Interview from Komix #150

[Kriton Kyrimis]

Here is the translation from Don's interview in last month's issue of
Komix. It would seem that translating it into Greek slightly twisted some
of the things Don tried to say. As my translation seems to have preserved
this twist, I am prefacing the translation, with his permission, with
some of Don's comments on the translated interview. [As usual, in the
translation that follows, comments in square brackets are my own.]

> I knew it was dangerous to say things about Barks that were perilously
> close to sounding like criticism even though they were meant to be
> compliments. And when it's translated into Greek then back into English,
> the nuances of the meaning get ever-so-slightly twisted.  Nevertheless,
> I still don't think Barks had any particular love of comic books (which
> is what I meant in my original text -- not "comics" in general)... but
> he did an excellent job producing them out of respect for the readers
> and for the self-respect of earning his pay with his best effort.

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	  Komix in a profound conversation with Don Rosa
       ON THE OCCASION OF THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING TIGHTWAD

  Conversation with Don Rosa is a wonderful experience... He love comics
  passionately and is one of the people who know the history of the
  Ninth Art in America best. As for the heroic crew of _Komix_, are very
  fond of learning and extremely curious. Thus, the conversation easily
  goes astray towards other roads, perhaps a lot more interesting than
  we expected.

KOMIX: First of all, we want to thank you for helping us publish your
story complete without any cuts.

ROSA: Previously, when I was working for _Egmont_, I had very strict
restrictions regarding the number of pages. In this case, the story
could not exceed 24 pages. Today, of course, these limitations are,
fortunately, much looser if I need more space. My problem is that I
write 60-page stories and have no choice but to cram everything into 24
pages. In the case of the _Incredible Shrinking Tightwad_, I could not
go below 25 pages, and so, initially, I was forced to omit the chase
scene a little before the end.  However, when _Gladstone_ decided to
publish this story in America, I thought that it was an opportunity to
add this page with the chase scene, because otherwise the evolution of
the plot was becoming very abrupt at the end.


KOMIX: However, this was not the end of the adventures of the _Incredible
Shrinking Tightwad_...

ROSA: In America, big companies are excessively sensitive to matters
of so called "political correctness". The entertainment sector and,
in particular, the field of comics, are extremely vulnerable to various
censors who believe that their job is to protect people from anything that
could be considered even vaguely problematic, even by the most neurotic
member of the smallest fringe group...  [The word I'm translating as
"censor" is a word derived from the Latin word "censor", which is used
with its original Latin meaning of "critic" in Greek. I don't know if
they really mean "critics" or censors. I do know that this is not the only
instance of their using an obscure word in this issue; I suspect that they
are trying to imitate Barks who, as an article in this or the previous
issue mentioned, would not dumb down his dialogs by avoiding "difficult"
words.] Thus the places where there was talk about lice, sneezing,
underwear and prunes in the Beagle Boys' pockets [*NO* comment!] were
considered "unhealthy" and were cut because of the excessive zeal of
some employee. And this did not happen with careful deletion of those
particular dialogs or panels; they entire page in which these terrible
and unheard of things appeared was cut from the story, to protect
humanity! The result was that, although the American edition of the
story had one extra page, it had lost another three. Against my desire,
and despite my extra work, my story was, finally, even shorter than
before... I am very glad that you publish it in its complete form! Thanks!


KOMIX: In Carl barks' stories, size is often very important, as, e.g.,
in *Microducks from Outer Space* (_Komix_ #128), and *Land of the Pygmy
Indians* (_Komix_ #14)...

ROSA: It is strange that you mention the Pygmy Indian Story. That story,
along with the sequel that I wrote, *War of the Wendigo* (_Komix_ #143),
are not reprinted in America, because there is talk about Indians. Any
reference to Indians is considered an outright violation of the rules
of political correctness. Therefore, these two stories were buried,
although the Pygmy Indians are shown as noble and unselfish. However,
I wouldn't have any comment on the way that the subject of size is used
in the Carl Barks' or my stories.  I think that Barks made his Indians
Pygmy sized, because they appear more harmless and cute. However, you
did not mention that ten-page story in which Donald takes the nephews
in an imaginary journey to distant planets, incredibly larger than
Earth. (Note: this is *Donald's Big Imagination*, which we published
in _Komix_ #125). This is the story in which Barks strives to show how
relative the notion of size is. It has almost no plot, and is only a
series of pictures of giant planets, increasingly more huge relative to
the microscopic Ducks. And it's a wonderful, incredible story!


KOMIX: Apart from the reference to Barks' story *The Titanic Ants*
(_Komix_ #150 ([I'm guessing at the story, as Komix #150 is the
current issue, and there's no Barks story in it], your story has other,
non-Barksian references.  To begin with, its title refers expressly to
Jack Arnold's classic movie _The Incredible Shrinking Man_.

ROSA: This is an enormous subject. The thing is that, despite my great
love for Barks' comics, there is a bunch of other things with which I
grew up, and which I like a lot. I will not hesitate to introduce into my
stories small references or a few in jokes in the background, referring
to other comics , TV series or movies that I love. Some times, I use gags
in such a way that I do not expect anyone other than myself to recognize
them. In a recent issue of _Komix_ you published my _Black Knight_. In
one panel, showing a group of reporters, I added a Duckburg version of
Jimmy Olsen, Superman's friend; you can even see the special watch with
which he communicates with Superman. And in Scrooge's storeroom, in the
_Incredible Shrinking Tightwad_, you can see a bunch of interesting items,
among which is the "Rosebud" sleigh from _Citizen Kane_. These gags are
not parts of the story or the drawing that have been designed in advance;
they simply come to my mind, suddenly, while I am drawing. I put them
in the picture simply to have fun. And yes, the title is a reference
to that ingenious existential science fiction movie of the fifties.
[I'll venture to recommend the 1936 SF story "He Who Shrank" by Henry
Hasse in, e..g, Asimov's "Before the Golden Age" anthology, where the
author takes the idea of shrinking to the limit.]


KOMIX: A question that we always wanted to ask you is how does Carl
Barks "fit" into the more general framework of the fifties, the decade
of classic horror and science fiction films, the EC comics...

ROSA: A very interesting question. Although you mentioned two of my
favorite comics, Carl Barks' work and EC comics, the two best comics of
the fifties, I don't believe that they have much in common...apart from
the publication date, that is. Barks matured during the first decades of
the 20th century, long before science fiction and other pulp magazines
were published. I doubt if he had seen any contemporary science fiction
movie... I believe that he has said that he liked old westerns. See how
long he managed to stay away from science fiction... Until the time when
his publishers asked him for such stories in the mid-sixties.


KOMIX: And what was Barks' relationship with the comics of his time?

ROSA: I don't believe that Barks read other comics... At the time those
comics were published, he was already middle-aged. I was always impressed
by the fact that, when he created his own "superhero", Super Snooper, to
express his rather low opinion on superhero comics, he had Donald describe
the character as a super powerful detective: notice the name Snooper...


KOMIX: Indeed. This is why we chose to leave it untranslated... (Snooper
in Greek means "he who digs things out", i.e., the "hound" -- in a
negative sense, "the indiscreet, the busybody".)

ROSA: I think that this shows that the notion of detectives had been
familiar to him since his youth, but the new idea about heroes in fancy
circus outfits making feats of power and good deeds left and right,
was something that he could not comprehend, thus distorting it slightly
to transform it into something more familiar. As for EC comics, they
were made by a team that really loved comics. Barks was a fine craftsman
with an old style moral code in his work. I do not believe that he loved
comics. Besides, there weren't any when he had been young... However,
he believed that he had to do his best in anything that he made, that he
had to deal with his readers with respect, and to give them a product that
was more than worth its money. Barks and the EC team created ingenious,
highly enjoyable stories. In fact, I believe that they accomplished
exactly the same result, following completely different routes, however.


KOMIX: Those were hard times...

ROSA: Indeed. I hope that what I said about Barks' attitude towards
comics will not be considered as criticism. At that time, work for
these magazines was casual work, poorly paid, which one undertook until
one found something else. That he did such a good job, makes his work
appear special.


[Caption, p.2:] The great artist's instructions on completing the missing
panels were more than precise and informative. The only thing we had to
do was to follow them to the letter.

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	Kriton	(e-mail: kyrimis at cti.gr)
	      	(WWW:    http://dias.cti.gr/~kyrimis)
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"First law of space-time travel: avoid voids."
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