Talk:The Phantom publications in France

Really a great job Andreas. Thanks a lot. This shows the way for more for further articles about French publications. Before the Second World War, the Phantom and Mandrake were published, amongst others American comics creations, in very popular weekly magazines (in colour and big format issues): respectively "HOP LA" (Phantom) and "ROBINSON" (Mandrake). The first complete magazine dedicated to The Phantom was a series entitled "AVENTURES ET MYSTERES" (Adventures and Mysteries) was published as soon as 1938 by the Parisian editor "La Librairie Moderne". The inside pages were in black and white but the covers were greatly coloured. Then The Phantom was published in another weekly magazine "AVENTURES" the name being "AVENTURES DE PARIS-JEUNES" after the world. The front page was usually the Phantom. After the world, another "AVENTURES ET MYSTERES" was printed always by "La Société Générale D'éditions (acronym  : SAGE or SAGÉditions) which also published in 1945 a series entitled "La série à 8 Francs", less-known (only 7 issues of 8 pages each...- the printing paper was rather rare after the war). But as all the "Aventures et mystères" issues were not for the Phantom, a full Phantom comic-book was launched in 1950 by the SAGE editor. It's the first one called "LE FANTOME DU BENGALE" with 50 issues as cited in your article. Unfortunately it ceased in 1953, and during the fifties Phantom fans could only read dailies published in the national newspaper "L'Aurore", having till to wait a gap of 10 years before the "Editions des Remparts" various series, the latter being all taken from the Fratelli Spada previous Italian publications. (so I call those ones mid French - mid Italian…) Please note that, being not at home, I write from memory only, so more detailed narration would be better. ALPHAN.

• I have added the dates 1947-1949 for the second series "AVENTURES ET MYSTERE" but it is only for the 14 issues with The Phantom. Please note that the whole series had 150 issues dated from 1947 to 1952. At last, there were also 27 issues devoted to Mandrake the Magician. Alain 171.18.2.82 14:10, 10 December 2008 (CET)

Bastei

The Bastei comics were without a doubt intended for distribution in France, this can be seen on the covers. But that does not mean they had to be available all over France, possibly only in cities close to the German border. Just like Fantomen is distributed in Finland, but only in parts that have a big Swedish-speaking population. Is there a Greman-speaking population in France? Andreas 13:10, 21 December 2010 (UTC)

To the best of my knowledge, Bastei comics have never been distributed in France. I don't know why prices in non-German currencies were mentionned on the covers. Maybe it could have been for very casual situations (for instance, sales on some holiday locations for tourists wanting to read material from their native country or to meet some press legislation...). What is sure is that I have never seen one of those comics sold in France, and so in spite of the fact that I was always interested by what was available at the time in the sellers shelves.

To answer to your asking about German-speaking population, Alsace (main town Strasbourg) is a region of France which is situed at the Eastern frontier, still keeping, for history reasons, some German customaries. But even if the regional dialect - The Alsatian - is based on German language, it remains different and is on a strong decline amongst young generations.

Knowing well-enough Alsace, I however never notice Phantom Bastei comic-books sold there. And even if some of them might have been casualy distribued in that way, it could be not what we can qualify of official distribution.

Furthermore, I never see on ebay Bastei publications being put on bid from Alsacian seller localisations.

I believe that may be consider as demonstrating that they were simply not available in Alsace when publishing.

So that's why I believe that the Phantom publications in France article has to be modified.

But, by the way, I have to say that it could be different as far as Switzerland is concerned, a country where official German and French languages are both speaking by large parts of population...Alain03 08:51, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

As a matter of fact, I have myself bought Bastei publications outside Germany, when I was on holiday in Greece. (This was long after their Phantom comics had ended though). So the idea that the prices were put there for the benefit of German tourists in other countries could be correct. However, until we can confirm that the issues were actually sold in the countries mentioned on the covers we could remove them from these lists and only keep a mention of it in the articles. For example, as in Phantom (Bastei): ..."was price-marked on the cover for distribution in"..."but whether the issues were actually available in all these countries is unconfirmed."Andreas 09:57, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

I found excellent the idea of adding this sentence about the prices marked in different currencies as it would be informative. No doubt the process was at first intended to native people who wanted bought newspapers and magazines when staying outside of their country. It was a very casual distributing not a general one. There are probably others publications in the same case. Checking that looks necessaryAlain03 14:07, 22 December 2010 (UTC)