Dr Entahausener Entaklemmer

Carl Barks
His Work and
His Life

Dr Entahausener Entaklemmer - Scrooge Speaks Swabian

It is almost unbelievable but the Ducks have learned a dialect of the German language. The album "De beschte Gschichta auf Schwäbisch - Dr Entahausener Entaklemmer" will be the first in a series of "Mundart" or slang comic books that the German publishers of Disney comics, egmont-ehapa, will bring to the market. Uncle Scrooge and Donald Duck are, however, not the first to speak in regional German tongues. Asterix and Obelix, two French comic characters, have done it before.

Even though it seems like another marketing ploy by the "egmont-ehapa" guys, it is still a quality ploy featuring Carl Barks stories and thus making them ready for another generation of comic readers. So why of all the regional dialects in Germany did they choose Swabian? That has probably a couple of reasons. First of all naturally the company (egmont-ehapa) resides in Stuttgart, the capital of Swabiandom but secondly Uncle Scrooge and the stereotypical character of the Swabian have something in common. Swabians are, like Uncle Scrooge, and naturally his Scottish heritage, considered to be very stingy. There is also a German joke that says that if you mix a Swabian and a Scot you get a Swot.

The stories "Der güldene Wasserfall" ("The Golden River" from US #22), "Magische Mahntinte" ("The Magic Ink" from US #24), and a ten-pager later dubbed "Wie gewonnen, so zerronnen" ("The Sunken Yacht" from WDC #104) have been translated into Swabian, a dialect spoken in southwest Germany. The album is completed by a magnificent cover by Barks from Uncle Scrooge #26 (1959). The book is completed by an all-new story by veteran Disney artist Daan Jippes which lets the Ducks see the Swabian traditions of Kehrwoche and the traditional Swabian dish, the Spätzle, a noodle dish.
The choice of the story "The Golden River" may have been precipitated by the fact that "(t)he plot shows clear traces of the Brothers Grimm," according to Goeffrey Blum ("The Source of the Golden River - Part I The Ailing King" in The Carl Barks Library of Uncle Scrooge Adventures by Carl Barks #22) The story is based on a story by John Ruskin called "The King of the Golden River", that he wrote to entertain a child.

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