Keskustelujen arkisto

Greetings!

Olaf wrote:
First: Why Gemstone? Gemstone clearly has not had a budget for developing
new stories, which is why they've based most of their publications on
reprints and European material. Why should Gemstone be responsible for
finding a successor to Don Rosa when Don Rosa never worked for Gemstone?

That is not clear to me at all: a company which sells comic books needs
to worry about developing artists for the future.

I wrote:
> There must be some budding young artist doodling away
> somewhere who could assume the throne!

Olaf wrote:

But... There ARE many great artists and writers currently making Disney
comics. Vicar. Marco Rota. Bill Van Horn. Kari Korhonen. Giorgio
Cavazzano. Rodriques. Maximino. And that's just the artists, don't forget
John Lustig, Janet Gilbert and a ton of other great writers. All of them
and more make comics in the tradition of Barks, what's wrong with them?

I do not believe they approach the level of Don Rosa or Carl Barks. Van
Horn and Pat Block are very nice, just not on the same "epic" level.

I wrote:
> Why has the development of a new generation of artists for Uncle
Scrooge
> and company not happened?

Olaf wrote:
It has happened, and it's still happening. It's just not happening in the
United States.

Since Gemstone is an American company, that was precisely my concern!

I wrote:
> Answer: bad, short-sighted management!
Olaf wrote:
Rubbish. There clearly are great artists and writers out there. Gemstone
aren't producing and finding them, but Gemstone never did.

I will repeat: they should be! It is their business!

I wrote:
> Let us hope this is not the end of the Barks/Rosa Universe!

I will now add for clarity: "In America."

Best Wishes!

L. Schulte

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Leo:

> Olaf wrote:
> > It has happened, and it's still happening. It's just not
> > happening in the United States.
>
> Since Gemstone is an American company, that was precisely my concern!

> I wrote:
> > Let us hope this is not the end of the Barks/Rosa Universe!
> I will now add for clarity: "In America."

I hear similar words from other Americans (about various things).

Why is it so important to Americans that all good things come from
America?
Why not think a bit more globally?
Is an orange from the USA tasting better than an orange from any other
country?

--Harry.
This e-mail and its contents are subject to the DISCLAIMER at http://www.tno.nl/disclaimer/email.html

Greetings!

Greetings! Concerning the comments from Harry Fluks: You misunderstand,
please. It is not important for me that all good things come from
America: "America" is the idea of individual freedom and responsibility,
especially freedom from too much government interference, an originally
European idea I would like to see spread to the dictatorships in Africa
and Asia. What is important is that Gemstone will sell English editions
of Uncle Scrooge and company here in America! Ehapa etc. does not sell
comic books here. I admit to not liking the European authors as much as
Barks and Rosa and Van Horn. But I still want to see the comic books
survive here in their birthplace, and if only European authors are
represented, so be it.. However, as Don Rosa has predicted once, the
genre may be dying away here faster than we would like. Best Wishes! L.
Schulte

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On Sat, Feb 14, 2009 at 14:35, Carl Lund <clund at cox.net> wrote:

> I would add to what Gary says that it seems to this American reader, at
> least, that it makes for better stories to have them originally in English
> rather than translated into English. Let me rephrase that slightly: it
> makes for better Duck stories.

You probably just read the wrong non-American stories to get this very
distorted idea. A good Italian story translated in English is better
than a bad American story. Just as good American story translated in
Italian is better than a bad Italian story. It's simple as that. You
don't need to be American to write good Duck (and Mouse) stories, some
writers can have the right sensibility to create masterpieces (that
fit perfectly with Barks - and Gottfredson's spirit) even on this side
of the Atlantic.

> I miss the highly literate translations of European stories in
> Gladstone Series I (as well as the erudite commentary often provided), but
> it takes a very special translation to capture the spirit of the original
> while capturing the imagination of its new audience.

"Highly literate"? No, no, no, what stories did you read? Our best
stories are just as "literate" as yours, not any more, not any less.
Don't anyone think "Mickey's Inferno" is a typical Italian story. It's
one of a kind (luckily, let me add, with all due respect to the story
and it's authors!)

--
Framcescp

I agree with this assesment completely. I don't think I've enjoyed a single European story that I've read in the Gemstone comics, which is pretty much the reason I finally?stopped buying them a year or two ago. Since I'm not in a position to read the originals, I don't know if the fault (if the inability to cater to my personal tastes can even be called a "fault") lies with the originals or the the localization, but either way, it's there.

A lot?of what's missing for me in these stories is the language and the timing. There isn't enough creative wordplay for me, and the timing of the action and the humor always seems a bit off.

It's probably not that useful for me to be speaking in such generalities; I should pick apart some particular stories and explain in detail what I don't like about them. That's not something I have time for today, but maybe I'll do it at some point. I just wanted to speak up to make it known that there are people (or at least one person)?like me who really do want to be reading Disney Duck stories but aren't able to find much that's compeling in Gemstone's current output.

-----Original Message-----

Message: 2
Date: Sat, 14 Feb 2009 07:35:20 -0600
From: Carl Lund <clund at cox.net>
Subject: Re: Globality
To: dcml at nafsk.se
Message-ID: <4996C898.9030904 at cox.net>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed

I would add to what Gary says that it seems to this American reader, at
least, that it makes for better stories to have them originally in
English rather than translated into English. Let me rephrase that
slightly: it makes for better Duck stories. Part of what made Barks'
stories so successful is that they were more than adventures; they were
more than comedies; there was also some social satire in there. And
while there are universal themes that lend themselves to social satire,
certainly, the best and the sharpest--I would argue--come from the
country whose society sets the framework for the action and the satire.
Duckburg (to me at least) seems quintessentially American. I say that
not to be jingoistic; it just does. I miss the highly literate
translations of European stories in Gladstone Series I (as well as the
erudite commentary often provided), but it takes a very special
translation to capture the spirit of the original while capturing the
imagination of its new audience.

(This is my 3rd try. I hope you didn't get the message below 3 times.
But if you do, sorry in advance!)

For clarity: my remark last week about Americans and oranges was about
American comic *production*, not about its *publication*. It's obvious
to me that American comics must be produced in America, translated (if
not written) by Americans.
I wouldn't want my Dutch comics have a Dutch translation made by
Germans, for instance.

(Note: I am Dutch, which means I am from Holland, Europe.)

Gary:

> As for all good things coming from America, it's really been
> quite a while since I or anyone I know has believed that.

Sometimes we (in Europe) get a different idea from TV fragments coming
from the USA.
I remember a documentary about a country&western group being completely
banned from USA radio because they had been "un-patriottic". It didn't
matter how much they disagreed with the American president, they *had*
to support him...
(Okay, this may be getting a bit too much about politics. For balance,
let me state that the prime minister of my own country is a real jerk
and I can't wait for him to be replaced.)

Apparently, these images are a result of selection, and therefore not
representative for the entire USA population.

On the other hand, I see "ymh" writing a text here on DCML that *does*
seem to show exactly my impressions:

> I don't think I've
> enjoyed a single European story that I've read in the
> Gemstone comics

ymh also wrote:

> It's probably not that useful for me to be speaking in such
> generalities

Exactly. It only strengens my ideas that many Americans don't *really*
look at things, but only judge them by the fact whether or not they are
American.

Carl:

> Part of what made Barks'
> stories so successful is that they were more than adventures;
> they were
> more than comedies; there was also some social satire in there. And
> while there are universal themes that lend themselves to
> social satire,
> certainly, the best and the sharpest--I would argue--come from the
> country whose society sets the framework for the action and
> the satire.

I remember some Italian stories which have much sharper satire on
society.
And at least one Dutch story.
But good satire is rare in all countries.

> Duckburg (to me at least) seems quintessentially American.

That may be true. Especially art-wise, I see some typical European
landscapes in Duck stories.
But since Europe is still doing its very best to look just like America,
European stories will get better at this point. :-)

> I miss the highly literate
> translations of European stories in Gladstone Series I (as
> well as the erudite commentary often provided)

I must admit that I hated these "translations". It was more or less like
saying "the stories are not good enough in their own right, let's add
some stuff in the translation to make them acceptable".
That didn't work for me (and for the same reason, the much-praised
German translations of Barks stories didn't work for me either).

> I haven't seen art that I enjoyed other than translations of
> Barks, Rosa, or Strobl work. I'm not an artist, so I don't know why
> that is.

That's odd, indeed, since (especially) Rosa has a completely different
art style, while people like Branca come much closer to Barks, art-wise.
I wonder if your appreciation of artwork would have been different if
the stories were still un-credited. (We'll never know...)

Leo:

> It is not important for me that
> all good things come from America

I think my remark was more in general, and I just used your text as an
example.
But it is puzzling to me that people have general feelings about
American and European authors, while they are so different,
individually.

> I admit to not liking the
> European authors as much as Barks and Rosa and Van Horn. But
> I still want to see the comic books survive here in their
> birthplace, and if only European authors are represented, so
> be it..

Note that a lot of "European" stories are written by Americans! So
apparently, having an American writer is not enough to have a "good"
story.

The only explanation that I currently have, is that:
- there must be some level of quality in writing *and* artwork;
- writer and artist must be the same person.

That would explain why Barks, Rosa and Van Horn are regarded better than
other people, because outside the USA, stories written and drawn by the
same person are rare.

I myself have no preference that writer and artist must be the same.
Daan Jippes, for instance (one of my favourites), is a very good artist
but he's not good at writing stories.
Kari Korhonen is a very good writer, but not a good artist.

--Harry.
This e-mail and its contents are subject to the DISCLAIMER at http://www.tno.nl/disclaimer/email.html

Dear All,

Some thoughts:

With respect to where Gemstone comic books are sold?comic shops, Barnes and Noble, etc., I have to believe that the folks at Gemstone know that the lack of visibility is a critical issue. I suspect that bookstores operate like supermarkets: In the supermarket industry, a store makes most of its money by selling a particular space on the shelf to a particular company, rather than in a markup from wholesale to retail. So, Kellogg?s pays to have its cereal on a particular shelf because research has shown that the shelf is the closest to eye level and that products close to eye level sell better, and so on. End caps?the ends of the supermarket aisles?are particularly expensive because practically everyone walking in the general area of that aisle sees the product. I would not be surprised in the slightest if chain bookstores charge publishers of books, magazines, music, etc. to have their products on display. How else could they possibly offer 35%
discounts on books? Depending on some variables, they buy them at about 60% of their retail cost, which leaves about 5% profit, minus employees, shipping, utilities, etc.

Having been a lifelong buyer of Disney comic books, I finally quit buying them a year ago. Two reasons: first, Gemstone was reprinting too many of the stories I already had. Second, I didn?t like most of the stories produced by the newer writers (at least those Gemstone printed, anyway). Whether they?re American or European or Venusian didn?t matter; they simply?in my mind?weren?t good enough to buy. There weren?t many longer stories, the personalities of the characters tended to be too different from the personalities I grew up with (Barks, Rosa, and Van Horn), the stories seemed too formulaic?it was like the story was planned out in advance instead of kind of taking on a life of its own as the writer wrote (which was the case with many of Barks?s stories; I don?t know about Rosa or van Horn), and the stories just didn?t suck me in. In truth, what I wanted was something on the level of Barks, Rosa, and Van Horn. Sometimes some
writers got to that level: some of Rota?s stuff is very impressive, as is Scarpa?s and a few others. But those stories didn?t appear often enough. It?s possible that this is all an issue of translating and dialoguing, but boy, I guess I don?t think that?s really it. I?ve always found David Gerstein to be pretty top-notch, and the supporting cast of dialoguers isn?t bad. Somewhat interestingly, though, I think the art put out now is generally really good?just not good enough to overcome the shortcomings of the story.

Robert Hutchings

Harry,

There's a strong likelihood that we in America get an even more
fragmented view of the rest of the world from newspapers, TV and our
so-called "talk radio." One listen to Rush Limbaugh should tell you
plenty about the way too many Americans think, and want to think.

But anyway, I fear that American Disney comics, at least as
periodicals, are soon going to go the way of the dodo. Then again, I
have this fear for periodical comics in general. And I don't see
digital distribution as any sort of solution, just considering the
contractural issues that would be involved and the lack of a clear
avenue to generating adequate revenues.

I'll be happy as a clam to be proved wrong about all that, though.

Gary

> Sometimes we (in Europe) get a different idea from TV fragments coming
> from the USA.
> I remember a documentary about a country&western group being
> completely
> banned from USA radio because they had been "un-patriottic". It didn't
> matter how much they disagreed with the American president, they *had*
> to support him...
> (Okay, this may be getting a bit too much about politics. For balance,
> let me state that the prime minister of my own country is a real jerk
> and I can't wait for him to be replaced.)
>
> Apparently, these images are a result of selection, and therefore not
> representative for the entire USA population.