Naples report: HDnL's parents?

M.J. Prior M.J.Prior at student.rug.nl
Mon Mar 17 18:46:13 CET 2003


Harry Fluks wrote:

> Here's a report of my short holiday to Napoli of the past > week. I went to the Napoli Comicon, where Don Rosa and 
> many Italian DCML-members met. I hope the following is
> not too boring for people who weren't there. 8-) 

Don’t worry Harry! Imho, yours was one of the most 
pleasant and interesting mails of the past few weeks.

> Still, I heard something new there: Don included a hint 
> to HDL's parents in the "Return to Xanadu" story! 

Puzzling! Any ideas on this subject, anyone? The only clue 
I can think of is that both “Return to Xanadu” 
and “The Crown of the Crusader Kings” have an 
ending that points forward to a possible sequel in which 
$crooge might return to his ancestral castle in Scotland.

"The Crown" seems thus in more than one way to be a sort 
of sequel to "Xanadu"! 
(The crown of the crusader kings being also the 
counterpart to the crown of Djenghis Khan, which got lost 
in Tralla La.)

Still, I think it’s a good thing that Don Rosa 
won’t be allowed to do a story about the "Return of 
Donald’s Lost Sister" or something like that. 
To me, part of the charm of this lost-sister-thing lies in 
the fact that nobody knows exactly what happened, so 
everybody can think of his own story. 
Of course, even when someone like Don Rosa *does* a story 
about what happened, we don’t have to accept his 
version as the ‘truth’, if we don’t like 
it. 
But I’m afraid that’s not exactly how it would 
work out. Somehow, all other possible versions of what 
happened would seem less possible (or even less 
‘legitimate’*), once one particular version 
will have been shown in a story.
Especially a story about such a fundamental thing as 
‘why HDnL don’t live with their 
parents’.

*) Yes, that’s an ugly term.

I like my own Della better than Don Rosa’s :)!

And maybe the same applies to ‘what happened between 
$crooge and Goldie when he kidnapped her for a month in 
the Yukon’. Telling that story might spoil it. And 
yet, it takes a good and careful storyteller to get it 
just right, so Don Rosa might very well be the right man 
on that job.
Don, I’m looking forward to it! 

Michiel Prior.


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