About Wilmer's comments

Fredrik Ekman d91fe at ide.ide.hk-r.se
Wed Sep 1 00:13:37 CEST 1993


Just a few comments that may or may not be of interest...

Wilmer Rivers wrote, in reply to Don:
>Maybe Barks just wants to cash in on his own popularity now that you
>have pointed out to him the extent of the market [in Scandinavia].
>Of course, he does so by exploiting you to some extent, since certainly
>your own stories have helped keep the duck market alive there.

Firstly, I'm quite sure that Barks is, and has been for a long time,
aware of his great popularity "over here". He is, after all, an honorary
member of the Swedish donaldist association NAFS(k) and has received
their club-fanzine and birthday greetings for several years.

Secondly, about Don keeping the Scandinavian market alive, that's not
quite true. The market here was very much "alive" even before Don's
stories started to appear, and has been so for several decades. It is
quite possible that Don's stories has attracted quite a few older readers
but they are just a very minor part of the market. The average reader is,
I would guess, between ten and fourteen years of age, perhaps even
younger, and even though there is no reason that they should dislike
Don's work I think that most of them find Vicar and others just as
exciting.

>Has [Barks] said anything about other comics artists in general in the
>interviews in which he comes down on your work?

That makes me think about a letter from Barks to Disney's Duck Tales book
soon after Disney's take-over (could have been #6 or something like that).
In the letter, Barks commented on the fact that they had used a character
looking very much like himself in one of the previous issues (#2 or 3?).
He also had some comments of the new Disney stories (which in the case of
Duck Tales would have had art by Jamie Diaz' studios and story by Marv
Wolfman (or am I mixing up things?)) and although he didn't say anything
straight out, it was quite clear that he wasn't very fond of the "Disney"
style. So far as I can remember that is the only time that I have read
about Barks commenting on someone elses work (except for second-hand
references from Don). Unfortunately, I have given away the comics in
question, so I can't look up the details.

For whatever it's worth

  /Fredrik Ekman



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