Van Horn's art / 1 April

[Daniel van Eijmeren]

WES:

> What do you mean by a 4-stroke format?

I guess I was using a wrong word here. It's sometimes difficult to 
use the right words, because I'm using a pocket-dictionary Dutch-
English (and vice versa). Sometimes I'm really wondering how odd 
my English might look for someone who uses it as his first language.

With "4-stroke" I meant a "four-line format". 

Van Horn first drew in a three-line format (like Barks did in WDC 31 
for instance). Together with his "hurried" art and the strange 
background-characters, it made his stories looking very odd to me. 

One more reason why his art irritates (or irritated) me, is that he 
already has shown in his work that he can draw very good and polished. 
But maybe he's doing that already? (I'm not very familiar with Van 
Horn's work, because I didn't give them very much attention untill 
I saw this story with the leave-raking.)


ALL:

So, the 1 April tradition is well-known in lots of countries. Can 
someone tell me where this tradition originates?

At first I thought the tradition was typically Dutch because there's 
a little rhyming phrase here about a Spanish conqueror who's called 
"duke of Alva" (shortly: Alva), he lived from 1507-1582. 

The translation of this rhyme "Op 1 April verloor Alva zijn bril" is: 
"On 1 April, Alva lost his glasses". 

With the word "bril" (glasses) is meant the Dutch town "Brielle".
According to the story, Alva lost this town on a 1 April in the 
year 15xx (I can't check the right year now). 

I'm told that the tradition of fooling each other on 1 April, 
originates from the town Brielle in Holland.

Unfortunately, Harry isn't here to tell me if I'm right or wrong. 
Maybe someone else can? Are there other stories about the origin of 
the 1 April tradition?


BTW. Harry once fooled me on a 1 April with telling me in a letter 
that the Barks' lost 10-pager "Golden Apples" was discovered. I even 
phoned to the editor of the Dutch weekly to ask about it. (Of course) 
the Dutch editors didn't know anything about it, I still have a letter 
in which they so...  

That #@%@&$%# Harry!!! ;-)


Greetings,

--- Daniel