I'm probably too late in posting this, but I'd suggest that anyone with any interest in British humour comics should try to seek out the issue of the Beano for the week ending 12th July, issue number 3440. In addition to the usual Dennis the Menace and Bash Street Kids strips there is a three page adaptation of Edward Lear's famous nonsense poem, The Owl and the Pussycat. Art, some additional dialogue and a biographical sketch of Mr Lear supplied by the superb Hunt Emerson.

I always tended to think of Emerson as the British 'Underground' Cartoonist of my youth. His Calculus the Cat strips for Knockabout and the full page strips that appear to this day in the Fortean Times have always made me think of him as someone who worked for grown-up comic fans. But his surreal style, which must have been influenced by the masters of British humour comics Leo Baxendale and Ken Reid, suits this material down to the ground. Lew Stringer, has a scan of the first page of the adaptation on his Blog so you can see for yourself just how good it looks.

http://lewstringer.blogspot.com/2008/07/edward-lear-in-beano.html

This seems to be a bit of a departure for the Beano, but in the same post Lew reports that another Emerson poetry adaptation has been completed for inclusion in a later issue. This time "You Are Old, Father William" by Lewis Carroll. I'll be watching out for that.


In the same vein, DC Thompson's Classics From the Comics magazine (at newsagents everywhere right now), celebrates the 70th anniversary of the Beano by abandoning its usual format of reprinting a selection of strips from right across the range of humour comics published over the years by the company and concentrating this month's issue on strips from the Beano. Nice to see that they are identifying the year each strip comes from as well, which makes it easier to figure out who the artist is.

A good read as usual, but I'm particularly delighted to see the first ever Bash Street Kids strip from 1954, produced by Leo Baxendale under the title "When the Bell Rings" reprinted.