Almost three years ago I posted about a Spanish language version of The Squirrel Cage from Argentina's Billiken Magazine, titled
Jopito Y Calvete. I've just found some more from a later period, but now titled
Sansón (Samson) - their take on Paul Bunyan. These strips are from the mid-1940s, when Paul Bunyan had become the star of the strip. From what I can see, it appears that Billiken must have followed The Squirrel Cage right through Paul Bunyan's transformation from his enormous, superhuman self to the red-hatted gnome who would remain in Foozland for the remainder of the strip (as far as anyone knows, anyway!) Here's a page from February 26, 1945.
I love this one because it reminds me of Rube Goldberg's fantastic animals from the "Boob's Ark" story in his wonderful Boob McNutt comic strip. Sadly, I don't have this strip in English. I hope to find it one of these days! There are still many pieces of the Foozland puzzle missing… the search continues! More coming soon, I promise!
As Spanish is my native tongue, I can translate this strip for you.
ReplyDeletePanel 1: "Visit our zoo and you´ll see lots of weird animals." "I´m going right now."
Panel 2: "Library berzokos. Very rare"
Panel 3: "Rainy bear"
Panel 4: "Lamp-cover lion" Here, "Apantallador" comes from "pantalla" (lit. "screen"), as we call the covers of lamps.
Panel 5: "Garden elephant"
Panel 6: "Caged tapir"
Panel 7: "Jumper dog" "Saltarín" is a being or thing with a perchant for make jumps.
Panel 8: "Simian hammock"
Panel 9: "Living carpet"
Panel 10: "Carpenter" In the balloon: "I´ve seen them, but I can´t believe none of this"
At page bottom: "Uruguay has a 187.000 km area"
Extra notes:
-If the strip´s title would be translated appropiatedly, it would be "La jaula de la ardilla". I suppose translators wanted to avoid a title with no relation to the strip´s content, but they missed the point cause it matches perfectly with a screwball comic.
-"Sansón" is no other than the biblical character Samson, as we called him in Spanish.
-Billiken is a very famous Argentinian kids magazine, with a very long running. It often publishes foreign strips like this, and translating licenses aren´t uncommon.
I hope you can enjoy this strip in all its glory now. Greets from Uruguay.