Geradts' "Donald's First..." one-pagers--D&D's parents

[Scroogerello]

May 17, 2018 13:11:55 GMT jopduck1 said:

May 15, 2018 14:04:02 GMT Matilda said:

My personal ground rules are: (1) Everyone gets to construct their own Duckworld from whichever comics stories and/or cartoons they prefer to use. (2) No one gets to say that their Duckworld is more real or legitimate than anyone else's (though it is possible to say that most fans, or most stories, or most current stories, weigh in on one side).

As I recently said on another thread, I *like* the fact that there is no official canon enforced everywhere on the universe of Disney Duck and Mouse comics. Instead, there are overlapping and sometimes contradictory versions of the Duckworld and Mouseworld, and every fan gets to construct their own canon. You get to decide which characters are "real" to you, how people are related, and what their backstories are.

I actually meant that they find it that way in the Netherlands where I live and come from.

I'm from the Netherlands, too, and I've never come across any story where Grandma Duck was Donald's mother. Could you name an example?

[jopduck1]

The Life of Times of Scrooge McDuck. They thought that Matilda was Grandma and have the name translated to Doortje and Grandma is called Dora in the Netherlands.

[Scrooge MacDuck]

May 17, 2018 14:17:47 GMT jopduck1 said:

The Life of Times of Scrooge McDuck. They thought that Matilda was Grandma and have the name translated to Doortje and Grandma is called Dora in the Netherlands.

This is fascinating, but it brings up the obvious questions: how did the poor translators handle it when Elvira Duck made an actual appearance in Chapter 10? 

[Matilda]

May 17, 2018 14:17:47 GMT jopduck1 said:

The Life of Times of Scrooge McDuck. They thought that Matilda was Grandma and have the name translated to Doortje and Grandma is called Dora in the Netherlands.

Yikes!! Rosa's own story being used against Rosa's (and Barks') understanding of the family tree!

[Scroogerello]

May 17, 2018 14:17:47 GMT jopduck1 said:

The Life of Times of Scrooge McDuck. They thought that Matilda was Grandma and have the name translated to Doortje and Grandma is called Dora in the Netherlands.

This was because Grandma was (and very often still is ) seen as Scrooge's sister in the Dutch stories. The translators were, however, fully aware that Hortense was supposed to be Donald's mother, so they must have figured that the "other sister" was Grandma. Basically the same approach as the German translators, who envision Grandma as Donald's Aunt. They never thought Grandma was Donald's mother.

[Scroogerello]

May 17, 2018 14:26:55 GMT Scrooge MacDuck said:

May 17, 2018 14:17:47 GMT jopduck1 said:

The Life of Times of Scrooge McDuck. They thought that Matilda was Grandma and have the name translated to Doortje and Grandma is called Dora in the Netherlands.

This is fascinating, but it brings up the obvious questions: how did the poor translators handle it when Elvira Duck made an actual appearance in Chapter 10? 

They simply differentiated between "Doortje" and "Dora" from then on. Whether they actually thought that Matilda was Grandma Duck has never been confirmed, though. It seems JopDuck is trying to stir up more discussion (succesfully ), but what he says about Grandma Duck being seen as Donald's mother in Dutch comics is 100% false.

[jopduck1]

You are Dagoduck.

[Matilda]

Thanks, Scroogerello. What Jopduck is right about, then, is that Scrooge and Grandma Duck have been (and sometimes still are) treated as siblings in Dutch comics. What happened in the translation of the L&T is less clear. Perhaps the giving of the GD-nickname to Matilda was just a way to fudge it, for anyone who wanted to see GD as Scrooge's sister while reading the L&T. But anyone who read the whole L&T and thought it through would realize that couldn't work in Rosa's Duckworld.

I wonder how Dutch and German translators handled the section in WHADALOTTAJARGON where GD is explicitly said to be HDL's great-grandmother?

So the Germans think of GD as Scrooge's sister, Donald's aunt and HDL's grandmother. Do they ever have Donald call her "Aunt," or does he call her "Grandma"? I suppose you could justify the latter as an instance of adults' referring to another adult by the title the children will use for her. Though the truth is that "Grandma" just functioned as the character's name for a long time, and *everyone* called her "Grandma," including those horrid Cinderella mice.

[Scroogerello]

May 17, 2018 15:28:24 GMT Matilda said:

Thanks, Scroogerello. What Jopduck is right about, then, is that Scrooge and Grandma Duck have been (and sometimes still are) treated as siblings in Dutch comics. What happened in the translation of the L&T is less clear. Perhaps the giving of the GD-nickname to Matilda was just a way to fudge it, for anyone who wanted to see GD as Scrooge's sister while reading the L&T. But anyone who read the whole L&T and thought it through would realize that couldn't work in Rosa's Duckworld.

I wonder how Dutch and German translators handled the section in WHADALOTTAJARGON where GD is explicitly said to be HDL's great-grandmother?

So the Germans think of GD as Scrooge's sister, Donald's aunt and HDL's grandmother. Do they ever have Donald call her "Aunt," or does he call her "Grandma"? I suppose you could justify the latter as an instance of adults' referring to another adult by the title the children will use for her. Though the truth is that "Grandma" just functioned as the character's name for a long time, and *everyone* called her "Grandma," including those horrid Cinderella mice.

Indeed, JopDuck is right about Grandma and Scrooge still being siblings here in the Netherlands. It even still influencers whether some stories get accepted or rejected: workingforthedisneydollar.blogspot.nl/2014/07/sibling-rivalry.html?m=0

I have WHADALOTTAJARGON in Dutch, and can confirm that the dialogue is very close to the original, and GD is said to be HDL's great-grandmother, although that's never really disputed in the Dutch stories. Just like in the Italian stories, Grandma is seen here as Donald's grandmother and Scrooge is seen as Donald's uncle (although I guess his being Grandma's brother would technically make him a GREAT-uncle to Donald, but given the age gap between Donald and Scrooge that's entirely plausible, as well (in fact, I believe RobbK recently posted that he thinks of Scrooge as Donald's great-uncle rather than uncle, as well. It could go both ways, I guess, and as you said, I think they're trying to keep it deliberately vague sometimes (just as with the Lo$ translation) so that there's no real "truth" when it comes to things like this. 

[Matilda]

Ah, interesting, Scroogerello! I didn't know about that now-unused blog by Geradts, and now that I know it has English translations, I'll have to go back and read his posts. Yes, the one you linked to shows that the GD/Scrooge sibling relationship is indeed "working canon" for the Dutch publishers (or was in 2014, at any rate).

So, in Dutch stories and many Italian stories, GD and Scrooge are siblings, GD is Donald's grandmother and HDL's great-grandmother, and Scrooge is therefore technically Donald's great-uncle and HDL's great-great-uncle.

If Germans think of GD (outside Rosa stories) as Donald's aunt, it would be interesting to know how much that theory determines their translations. Anyone seen the German version of WHADALOTTAJARGON? And does Donald ever in any story call her "Aunt" or refer to her explicitly as his aunt?

Edit: I'm just re-reading the posts on the "Grandma Duck Scrooge's sister" thread, and drakeborough does answer that last question: older German translations did indeed make it explicit that Donald was GD's nephew (and Daisy her niece!), and even, once that HDL are her [great-]nephews, which seems truly odd.

[Matilda]

When I was a Disney-comics-reading child, my father had an aunt who was in her 70's, so the age difference between Donald and his uncle Scrooge seemed perfectly reasonable to me! It's true, though, that especially if you think of Donald as being in his 20's, it could be more natural to think of Scrooge as his great-uncle.

[RobbK1]

May 14, 2018 21:49:32 GMT drleevezan said:

May 14, 2018 19:07:37 GMT jopduck1 said:

Grandma Duck is the mother of Donald and Dumbella, because how can Grandma and Scrooge be so attached to each other if it is the mother of your sister's husband? What according to that stupid Rosa is true.

Well, it's pretty much completely accepted now except by a few people that Rosa's family tree is canon, so you might not get a lot of leverage around here with that one. And there's really no need to insult Rosa.

I guess I'm one of the few people that think Grandma is Donald's mother (she calls him "Son" in the Taliaferro strips).  I also don't think she is more than a coup;e years older than Scrooge (if that).  I have other problems with Rosa's Duck Family Tree.

[Matilda]

May 17, 2018 19:41:48 GMT RobbK1 said:

May 14, 2018 21:49:32 GMT drleevezan said:

Well, it's pretty much completely accepted now except by a few people that Rosa's family tree is canon, so you might not get a lot of leverage around here with that one. And there's really no need to insult Rosa.

I guess I'm one of the few people that think Grandma is Donald's mother (she calls him "Son" in the Taliaferro strips).  I also don't think she is more than a coup;e years older than Scrooge (if that).  I have other problems with Rosa's Duck Family Tree.

It's fine with me if someone decides that GD is Donald's mother. I don't think her calling him "Son" is evidence one way or another, though. In the early 20th century in the USA, older adults, whether related or unrelated, often called a younger man or boy "Son." It wouldn't have been at all strange for a grandparent to call a young man "Son." As has been pointed out on this forum, that's said in Disney strips/comics by other characters who are clearly not the parent of the one they're addressing.

So you are not swayed by Barks' sketch of the family tree? I figure that probably does show us how Barks came to think of the Ducks' relationships.

[RobbK1]

May 17, 2018 20:20:44 GMT Matilda said:

May 17, 2018 19:41:48 GMT RobbK1 said:

I guess I'm one of the few people that think Grandma is Donald's mother (she calls him "Son" in the Taliaferro strips).  I also don't think she is more than a coup;e years older than Scrooge (if that).  I have other problems with Rosa's Duck Family Tree.

It's fine with me if someone decides that GD is Donald's mother. I don't think her calling him "Son" is evidence one way or another, though. In the early 20th century in the USA, older adults, whether related or unrelated, often called a younger man or boy "Son." It wouldn't have been at all strange for a grandparent to call a young man "Son." As has been pointed out on this forum, that's said in Disney strips/comics by other characters who are clearly not the parent of the one they're addressing.

So you are not swayed by Barks' sketch of the family tree? I figure that probably does show us how Barks came to think of the Ducks' relationships.

No, Barks thought up the 2 trees hastily, without pondering over many of the stories he wrote.  They had some relationships different from what he said in person. He changed what he had stated earlier in some cases.

[Horace]

May 17, 2018 17:34:13 GMT Matilda said:

If Germans think of GD (outside Rosa stories) as Donald's aunt, it would be interesting to know how much that theory determines their translations. Anyone seen the German version of WHADALOTTAJARGON?

 Yes, she says that she is the kids' great-grandmother.