatoverte dama!
You can learn a lot from Lydia Ryggen hennes viser et historisk panorama!
Der er Hannibal paa elefanttur over fjellet,
bak ham staar Napoelon med kaker han vil selge
p. 14:
Lydia, oh Lydia, Lydia, aa, Lydia,
say have you met... kjenner dere...
p. 16:
Lydia, oh Lydia, Lydia, aa, Lydia,
Say, have you met Lydia, hun viser deg omkring,
Lydia the tattooed lady, hun har hele atlaset paa kroppen...
For en krone faar du se Paris eller Beijing,
for en femmer ser du Sukkertoppen
p. 24:
Lydia, oh Lydia, Lydia, aa, Lydia,
Say, have you met Lydia, kjenner dere Lydia?
Lydia, den tatoverte dama...

DON:

I think you are right about the original story of "Once and..."
being too much sci-fi oriented. BUT on the other hand, I think
modern kids know quite a bit about "standard sci-fi" time travel
business - just think what might be the average age of the
viewers of the Back to the Future movies (some of my favourite
movies, I might add). And isn't there even a tv cartoon show
about it nowadays, so that would be aimed at even younger
audience?
Just out of curiosity: how many nights did you spend without
sleep when you wrote these stories (the original/ the duck
version) ? I mean, you really seem to THINK a lot about these
stories and ways to make them work logically!

Is there still a lot of Pertwillaby Papers stories that haven't
been turned into Duck stories?

--- Jyrki Vainio ---