Article from Komix #170

Kriton Kyrimis kyrimis at cti.gr
Mon Sep 30 07:42:49 CEST 2002


Here is the translation of an article from Komix #170. [As usual, comments
within square brackets are my own.]

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                            DETAILS AND SEARCHES
                Don Rosa comments on the story _An Eye for Detail_

  Don Rosa is, perhaps, the most severe critic of his work. He is often
  left unsatisfied by stories that fascinate his friends... like _An Eye
  for Detail_.

I collect in a notebook ideas for stories with the Ducks. One of the
ideas, that I wrote hastily one day, regarded Donald's innate talent to
distinguish between his three identical nephews. I thought that Donald
could be gifted with the ability to distinguish details. This ability of
his would allow him to notice, subconsciously, the most minute difference
between seemingly identical objects... and ducklings. Uncle Scrooge,
in turn, would try to take advantage, as usual, of his nephew's special
ability, in exchange for the usual thirty cents an hour, which he lavishly
provides him for his efforts.


THE DEVELOPMENT OF AN IDEA.

I some times come up with ideas that suggest that I can let them develop
on their own into complete stories, taking me along on a wild ride. I had
this feeling with short stories such as _On a Silver Platter_ (_Komix_
#86) or, more recently, _A Matter of Some Gravity_ (_Komix_ #141). In
both of these stories, the initial idea developed, almost by itself, into
a series of entertaining subversive[!] drawings, with Donald and Scrooge
being transported... in part to Magica's hide-away, or to move upside down
in half the panels of the story.  And it is a fact that the more easily,
and without being forced, a story is written, the best the result is.


SQUEEZING THE BRAIN

Unfortunately, in the _Eye for Detail_ story, things were not so
easy... The idea was simple and entertaining... However, when I finally
decided to use it in 1994, it proved that creating the story was extremely
difficult. Indeed, I think that its final form is substantially different
from the initial summary, which I showed to my publisher, and he replied
that I had to "give it another go"... Some times, I feel that I'm looking
in the dark, when I do not manage to write a simple funny story, based
on a simple funny idea. I always felt that _An Eye for Detail_ was a
rather moderate story based on a seemingly good idea. Who knows... I
might do what Barks did and reuse this idea in a few years, to see if
I can write a completely different--and I hope even better--story.

[Signed] Don Rosa.

[Caption]

Don Rosa gives a particular... importance to detail [this is the Greek
title of the story] and does not omit dedicating his stories to uncle
Carl. He hides these dedications with abbreviations in the most incredible
places, such as in this broom [thanks, Komix, for spoiling the fun of
looking for the D.U.C.K. ourselves--is this the "search" to which the
title of the article refers?], where the initials D.U.C.K. (Dedicated
to Uncle Carl by Keno, alias Don Rosa), can be seen.


	Kriton	(e-mail: kyrimis at cti.gr)
	      	(WWW:    http://dias.cti.gr/~kyrimis)
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"How fast can you get a phaser lock?"
"Fast!"
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