Quebec comics
Quebec comics | |
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Earliest publications | 19th century |
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Languages | French |
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Quebec comics (French: bande dessinée québécoise [bɑ̃d dɛ.si.ne ke.be.kwaz] or BDQ) are French language comics produced primarily in the Canadian province of Quebec, and read both within and outside Canada, particularly in French-speaking Europe.
In contrast to
Overview
The majority language of Quebec is
In the early 2000s, most comics consumed within Quebec were of European or American origin, with local comics only making up 5% of the total market,[1] which had been true since the early 1970s.[2] However, a number of comics of Québécois origin have found success overseas, like Michel Rabagliati's Paul series and Maryse Dubuc's Les Nombrils (The Bellybuttons), some of these cartoonists have had success with English translations, as when Montreal-based English publisher Drawn & Quarterly picked up Julie Doucet's Dirty Plotte, which won acclaim and awards in the English-speaking comics world.[1]
History
Native Quebec comics have had a long up-and-down history, alternating between periods of flourishing and periods languishing under the deluge of foreign comics.
19th century
Caricatures have appeared in newspapers in Quebec since at least the 18th century. A political poster using
By the end of the century, one could buy compilations of these cartoons and illustrations—the roots of
What has been called the first comic strip in Quebec appeared in 1866. The woodcut serial strip was called Baptiste Pacôt and has been attributed to the sculptor
Hector Berthelot was a cartoonist and the publisher of Le Canard, where Berthelot started running satirical material signed Père Ladébauche ("Father Debauchery") starting in 1878.[4] Berthelot would bring Ladébauche with him from newspaper to newspaper,[4] and in 1904, Joseph Charlebois's comic strip version of Le Père Ladébauche debuted in La Presse, a popular strip that would last until 1957.[5] Le Canard published the works of a number of other notable cartoonists, such as Henri Julien, and it was there that the oldest known comic strip using a speech balloon appeared, an unsigned strip printed on 22 September 1883.[4]
Early 20th century comic strips
The popular press began to flourish at the turn of the century, and, as photographic reproduction was still in its infancy, the papers hired cartoonists and illustrators to liven up their pages, with the
La Presse, in response to La Patrie's success with Timothée, added a weekly children's section, "La Ruche enfantine", which included comic strips. Charlebois's Père Ladébauche had begun, and after 43 instalments was taken over by Bourgeois, who continued to create other strips as well for La Presse, to which he soon moved and stayed with until his 1955 retirement. Théophile Busnel took over Timothée and continued it until his sudden death in 1908. It was replaced with a translation of American Richard F. Outcault's Buster Brown. Soon, other native strips were being replaced with translations of popular American strips, and by 1909, the "Golden Age" that had started in 1904 had come to an end. Native strips didn't disappear entirely, but those that remained lost the distinct flavour of contemporary life in Quebec, and began to imitate the silent films and vaudeville that were inundating popular culture in the province.[7]
Québécois cartoonists would unsuccessfully propose a number of strips to compete with the American strips that dominated the Sundays and dailies. The native Quebec presence on those pages would become more dominant after 1940, however, with the introduction of the
While the adventure strip flourished in the 1930s, papers in Quebec were unwilling to pay local artists more than what they would pay for a syndicated American strip, which made it hard for local artists to survive, due to the economies of scale that made it cheaper for them to buy the American strips. A few commissioned propaganda works and adaptations of "novels of the homeland" appeared. Rodolphe and Odette Vincent, under the banner of Éditions Vincent, produced some adaptations of adventure novels that they managed to sell to some papers, and were collected into albums by Quebec Éditions de l'A. B. After the end of World War II, however, Éditions Vincent found themselves unable to compete with the flood of American comics that returned after trade restrictions were loosened. The longest-running of the adventure strips was Les Aventures de Robert et Roland by Roberto Wilson, which debuted in 1956 and lasted until 1965.[7]
Paulin Lessard, at the age of sixteen, had his Les Deux Petits Nains published in Le Progrès du Saguenay in 1947 and 1948. This was the first science fiction BDQ, about two brothers who were only a few centimetres tall, but were endowed with enormous strength, and met with people of other minuscule races.[7]
Post-war era
The end of World War II brought with it a loosening in trade restrictions with the US, and American comics came flooding into the province. Whereas in English Canada this had meant the death toll for the local industry, in Quebec local production was paradoxically stimulated by the influx of foreign material. At the height of the "Great Darkness", a time of conservative government policies mixed with close government ties with the Catholic Church, the violence in many American comics at the time led to a belief that they promoted juvenile delinquency, and as it had in English Canada and the US, the belief prompted the authorities and concerned parents to crack down on comics. Gérard Tessier, with the support of Cardinal Paul-Émile Léger, published Face à l'imprimé obscène in 1955, in the vein of Fredric Wertham's Seduction of the Innocent.[8]
Catholic comics reached their highest point at this time. The Centrale de la Jeunesse étudiante catholique ("The Centre for Young Catholic Students") put out the biweekly François beginning in 1943, printing mostly humorous strips. It was joined by Claire in 1957, the girls' version of François, which was almost identical in content. Hérauts began in 1944, at first printing translations of American strips from the religious Timeless Topix. The publication, which had a circulation of 100,000, had a mission to battle the "bad" American comics, and was distributed in schools starting in 1947, which resulted in fewer comics being included in its pages. Hérauts was also the first BDQ to be exported to the European market, although only briefly. By the mid-1950s, Hérauts was publishing local comics by the likes of Gabriel de Beney and Maurice Petitdidier. Almost all the strips from Hérauts, Québécois and American, were reprinted in comics albums during this time, and they also launched a younger version called Le Petit Hérauts in 1958, in which Petitdidier's Fanchon et Jean-Lou was particularly popular.[8][9]
BDQ of this period flourished only between 1955 and 1960. After this time, the Catholic magazines once again took to reprinting American comics, and the market was flooded with glossy, full-colour
Spring of BDQ
The revolutionary 1960s and the Quiet Revolution in Quebec saw new vigour in BDQ. The so-called printemps de la BD québécoise ("Spring of Quebec comics") is said to have begun in 1968 with the creation of the group Chiendent, who published in La Presse and Dimanche-Magazine. Jacques Hurtubise (Zyx), Réal Godbout, Gilles Thibault ("Tibo"), and Jacques Boivin were particularly notable cartoonists, and publications appeared with names like Ma®de in Québec, L'Hydrocéphale illustré, La Pulpe, B.D., and L'Écran. The comics no longer focused on younger audiences, instead seeking confrontation or experimenting with graphics.[5] The first modern Quebec comic book is said to be Oror 70 (Celle qui en a marre tire) by André Philibert, which dealt with countercultural topics like what were being seen in the underground comix of Robert Crumb and Gilbert Shelton.[10] During the 1970s, BDQ were sometimes called "BDK", bande dessinée kébécoise.[11]
Numerous short-lived, small press titles popped up here and there throughout the province. The artists who made them set out to challenge society, and the comics abounded in taboos, like sex and drugs. Lack of distribution, irregular publishing scales, and a relatively small market led eventually to the demise of these publications.
This period saw an increased interest in Quebec of local comics, and a number of events were first held: the
In 1979, with the help of an $80,000 grant from the ministère des Affaires culturelles du Québec ("Quebec Ministry of Cultural Affairs"
Adult and Underground comics of the time began to multiply, with notable titles including Cocktail, Tchiize! présente, Tchiize! bis, and the fanzine Iceberg appearing in the early 1980s, giving an outlet to young cartoonists like Henriette Valium and Julie Doucet. Fanzines, which had earlier focused on superheroes, now began to feature science fiction instead.[13]
Since the 1990s
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In Montreal in the 1980s and 1990s, in parallel to mainstream humour magazines, a healthy underground scene developed, and self-published fanzines proliferated.
In the 21st century, some Québécois cartoonists who have seen success in Canada and abroad are
Around the turn of the century, the government of Quebec mandated La Fondation du 9e art ("The
Publication, promotion and distribution
Comics publications tend to follow the
Traditionally, comics publishing in Quebec has centred in Montreal, Quebec City,
The Prix Bédélys ("Bédélys Prize") has been awarded to French language comics since 2000. It comes with bursaries for the Prix Bédélys Québec for Best Book from Quebec and the Prix Bédélys Fanzine.[16] The Joe Shuster Awards are open to all Canadian comics in any language, not limited to either French or English, and a number of francophone comics and publishers have won the awards.
The
See also
References
- ^ a b c Viau, Michel (2002-06-24). "Publishing Comics". Library and Archives Canada. Retrieved 2012-01-12.
- ^ ISSN 1499-6642. Retrieved 2012-01-16.
- ^ (in French) Viau, Michel, MensuHell #45, August 2003
- ^ a b c d e f g h Viau, Michel (2002-06-24). "Satirical Newspapers of the 19th Century". Library and Archives Canada. Retrieved 2012-01-10.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Swift, William (8 July 2015). "French Comic Strips". The Canadian Encyclopedia. Historica Canada.
- ^ a b Bell, Invaders, page 27
- ^ a b c d e Viau, Michel (2002-06-24). "Newspaper Strips of the 20th Century". Library and Archives Canada. Retrieved 2012-01-11.
- ^ a b c Viau, Michel (2002-06-24). "Comics During the "Great Darkness"". Library and Archives Canada. Retrieved 2012-01-11.
- ISBN 978-2-7621-2636-5
- ^ a b c d Viau, Michel (2002-06-24). "Springtime of the Quebecois Comic Strip". Library and Archives Canada. Retrieved 2012-01-12.
- ^ (in French) Carpentier, André, et al., La Bande dessinée kébécoise, La barre du jour, 1975
- ^ Potvin, Gilles (15 December 2013). "Ministère des Affaires culturelles du Québec". The Canadian Encyclopedia. Historica Canada.
- ^ a b c Viau, Michel (2002-06-24). "Breaking into the Quebec Market". Library and Archives Canada. Retrieved 2012-01-13.
- ^ Viau, Michel (2002-06-24). "Quebecois Comics". Library and Archives Canada. Retrieved 2012-01-10.
- ^ Smith, Kenton (2011-08-19). "Not just your ordinary cartoons". The Globe and Mail. Retrieved 2011-01-16.
- ^ "Les Prix Bédélys: Winners Announced – Paul 06 x 2, Rapport de Stage, Pico Bogue 03". The Joe Shuster Awards. 2010-04-20. Retrieved 2012-01-09.
Notes
- ^ In Canada, the words "university" and "college" have different meanings—both are post-secondary institutions, but, in general, a "university" is a school which grant degrees, while a "college" is a vocational school. See Education in Canada#Post-secondary education.
- ^ "Little by little, the original fans gave way to a new generation of more scholarly researchers. Historians, sociologists and semiologists took an interest in the comic strip, as being typical of the 20th century. Encyclopaedic, historical and pedagogic works appeared. The visual grammar and syntax of the comics were scrutinized, analyzed and examined in all their forms."—Michel Viau, 2002, writing about the period of 1971–1978[10]
Works cited
- Bell, John and Viau, Michel (2002-06-24). "Beyond the Funnies". Library and Archives Canada. Retrieved 2012-01-13.
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: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - ISBN 978-1-55002-659-7
- (in French) Carpentier, André, et al., La Bande dessinée kébécoise, La barre du jour, 1975
Further reading
In French:
- (in French) Tessier, Gérard. Face à l'imprimé obscène. Plaidoyer en faveur d'une littérature saine. Montréal: Éditions de la Feuille d'érable, 1955
- (in French) Dubois, B. Bande dessinée québécoise : répertoire bibliographique à suivre. éditions D.B.K., Sillery, 1996
- (in French) Falardeau Mira. La Bande dessinée au Québec. Boréal, 1994
- (in French) Falardeau, Mira. Histoire de la bande dessinée au Québec. VLB éditeur, collection Études québécoises, Montréal, 2008
- (in French) Giguère, M. La bande dessinée, populaire et méconnue, Cahier de référence du programme de perfectionnement professionnel ALQ, 2005
- (in French) ISBN 2-920993-38-0
- (in French) Lemay, Sylvain (2003). "Panorama de la bande dessinée québécoise pour la jeunesse (1970–2000))". In Lepage, Françoise (ed.). La littérature pour la jeunesse, 1970-2000 (in French). Les Editions Fides. pp. 99–118. ISBN 978-2-7621-2404-0. Retrieved 2012-09-04.
- (in French) Viau, Michel. Grande presse et petits bonhommes, la naissance de la BDQ, in Formule Un, Mécanique Générale, 2007
External links
- Quebecois Comics, history at Collections Canada
- (in French) La bande dessinée québécoise, history at Collections Canada
- (in French) La BD au Québec
- A long response to Marc Tessier's history of the Montreal comics since that appeared in The Comics Journal's 2005 Special Edition
Comics festivals and conventions in Quebec
- (in English and French) Montréal Comicon
- (in English and French) Expozine (website of Expozine press fair)
- (in French) Festival de la bande dessinée francophone de Québec
- (in French) Otakuthon