Post by manoopuesta on Dec 18, 2022 23:06:46 GMT
So I wonder from time to time when I read certain comics if they would translate well to other languages: both because of the nuances of the language as well as because of the regional cultural background that is embed in the story.
A couple that always come to my mind are "Makinavaja" by Ivá and "Makoki" by Gallardo and Mediavilla. These two comics series talk about a very specific era and place (Barcelona in the 70s-90s) , and also they rely heavily in the realistic use of dialog of the people that they portrait and their accents.
Makinavaja:
and Makoki:
From contemporary cartoonists, one that I feel unfortunately would be difficult to read abroad is the comics of Lorenzo Montatore, one of my favourite spanish cartoonists of nowadays. His comics often include traditional portraits of Spain, in a way that luckily shines the good parts of the spanish culture -- which is something I tend to struggle with many times for being a very conservative culture in many aspects. He makes use of popular and traditional spanish songs, and his storytelling feeds directly from many of the spanish famous writers of the beginning of the 20th century. Though maybe not getting all of these references would still make for the book an interesting reading since his art is great too, I think his comics are so wonderful and poetic when you see the whole picture.
And going into english language territory, I must say that the first time I read Popeye (in spanish) I plainly disliked it, it was not for me. But then years later I read Fantagraphics´ Popeye volumes and I fell in love with it, it is one of my favourite comic strips of all times. The way that the characters communicate, their slang and all - especially for Popeye- is so wonderful in english, that in comparison the spanish version felt completely dull. Maybe some people still enjoy it but really, what a difference...
So after all this, I am curious to learn of examples others could think of of comics that don´t seem to be translatable.