Revelation / religion in Duckburg / predictions

[Daniel van Eijmeren]

DAN SHANE, 14-09-2001:

> Congratulations, Daniel, on calling it the proper English name 
> "Revelation", rather than "Revelations" (plural), as most 
> Americans do.  There was only one.

Er... before I get the choice between the money or the tricycle, 
I must admit I still might deserve the globule of jell for making 
that plurar error in Dutch. :-)

I said that our Dutch name for Revelation is "Openbaringen", but 
it should be *Openbaring* instead. ("Openbaringen" is plural.)

> To avoid getting way off topic, I'll just extend an invitation 
> to any interested in this subject to write me privately. I can 
> offer information about an extremely enlightening and interesting 
> publication that offers a very thorough and clear interpretation 
> of the last book of the Bible.

Yes, I would like to have this information about that publication. 

As you made a connection between Revelation and ducks, this subject 
could become an interesting discussion about religion included 
- or, as you also point out, *excluded* - in duck stories.

Are there any Duck stories, which do refer to Revelation or other 
events in the Bible? Jeruzalem, the Roman Imperium from that time, 
etc.? As the Roman capitol Rome is an Italian city, I'm wondering 
how the Italian comics treat this subject, because it's (more or 
less) part of their national history.

(I haven't seen Don Rosa's story "Crown of the Crusader Kings", so 
I don't know what you mean when you say that he comes "perilously 
close" to Biblical references in that story. I'll look for it when 
the story is published here in The Netherlands.)

I wanted to include a link to VIDAR SVENDSEN's "Religion in Duckburg"
site, but it seems that I only have an old non-working URL. On that site,
Vidar lists religious references in Disney comics, but also in comics 
in general.


About the predictions subject, it might be interesting to list stories 
which contain predictions. These are the ones I can remember off-hand:
 
- Carl Barks' Gyro Gearloose predictor machine (US 16)
- Carl Barks' destructive bull story (WDC 182)
- Carl Barks' Rip van Winkle story (WDC 112)
- Don Rosa's "Curse of Nostrildamus" (AR 143)
- Don Rosa's "The Duck Who Never Was" (D 93574)
- Mau Heymans' future photo-camera (H 90135)
- Massimo De Vita "Il ritorno al passato" (TL 1672)
   This story was mentioned here by Archontis Pantsios, on 13 september.
   I don't know this story myself.

I've listed "The Duck Who Never Was" because it contains a detailed 
prediction of future events if something in the past would not have 
happened.

The Rip van Winkle story is included because it refers to future 
events in 1990, which now is the past for us. (In the story, this 
future is made up by the nephews, but I think this future must at 
least have contained some of Barks' vision/imagination of how live 
could be in 1990.)


--- Daniel

PS. Also here in Maassluis, there are many flags hanging outside. 
At one house I saw both the Dutch and the USA flag.

Looking at the news in the last days, there also was at least 
something positive, I *hope*: Has there ever been any moment in 
history which showed so much commitment of so many countries all
over the world? Even the Russians, China, and Cuba showed their 
protest against what has happened in the USA last Tuesday. 

Call me a naive dreamer, but I'm hoping that this will be the 
beginning of a better world. After last Tuesday, I even think it
is our *duty* to finally reach that goal.