Post by dorialexander on Apr 8, 2021 12:33:08 GMT
In volume 5 of Scarpa's full work, Luca Boschi gives additional detail: the name of the character is Julius Pecunius "a first sketch of a more consistent character that Scarpa intended to develop by the end of his life but never found its proper place". Apparently one source of inspiration of Scarpa was the imaginary rabbit Harvey in the 1950 movie with James Stewart.
This raises an additional mystery. In a dutch story from 2005 (H 23176) Scrooge attempts to find (apparently in Rome) a golden laurel wreath from Julius Pecunius. Is it an allusion to Scarpa's character?
EDIT: Woops! You got there before me.
I'm not sure it's completely unrelated. I've got a copy of Scrooge 375 and it could be an homage to Scarpa, with an italian setting, a mix of classic Barks adventure, historical references, surnatural elements and a disappointing ending for Scrooge. Julius Pecunius was a mad emperor that came to the throne right after Caligula. It turned out he was rendered madly spendthrift by the golden laurel (and Scrooge experiment a similar fate at the end, only with less consequences). In a weird way, this could also be an origin story for the other Julius Pecunius with the spirit of the mad emperor coming to inhabit Scrooge's mind (although Pecunius is never displayed in the story).
I don't know how the story was framed in his initial publication (nor how strong is the cult-following of Scarpa in the Netherlands).