Text comics

"Histoire de Monsieur Cryptogame" (1830) by Rodolphe Töpffer, an early example of a text comic. Notice the text underneath the images.

Text comics or a text comic is a genre of comics where the stories are told in captions below the images and without the use of speech balloons. It's the oldest genre of comics and was especially dominant in European comics from the 19th century [1] until the 1950s, after which it gradually lost popularity in favor of comics with speech balloons.

The genre is sometimes referred to as a pantomime comic too,[2] even though text comics do make use of dialogue, only not in the images themselves.

Definition

Marmittone (1920) by Bruno Angoletta.

A text comic is published as a series of illustrations that can be read as a continuous story. However, within the illustrations themselves no text is used: no speech balloons, no onomatopoeias, no written indications to explain where the action takes place or how many time passed. In order to understand what is happening in the drawings the reader has to read the captions below each image, where the story is written out in the same style as a novel.

Much like other comics text comics were pre-published in newspapers and weekly comics magazines as a continuous story, told in daily or weekly episodes. When published in book format the comics were sometimes published as actual illustrated novels. In some cases the original text was kept, but only a few drawings were used as illustrations, rather than the entire comic. In the Netherlands text comics were published in small rectangular books, called oblong books, due to the shape of the books.

History

Quadratino (1910) by Italian artist Antonio Rubino is an example of a text comic.

Text comics are older than balloon comics. Ancient Egyptian wall paintings with hieroglyphs explaining the images are the oldest predecessors. In the late 18th century and early 19th century picture narratives were popular in Western Europe, such as the cartoons of William Hogarth, Thomas Rowlandson and George Cruikshank.[2] These images provided visual stories which often placed captions below the images to explain a moral message.

The earliest examples of text comics are the Swiss comics series Histoire de M. Vieux Bois (1827) by Rodolphe Töpffer, the German Max und Moritz (1866) by Wilhelm Busch and the British Ally Sloper (1867). Töpffer often put considerable effort in the narrative captions of his graphic narratives, which made them just as distinctive and appealing as the drawings. Wilhelm Busch used rhyming couplets in his captions.[2]

During the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century text comics were the dominant genre in Europe. In the United States of America the speech balloon made his entry in comics with 1895's The Yellow Kid. Frederick Burr Opper's Happy Hooligan and Alphonse and Gaston further popularized the technique.[1] As speech balloons asked for less text to read and had the advantage of aiding the dialogues directly to the characters who were speaking or thinking it allowed readers to connect better with the stories. By the early 1900s most American newspaper comics had switched to the speech balloon format.[1]

The Adventures of Totor (1926) by Hergé, depicting text below the images.

While speech balloon comics became the norm in the United States it didn't always catch on as well in the rest of the world. In Mexico and Argentine speech balloons were adapted very quickly,[1] while in Europe they remained a rarity until deep in the 1920s. In other parts of Europe, most notably the Netherlands, text comics even remained dominant as late as the early 1960s.[1] Many European moral guardians looked down upon on comics as low-brow entertainment that made the youth too lazy to read. Christian comics magazines and newspapers closely supervised the content of their publications and preferred text comics, as the format still encouraged children to read actual written texts. It was also ideal to adapt classic novels and guide young readers towards "real" literature. In some instances foreign balloon comics were simply re-adapted by erasing the balloons and adding captions underneath them. It even happened with the European Tintin in the Land of the Soviets (1929) by Hergé, which was republished in the French magazine Coeurs Vaillants, but with captions.[1] Other comics, like Pip, Squeak and Wilfred, used both speech balloons and captions. Under the Nazi, Fascist and Communist regimes in Western and/or Eastern Europe balloon comics were even banned in favor of comics with captions underneath them.[1]

The success of The Adventures of Tintin by Hergé from 1929 on, influenced many other European comics, especially in the Franco-Belgian comics market, to adapt speech balloons. Translations of popular American comics such as Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Popeye throughout the 1930s and especially after the liberation of Europe in 1945 further encouraged the speech balloon format. By the 1960s text comics had lost popularity worldwide and only a few remained.

Classic text comics

Europe

Belgium

Denmark

France

Germany

Italy

Netherlands

Sweden

Switzerland

United Kingdom

The British comics magazines Jack and Jill and Playhour published most of its comics in text comic format.

North America

Canada

United States

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "Image and Narrative - Article". Imageandnarrative.be. Retrieved 2015-11-18.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Laurence Grove (2015-08-13). "Transforming Anthony Trollope: Dispossession, Victorianism and Nineteenth ...". Books.google.be. p. 132. Retrieved 2015-11-18.
  3. ↑ http://www.bellier.org/flup%201928/vue1.htm
  4. ↑ http://www.swapmeetdave.com/Herge/Fred-and-Mile/fred-mile.htm
  5. ↑ Durnez, Erik, "Willy Vandersteen in: ik vier het elke dag, 65", Standaard Uitgeverij, 1978.
  6. ↑ https://www.lambiek.net/artists/v/vandersteen.htm
  7. ↑ Durnez, Erik, "Willy Vandersteen in: ik vier het elke dag, 65", Standaard Uitgeverij, 1978.
  8. ↑ "Vilhelm Hansen | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
  9. ↑ "Christophe (French artist Georges Colomb) | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
  10. ↑ "Émile-Joseph Pinchon | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. Retrieved 2015-11-18.
  11. ↑ "Bruno Angoletta | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
  12. ↑ "Carlo Bisi | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
  13. ↑ "Attilio Mussino | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. 2007-06-22. Retrieved 2015-11-18.
  14. ↑ "Antonio Rubino | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. 1964-07-01. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
  15. ↑ "Sto (Sergio Tofano) | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. 1973-10-28. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
  16. ↑ "Carol Voges | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
  17. ↑ "Marten Toonder | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
  18. ↑ "Louis Raemaekers | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
  19. ↑ "Pieter Kuhn | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
  20. ↑ "Dick Vlottes | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
  21. ↑ "Phiny Dick | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
  22. ↑ "Peter van Straaten | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
  23. ↑ "Henk Backer | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. Retrieved 2015-11-18.
  24. ↑ "Birgitta Lilliehöök | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. 2010-10-15. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
  25. ↑ https://www.lambiek.net/artists/l/lundberg_lucie.htm
  26. ↑ "Gustave Verbeck | Lambiek Comiclopedia". Lambiek.net. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
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