Books/articles about European disney comics

[mrixolite]

Hi! First time poster here
I'm a longtime danish Disney/Duck comics reader, and have reached a point in my fandom where I'm compelled to write about the columns themselves. Not "reviews" per se, but an overall analysis/perspective on the stories. This was partly founded on the notion that theres not really much "litterature" about the Duck comics, but is that really the case? Or to put it another way, do any of you guys know of any books/articles/blog-post diving into the history and evolution European Disney Comics? Beyond the works of the superstars like Barks and Don Rosa, I mean. Like, is there a work that tracks how the tone / content of a Mickey Mouse Mystery shifted, or how the Phantom Blot evolved as a character etc?

Any suggestions are appreciated! It doesn't have to be hardcore academic publications!

[farmspirit]

It really depends on what languages you can read. Italy, being the biggest current producer, has its fair share of reviews, books and blogs. The papersera forum can probably direct you better to them. But being in Italy, those are obviously written first in Italian, and I don't know how many are translated.

[hex]

The first one I recommend is "Egmont & Co. - 50 år med dansk produktion af Disney-serier". It's in Danish but have a lot of information about Egmont (Gutenberghus) production of Disney comics.

The new "Anders And & Co. - 60 år med danske serieskabere" aslo has articles with information about Egmont production, but I haven't had the time to read it yet and can't give any opinions on it.

Two books that I have on my want/to get list:

"La Grande Histoire du Journal de Mickey", that I think has a lot of interesting information about French comics. And "I Disney Italiani", with a history of Italian comics. But I haven't read any of the two (if anyone has, please say a few words about them!)

Another recommendation is "Disney-sarjakuvien historia 1930-2020", but that book is not just about European comics. I have partly read it, but it's a pain as I don't understand much Finnish and need to use translator apps/programs.

[Matilda]

Nov 24, 2022 14:16:32 GMT hex said:

Another recommendation is "Disney-sarjakuvien historia 1930-2020", but that book is not just about European comics. I have partly read it, but it's a pain as I don't understand much Finnish and need to use translator apps/programs.

I SOOOO want to read this book! But I have found Google Translate to be very poor with Finnish, so I'm not tempted to buy the book currently. Are any other apps/programs any better? One Finnish friend suggested maybe I should translate from Finnish to, say, Swedish and then from Swedish to English, but I haven't had the patience to try that.

[Mesterius]

Nov 25, 2022 2:07:26 GMT Matilda said:

Nov 24, 2022 14:16:32 GMT hex said:

Another recommendation is "Disney-sarjakuvien historia 1930-2020", but that book is not just about European comics. I have partly read it, but it's a pain as I don't understand much Finnish and need to use translator apps/programs.

I SOOOO want to read this book! But I have found Google Translate to be very poor with Finnish, so I'm not tempted to buy the book currently. Are any other apps/programs any better?

DeepL is pretty good, in my experience.

[corrado]

Nov 24, 2022 11:39:17 GMT mrixolite said:

Hi! First time poster here
I'm a longtime danish Disney/Duck comics reader, and have reached a point in my fandom where I'm compelled to write about the columns themselves. Not "reviews" per se, but an overall analysis/perspective on the stories. This was partly founded on the notion that theres not really much "litterature" about the Duck comics, but is that really the case? Or to put it another way, do any of you guys know of any books/articles/blog-post diving into the history and evolution European Disney Comics? Beyond the works of the superstars like Barks and Don Rosa, I mean. Like, is there a work that tracks how the tone / content of a Mickey Mouse Mystery shifted, or how the Phantom Blot evolved as a character etc?

Any suggestions are appreciated! It doesn't have to be hardcore academic publications!

Far the best book is "Disney Comics. The Whole Story" by Alberto Becattini, the main expert on Disney Comics. Here you will get all the information about every country, every artist and every publication in the whole Disney world. It´s really impressive. You will get it on Amazon and it is not expensive.

[bats]

Leonardo Gori's extensive writeup about early Italian comic books, Disney and others, is an incredibly interesting read.
Here's his first Topolino article.