Comics UK

As you said, variety is the spice of life. And my reading habits range far and wide. In fact, my folks often said that if there was nothing else to read, I would read the ingredients list off a cornflakes packet! And I have been known to do that on many an occasion.

It is too easy to pigeon-hole people, which is why I enjoy disconcerting those that attempt to do so. My job requires a flexibility of thought that is belied by the mundane reality of getting each task done. So I escape through reading, and that reading is often comics and novels. Sometimes that escape is through reading factual reference books that has absolutely nothing to do with what I originally set out to research, but it works for me.

Many classic novels have been adapted for comics (thinking of such books as Treasure Island and The Three Musketeers) so they are fair game for our discussions. An interesting side note would be which classic novel do you think would be a good candidate for adaptation, but no, I am digressing again!

And many comics find their roots in classic novels. Examples such as The Red Circle stories could easily be discerned as having roots in Tom Brown's Schooldays or Rogue Trooper as having roots in Frankenstein (think about it)

I do get annoyed when people try to narrow the medium of comics down to the purview of the sad geek or the kids that never grew up. I would love to ask them to try and apply those labels to Kashgar or Phoenix4ever! Comics is a medium that can carry powerful messages. And the messages that comics carried for me when I was the target audience were so powerful, I am still working now to figure out what those messages were.

Digifiend wrote:Je m'apelle Digifiend, et tu est colcool007. My French is patchy at best, but I think that means "My name is Digifiend, and you are colcool007". Trois, deux, une, zut alors!

Eight and a half out of ten, Digifiend. The two errors were Je m'apelle, which should have been Je m'appelle, and tu est, which should have been tu es. However, as there is no difference in sound in either case you would not have lost any marks in the GCSE speaking test. Trust me, I know these things, I used to mark them. The extra half that I have deducted is because une, though correct for one, is normally used in its masculine form un in a list of numbers, as in the punchline to the story of the three moggies who were sailing happily down a stream when their boat began to capsize. The result? Un, deux, trois cats sank.

Like I said, it's patchy. C'est non bien, mon ami (That's no good, my friend)!

So that's Phoenix, Colcool and myself who all know some French. We have more in common than I thought.

Digifiend wrote: So that's Phoenix, Colcool and myself who all know some French. We have more in common than I thought.

Nice one, Digifiend. I'll go along with that.

"Malheureusement, je ne parle pas le Francais", is what I tell 'em when asked directions in the street in Paris.

Speaking of classic novel adaptations I'd like to give a mention to Bunty's version of Joyce's 'Finnegans Wake'. Brilliantly exciting and faithful to the novel in all respects!

colcool007 wrote: I do get annoyed when people try to narrow the medium of comics down to the purview of the sad geek or the kids that never grew up. I would love to ask them to try and apply those labels to Kashgar or Phoenix4ever! Comics is a medium that can carry powerful messages. And the messages that comics carried for me when I was the target audience were so powerful, I am still working now to figure out what those messages were.

Thanks for the compliment Col however ill-deserved. Derek will no doubt reply when he returns from the local pond with his jam jar full of sticklebacks!

phoenix4ever wrote:

Digifiend wrote: So that's Phoenix, Colcool and myself who all know some French. We have more in common than I thought.

Nice one, Digifiend. I'll go along with that.

N'importe qui peut écrire en français, et je sais aussi quelques œuvres, quand je n'étais pas mucking autour de la classe.
Keep going Colcool

Kashgar wrote:Speaking of classic novel adaptations I'd like to give a mention to Bunty's version of Joyce's 'Finnegans Wake'. Brilliantly exciting and faithful to the novel in all respects!

In the light of Kashgar's recently-expressed interest and appreciation of some version or other of what many critics feel to be one of the greatest novels ever to emerge from Ireland, I popped downstairs to extract my copy from its position on the shelf, blew the dust off it and proceeded to check it against the impressions of it that I carry in my memory. I can assure everybody that my impressions were confirmed. I didn't understand a word of it. Mind you, if Miss Creef were ever to attempt to explain this text from it to the Four Marys and their companions in the Lower Third, I would just love to be there. O mind you poo tickly. Sall I puhim in momou. Mummum. Funny spot to have a fingey! I'm terribly sorry, I swear to you I am! May you never see me in my birthday pelts seenso tutu and that her blanches mainges may rot leprous off her whatever winking maggis I'll bet by your cut you go fleurting after with all the glass on her and the jumps in her stomewhere. 'Please Miss, what do you think he means exactly by mainges?' 'Mary Simpson, do you really think that is an appropriate question to be raising in a class of mine at St. Elmo's, a school for young ladies? I'm very disappointed in you. Perhaps you should never have left that grocer's shop in Ironboro.'

On the other hand, the 1976 Princess Tina Annual did manage to adapt Tolstoy's War and Peace as a 13-page comic strip. Forget all those endless pages pondering about the human condition, or the complex geopolitical forces which tore Europe apart for a generation and shaped the world in which we live today - it's perfectly obvious that all the public really wants to know is whether Natasha gets her man in the end!

- Phil Rushton

Rather than start another thread, I thought that this would be the optimum thread to resurrect. So as I have been able to get some time off and I am not rushing to all parts of the Big Smoke, I thought that this would be a good time to start tidying up and figuring out what I have exactly. So far, the count is 2 A4 boxes (The ones that you get paper in are a great wee storage system) of Warlord doubles, 3 boxes of Victor doubles, trebles and in a few cases quads!

I knew that from a kid, I was destined to be hooked on comics. After all, my impetus to start reading was Lord Peter and UJJ as that comic came out in the year I first went to school. And in the second year, comics made an even bigger impact as I spent all of an hour of my second day in Primary Two before I was hit square in the eye with one of those spinners. It didn't half hurt and as I ended up looking like a pirate for the next month, I thought it was pretty cool. Mind you, the two months off school were a bit of a bonus as well! Even today, I can still see the scar on my eyeball, although I did lose the pirate look a long time ago!

However, I digress. So far, I have discovered Eagles (Mk 2), Wizard (Mks 1 and 2), Roy Of The Rovers Monthly (Where the hell did they come from?), Action, Buddy, Spike and a whole host of goodies that have been calling to me to stop carrying out that boring sorting malarkey and get down to a good old fashioned reading splurge. I am so tempted to do just that, but I seriously need some space in this house, so I am going to put those doubles up for sale. Any queries are welcome, but remember I am selling my doubles, so you are going to get the fair copy, not the mint one if you are interested.

Phoenix wrote:Mind you, if Miss Creef were ever to attempt to explain this text from it to the Four Marys and their companions in the Lower Third, I would just love to be there. O mind you poo tickly. Sall I puhim in momou. Mummum. Funny spot to have a fingey! etc...

Personally I think Baby Crockett would be better equipped to provide a literary exegesis of Joyce's classic!

- Phil Rushton