Erika Fuchs

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Erika Fuchs
Born
Johanne Theodolinde Erika Petri

(1906-12-07)7 December 1906
Died22 April 2005(2005-04-22) (aged 98)

Erika Fuchs, née Petri (7 December 1906 in

Duckburg
and its inhabitants, as well the effects on the German language as a whole caused thereby.

Both her grammatical innovations and adaptation of classical literary features into modern pop-cultural works have been recognized as positive contributions to contemporary used language and to the image of comics as media in Germany, having played a major part in delegitimizing public perception of said comics as low-quality pulp fiction.[1] Fuchs' widely quoted translations have further been described standing in the tradition of great German-language light poetry such as the works of Heinrich Heine, Wilhelm Busch, and Kurt Tucholsky. She has been emblematically quoted as saying "You can't be educated enough to translate comic books", reflecting her high standards for localization work.[2]

Life

Johanne Theodolinde Erika Petri[3] was born on 7 December 1906 in Rostock[4] as the second of six children of electrical engineer August Petri and his wife Auguste. Erika spent most of her childhood and youth in Belgard, a small rural town in Pomerania, where her father became director of the newly-built electric power plant in 1911. In 1922, Erika Petri became the first girl ever to be admitted to the town's boys' Gymnasium, passing her Abitur exam there in 1926. She went on to study art history in Lausanne, Munich and London and graduated with a doctorate in 1931. Her dissertation titled "Johann Michael Feuchtmayr: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des deutschen Rokoko" ("A contribution to the history of German Rococo)" was marked magna cum laude. It appeared in print only in 1935. In 1932, Erika Petri married engineer, industrialist and inventor Günter Fuchs (1907-1984). From 1933 to 1984, the couple lived in Schwarzenbach an der Saale, a small industrial town in Upper Franconia. They had two sons, Thomas and Nikolaus.

Following

chief editor of Disney's newly-formed German Micky Maus
magazine, where she continued to work until her retirement in 1988.

After the death of her husband in 1984, Erika Fuchs moved to Munich, where she died on 22 April 2005.[5]

Work

Duckburg
and enriched the German language."

Many of her creations as translator of Carl Barks comics entered or reentered

The Ritual of the Calling of an Engineer
. Fuchs had heard it from her husband, who was an engineer himself.

An example of Fuchs' many allusions to classical German literature may be found found in her translation of Barks's 1956 story "Three Un-Ducks" (

Rütlischwur from his 1804 play William Tell
.

Her use of verbs shortened to their stems as interjections— not only to imitate sounds (onomatopoeia), such as schluck, stöhn, knarr, klimper (gulp, groan, creak, chink/jingle), but also to represent soundless events grübel, staun, zitter (ponder, goggle, tremble) — popularized the verb form. While the official technical term for this remains Inflektiv,[6] the term Erikativ, a tongue-in-cheek reference to Fuchs' first name, made to resemble similar grammatical terms such as Infinitiv (infinitive), Indikativ (indicative mood) or Akkusativ (accusative case), has seen more use. The form itself was commonly used as a form of emoting in Internet forums and chatrooms well into the 2010s, with users seeking to simulate aspects of face-to-face communication by employing Inflektive of off-screen activities enclosed in asterisks (e.g. *lach*, *weglauf*, *zwinker*).[7]

Honors and legacy

The Erika-Fuchs-Haus in Schwarzenbach a.d. Saale in 2015.

In 2001, Erika Fuchs was awarded the

D.O.N.A.L.D." ("Deutsche Organisation nichtkommerzieller Anhänger des lauteren Donaldismus" or the "German Organization of Non-commercial Devotees of the true Donaldism"). Some members of the organisation (Patrick Bahners [de] and Andreas Platthaus) occasionally included hidden references to Fuchs' works in the headlines of Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung
.

In 1991, painter Gottfried Helnwein set a portrait of Fuchs among his work Die 48 bedeutendsten Frauen des Jahrhunderts (48 Most Important Women of the Century).[8] The work is now to be found at Museum Ludwig in Cologne.[9]

A comic museum in her hometown of Schwarzenbach an der Saale, named after Erika Fuchs, saw its opening on 1 August 2015.[10]

References

  1. ^ Metz, Markus; Seeßlen, Georg (12 March 2022). "Comic-Übersetzerin Erika Fuchs: "Dem Ingeniör ist nichts zu schwör"". Radio Bayern 2 (in German). Retrieved 3 March 2024.
  2. ^ "60 Jahre Micky-Maus-Übersetzungen: Wie Erika Fuchs eine eigene Sprache für die Mäusewelt schuf". uepo.de (in German). 18 September 2011. Retrieved 3 March 2024.
  3. S2CID 236669263
    .
  4. ^ Pannor, Stefan (25 April 2005). "Trauer in Entenhausen: Donald-Duck-Übersetzerin Erika Fuchs gestorben". Der Spiegel (in German). Archived from the original on 29 December 2022. Retrieved 29 December 2022.
  5. ^ "22. April 2010 - Vor 5 Jahren: Comic-Übersetzerin Erika Fuchs stirbt in München". Westdeutscher Rundfunk (in German). 20 April 2010. Archived from the original on 29 December 2022. Retrieved 29 December 2022.
  6. ISSN 0072-1492
    .
  7. ^ Schmitt, Stefan (10 September 2002). "Die Technik des Chattens: *textlesenwill*". sueddeutsche.de (in German). Retrieved 3 March 2024.
  8. ^ Schatz, Sibylle (18 December 1991). "48 berühmte Frauen: Gottfried Helnwein antwortet Gerhard Richter in der Galerie Koppelmann". Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger (in German). Archived from the original on 19 July 2011.
  9. ^ Gottfried Helnwein, Werke, Mischtechnik auf Leinwand, 48 Portraits Archived 2011-07-19 at the Wayback Machine, 1991, www.helnwein.de
  10. ^ Bahners, Patrick (1 August 2015). "Erika-Fuchs-Haus eröffnet: Gesucht wird ein Volk von Museumsbesuchern". Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (in German).
  • This article is based on a translation of the corresponding article from the German Wikipedia, retrieved May 6, 2005, and corrected March 3, 2024.

Further reading

External links