Ghosts in Barks Stories
Daniel van Eijmeren
dve at kabelfoon.nl
Sat Aug 30 01:16:07 CEST 2003
NILS KLARTEKST to DON ROSA, 29-08-2003:
> DON ROSA WROTE:
> Barks would *never* use a ghost in a story.
> AND I AGREE, BUT...
> there is one very interesting borderline case: "The [Ghost] Sheriff
> of Las Gasp" (WDC 176).
There's another one, the will-o-the-wisp (WDC 159) story. According to
that story, a will-o-the-wisp is a jack-o-lantern. Uncle Scrooge asks
Dr. Superthink to make "MORE than the LANTERN!" He wants the horrible,
slithering something that carries the lantern. Dr. Superthink captures
a jugful of marsh gas, and completes his "weird project" with some mold
from the mustiest depths of an old mine tunnel. He tests these gases
and molds in a vacuum tank. The gases fuse into swamp fire and then a
wispy shade is forming. Dr. Superthink asks for help to control it if
it breaks. Donald says: "It's just a bunch of marsh gas and mold spores,
but it looks like it's alive!" It gets bigger and then Donald concludes:
"It IS alive! It's a REAL will-o-the-wisp!" The nephews say it looks
hungry and call him(!) Willie - Wispy Willie!" According to Superthink
it's a "transparent being that looks like an oversized mold spore!" And
then he lets the nephews feed Willie, by grinding up some mold and tule
roots. On the next page, Uncle Scrooge asks the Willie to go to a window
to scare the house owners away. Donald and the nephews, to be exactly.
Willie follows(!) Scrooge's commands, and then Scrooge is astonished to
learn that Donald and the nephews already know Willie. And Willie looks
happy to see them, and he smacks his lips with closed eyes when he's
offered some tule roots.
I've never quite understood what is going on in this imaginative scenes,
other than that "will-o-the-wisp" is an interacting, consciousness,
living being, created by science.
If Barks has written a weird story like this, in his so-called "classic
years" (1950s), then I'm not so sure if he definitely would have objected
to ghosts appearing in his stories. I would like to see him being quoted
on that.
The money stairs to the top of a mountain (WDC 157), two issues earlier,
would look more realistic to me than Wispy Willie. And in 1973, Barks has
said that he thinks he decided to turn that story into a dream, because
the money stairs looked "too IMPOSSIBLE to be real". Go figure.
I've rarely seen Barks stating the limits of his imagination. And in his
stories, *anything* seems to have been possible. The word "never" doesn't
seem to have been in his dictionary. And mostly, he managed to make his
imagination believable with only little explanation. That's what I like
so much about his work, and that's why I tend to nitpick when the words
"Barks" and "never" are used in one line.
--- Daniël
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