Disney-comics digest #139.

[Geir.Hasnes@delab.sintef.no]

>> [Geir] is known for his participation in the quiz "Double or Nothing"
>> on NRK TV in 1989.
>>
>What's this all about?  Did Geir choose to compete in a category devoted
>to Disney comics?  If so, what were the questions?
>
>> He often lectures about Donald and
>> measures his comics in meters, not in numbers.
>> Now I have about ten meters of Donald magazines and a couple of
>> meters with scholarly literature says Hasnes.
>>
>Hey Geir, can we come over to your house and play?  :-)
>
>Anyway, thanks to you both for sharing this article with us.  Please let
>us know as soon as "Dagbladet" follows up on this line of hard-hitting
>investigative journalism with articles about the sex lives of Pluto, the
>seven dwarves, and (of course) Ariel.  Not to mention (** Please!!!! **)
>the scandalous live-in relationship between Chip and Dale....
>
>Wilmer Rivers

I have many reasons for letting Dagbladet investigate Donalds sex-life - or
the absence of it. The most important is (you might not believe it) is to
show that there is a depth to the stories that most people dont perceive. I
think most Norwegians feel hit on their head reading an article (or shall
we call it interview) that gives an _adult_ view on reading the Duck
stories. I think it very important to read Barks stories with adult eyes,
to try to understand his stories from an adult viewpoint. Many things make
sense that didnt make sense for me as a boy.

The other main reason is that it is impossible to have a serious article
about Barks published, because "Donald is for the kids. Period!" I have
been on the back of the Duck publishers in Norway for many years because I
wanted to write a relatively serious book about the artists and the main
stories and give a perspective on fairy tales and the development of the
characters and so on - and no sex, really - but they never found time to
work with the concept. I have sent a number of more or less serious and in
my own eyes well-written essays to magazines and newspapers, and never got
them in. So I get so damned bored about the whole thing. But I couldnt
resist it when they showed the official view of non-sex Donald on the main
news program on the Norwegian Television. I had to react. I cant let them
get away with that.

Recently I talked with a well-known Norwegian author who was an editor of a
large Norwegian literary magazine some years ago. He told me that in the
light of the work I had done for him and what he had read of me in various
places on various topics he was sorry that he had refused me when I had
sent an article to that magazine in 1984. He had another opinion of that
today, and said further that he planned a new literary magazine, would I
care to be one of the editors? Fantastic, huh, but too late.

I have actually ended my work on Disney and the Ducks some years ago, my
last work being this large bibliography on all articles etc. about Barks in
Europe, which I wrote together with Dana Gabbard of Duckburg Times fame for
the Carl Barks Library. It turned out to be too large for the Library so
that Bruce Hamilton has considered making a separate paperback edition and
Geoffrey Blum has proposed to fill in some serious Barks letters, but so
far, it is on ice. So here I sit with one of the best collections in the
world when it comes to writings on the Ducks and Barks - yes, I dont have
the Italian books, only all the articles - would anyone care to photocopy
the books for me? - I can read more or less all the main European languages
now and has found a lot of interesting and also less interesting things -
but there is no really serious interest in Barks that makes it economically
possible to write about him. So we sit there with all our fanzines, that
will dwindle now that the Index research is finished and everyone knows
where to find all the stories. 

It must be said that without Gladstone, and then Rosa and van Horn, the
whole thing would have been over now, but we have witnessed a revival which
is just incredible. Hey Don, I never thought I would find another guy who
actually sat down to collect all those details about Duckburg like I did...

In 1989, my mother said to me that I should attend the quiz show Double or
Nothing on the Norwegian Television. You can choose the subject, but it has
to be a subject that people would care to watch. So you might choose Bach
or Beethoven or Mozart or Grieg (since in Norway) but probably not Poulenc
or desPres or Faure or Bartok for instance. You might choose Donald Duck or
Asterix or Lucky Luke but not Sandman or the Katzenjammer Kids or Polly and
her Pals. I was asked mainly questions from Barks series and actually came
so far as to the third program (on Saturdays, the most popular program on
Norwegian Television ever, over 80% of the Norwegian population viewing
each program) and 24 000 Norwegian Kroner to win if I answered correctly a
set of five questions. The last round was 48 000 NKr if 8 of 10 questions
were answered correctly. So the 24 000 round was considered the toughest. I
was asked to date five Donald Ducks given the illustration of the cover - I
identified the ones from 1952, 1960, 1968 and 1958, but the one from 1976
escaped me (it was not a Barks cover) and so I lost. Curiously enough,
Alberto Becattini, the Italian Disney expert wrote me a reply (he helped me
with the bibliography) and told he had also attended the Italian Double or
Nothing quiz show at the same time, 6 rounds and he won the equivalent of I
think $ 70 000. So if I wasnt depressed enough already about my loss...

Other questions was: What was the question in that quiz show which Donald
managed (drops in Niagara), who said "I can fly like a bird", what was the
value of the bills Donald found in the wallets when the nephews would fool
him on April 1., who appeared in a certain story (Gyro Gearloose), which
meals did they serve the Ducks at Plain Awful, in which issues was the
Plain Awful story printed in Norway the first time, there was some more but
I have forgot them, I can look it up on the video (which I have seen only
once since). I won the Barks Library, a lifetime sub to Donald Duck, a
Barks lithography - Dam diaster at the money sea, and a a trip for two to
Disney World. 

I had never thought it was possible to become that nervous.

Seems that a lot of people remembers the show still. Oh, the mighty media!
I am still asked to lecture or whatever you might call it, both for
students and designers and so on and so on.

About Chip and Dale - in a Disney short they compete about a miss Two Chips
and A Miss. Clear sexual relations. Or what about Pluto in his shorts,
plenty of humour regarding man and woman either they are married or not,
typical sexually biased humour.

The 1000 lakes story - that was the one with the Pygmy Indians. 

About Burbank and Mousetown and Mickey and Donald. It is possible as
proposed by some of you to have Mickey and Donald living in the same
universe even though they dont see each other very often. I see no use in
denying what Taliaferro and Gottfredson wrote and drew. By the way, I have
got the complete Gottfredson daily strips 1930-1955, they are fabulous. And
the complete daily strips of Taliaferro 1938-195?. They become gradually
worse, just like Gottfredson of the late 40s and 50s. And the Sunday comics
of both of the 30s and early 40s.

In my theory, which is even published in the Barks Collector, Gyro
Gearloose was born in 1920, Donald in 1923 and the boys in 1933. In my
opinion, the Barks stories take place in the middle to the late 40s. This
suits both the films, the newspaper strips and the comics - apart from some
discrepancies here and there, there will always be such.

Thank you for letting me know that the series I thought were so well done,
was simply inking of Barkses scripts. Damned. I thought there was a new
genius around. I looked up the Library on the Woodchucks scripts, they were
the only thing I havent really cared for, probably because they were so
bacly inked (mostly) in the 70s when they were printed in the Norwegian
DD&Co.

There are really many more things that should have been commented upon, but
I have to return to work.

Geir Hasnes