[SPG, Suspected, pattern=3.60]RE: Mr. Erlend's message about Disney comics sales inthe US...

[George]

I am not Mr. Leach but I am American and have lived in Europe several years (France, Italy, and Spain).
This is what I have noticed.  
1- The average American youth does not read much on their own, TV, video games, computer (games mostly) and Internet surfing has displaced books as a past time.  As a teacher, for many students, the only reading will be what they do in the classroom.  There is no incentive for them to read on their own and consequently, they have problems reading, i.e. it is hard/slow process for them to read.
2- I have not found the broad selection of quality comic or illustrated books/magazines in the likes of Journal de Tintin (defunct), Journal de Mickey, Spirou, and all the hard cover illustrated books that included an entire story from these magazines (Adventures of Blake and Mortimer and Tintin stories come to mind).
3- Finally, the American family is going through a transition with half my students from single parent families. This, along with the stresses involved makes it difficult for the child to have a stable, mind stimulating environment.  The TV (especially since "bad" TV, talk shows, confrontations, etc... replaced the children hours 1600~1800) has replaced the baby sitter or the parent at home.
I hope it helps,
Lancelot



Actually, I would like to disagree with that.  Maybe it's just the area you're in.  I don't collect comic books much, but I buy the collections and treasuries.  Not because of the price and availability, but because of the durability.  Hardbound and "soft cover" treasuries and collections just last longer for me and finding the actual older comic books would be very difficult.  And with a 5 year old and 9 year old + their friends reading them, I need the durability factor.  If they asked me to order a subscription, I would.  But my first personal choice to be bought is any collection that I haven't bought yet.

  As to kids not getting out from in front of the brain drain machine, I live in a pretty bad area.  Over half the kids in my town are disadvantaged and many of them stay at my home more then they do at their house since there is no one there for them.  But out of the 25-30 kids in the area under the age of 12, a sizable fraction of my older Disney collection (10-15 books) are constantly borrowed to read on their own time with more kids waiting for the books to be returned so they can borrow them.  The newer collections (1995-present) don't seem to get borrowed so much, but the older Disney collections always out enough that I've been planning on finding and buying second books to stay in my library.  And it's not only Disney comic collections that are asked for.  The Richard Halliburton collections, Tom Swift Jr, and older Hardy Boys and Nancy Drews, as well as many others are being borrowed as well.  Some kids may have never been introduced to good reading, I have to agree.  But there seems (at least in my area) a lack of things kids will read that they enjoy.  After reading the above when it came into my email, I asked one of the kids why he came to my place to borrow books (2 Hardy Boys and Carl Barks 1978 Mickey Mouse collection) and he told me that the books I had were more enjoyable then the ones in the library........  With an answer like that, I'll keep lending them out as much as they want me to.  If the books becomes too worn or damaged to give out, I'll replace them if I can find them.

G.E. Craig

BTW, while I'm here in my second post to the newsletter.....  Is there a good site that list older collections?  Right now, my collecting process is very shoddy.  If I see a collection and I recognize that I don't own it, I try to buy it if it's for sale ($230 for a unopened/perfect Carl Barks Donald Duck (1978?).... Yikes!!!!  But I bought it for a non-lendable book), but I know there are gaps in what I have and what has been issued.
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