Jinty 4 February 1978

Come Into My Parlour – artist Douglas Perry

Sue’s Fantastic Fun-Bag! – artist Hugh Thornton-Jones

Two Mothers for Maggie – Jim Baikie

Alley Cat – artist Rob Lee

Waking Nightmare– Phil Townsend

Concrete Surfer – artist Christine Ellingham, writer Pat Mills

The Jam – feature 

Rinty ‘n’ Jinty – cartoon

Paula’s Puppets (first episode) – artist Julian Vivas

Land of No Tears – artist Guy Peeters, writer Pat Mills

Darling Clementine – artist Richard Neillands, writer Alison Christie

You Really Take the Biscuit! – feature

In this issue, two stories are clearly on their penultimate episodes: “Come Into My Parlour” and “Land of No Tears”.

In the former, Mother Heggerty’s spell forces Jody to set fire to the Kings’ store. But she’s been caught in the act. She could be facing criminal charges, but the blurb for next week says fire will strike at something else other than the store. Maybe someone is going to burn the old witch at the stake or something?

In the latter, Cassy comes close to losing the vital swimming marathon the Gamma Girls need to win because of a forced bargain with the ruthless Perfecta. Fortunately Perfecta injures herself from over-exertion in the race and drops out, freeing Cassy from all that and enabling her to catch up in the nick of time. Everyone is cheering her on, much to the villainous Hive Inspector’s chagrin. His response to secret helper Miss Norm’s delight in Cassy catching up – “What do you mean, Miss Norm? It’s a disgrace!” – cracks me up every time. Now Cassy is duking out the final length with two others and it’s so close. Everyone except the Hive Inspector and Perfecta is on the edge of their seats to see if Cassy will win. 

“Two Mothers for Maggie” looks like it could be nearing its end as well. Mum is critically ill. It looks like the crisis has actually aroused a bit of conscience in Maggie’s horrible stepfather, but he’s not treating Maggie any better because of it. 

A new story starts, “Paula’s Puppets”. Paula Richards is a spoiled, selfish girl whose rocky road to redemption starts when her father’s toy factory burns down and he is arrested for it. Her life turns upside-down while he protests his innocence. We believe him though nobody else does, but we know the poor bloke’s going to go down for it. Meanwhile, Paula finds some weird puppets at the burned-out factory, which seem to possess some kind of power. 

People should really watch what they say with Sue’s Fantastic Fun-Bag around. Two pitying women whisper what an “absolute dragon” poor Jenny’s got for an aunt and she needs a knight in shining armour. Henrietta obliges, but she has taken it a bit literally and hijinks ensue. But of course it sorts out the old dragon.

Ella is not making much progress with her training for the waterskiing event she wants to win for her family, nor with convincing others she was not to blame for her cousin Clem’s accident. Then Ella makes progress with something else – finding the girl who really caused Clem’s accident. But when she confronts the girl, the miscreant makes it clear she is not going to own up and clear Ella’s name. 

Alley Cat gets freebies from the sausage factory, but trust Spotty Muchloot to make trouble. Fortunately it all turns to the advantage of the factory and Alley Cat is rewarded, much to Spotty’s consternation.

Phil is trying to work out how break into Hardacre House, where she believes Carol is being held prisoner. It’s still very odd that Carol’s family clam up about it. It gets even odder when Phil learns Hardacre House and its owners are very mysterious, and she does not like the look of them when she sees them. After an accident with a tractor she is finally inside. The blurb for next week hints she will not like the look of what she finds there either.

Skateboarding is the only thing that gives Concrete Surfer Jean Everidge the upper hand over her smarmy cousin Carol. Jean’s about to start her new school with Carol, but the leadup to it is not going well, and Jean senses Carol is behind it. 

Jinty 14 January 1978

Come Into My Parlour – artist Douglas Perry

Sue’s Fantastic Fun-Bag! – artist Hugh Thornton-Jones

Two Mothers for Maggie – Jim Baikie

Alley Cat – artist Rob Lee

Waking Nightmare – Phil Townsend

Willy de Ville – feature 

Rinty ‘n’ Jinty – cartoon

Darling Clementine – artist Richard Neillands, writer Alison Christie

Susanna’s Snowstorm (Gypsy Rose story) – artist Keith Robson 

Land of No Tears – artist Guy Peeters, writer Pat Mills

Race for a Fortune – artist Christine Ellingham

The Wild Horse – feature 

Jody has become evil thanks to an additional spell from the witch Mother Heggerty. She now believes she is capable of anything, regardless of how terrible it is, and is loving every minute of it. How is she going to break free of Mother Heggerty’s power when right now she doesn’t even want to?

Cassy gets even more of a taste of how totalitarian this Land of No Tears is. She learns the Hive Inspector, who’s about to pay a visit, has powers to take you away: “No one knows where to, but you never return!” Shades of the Gestapo! Miranda is terrified she will meet this fate if the Inspector finds out she is secretly seeing her mother, and she breaks off with Cassy. Meanwhile, the ruthless Perfecta breaks off with her own friend to train every waking hour for the Golden Girl Award. Cassy is shocked to see the former bosom pals “walking away from each other like robots!” 

Ella bravely sets out to learn to waterski to win the competition for Clem, in the face of everyone who’s against her because they think she deliberately caused Clem’s accident. But her first attempt at waterskiing is such a disaster she’s lucky she didn’t hurt herself.

The same can also be said for sneaky cousin Rodney when he steals Katie’s roller skates to overtake her in the “Race for a Fortune”. But he soon finds he’s nowhere near as good on them as she is. He goes careering down a hill and lands on the back of a rodeo steer with her! Roller skating is back in the hands of the expert by the end of the episode. Thanks to his little stunt she has taken the lead again, and she’s gotten a lot of money out of it as well. 

In “Sue’s Fantastic Fun-Bag!”, a thief breaks into the school, his first attempt at crime. But his remark that he could become the world’s leading cat burglar really is asking for it with Henrietta around, especially when she’s the first thing he tries to steal. Needless to say, his first attempt at crime is his last by the end of the episode.

In the Gypsy Rose story, Susanna is given a snowstorm and finds it has a tale to tell, with each instalment appearing every time she shakes it. The trouble is, the tale is scaring her to death. Gypsy Rose tells Susanna that she must either follow it through to know how the tale ended or put the snowstorm away. Susanna decides to follow through because she must know (not to mention us readers) what the ending is, but what will the final shake of the snowstorm reveal?

Maggie’s sleazy stepfather shows what an abuser he is when he gets so mad he locks her in the coal shed without food or water. Then he refuses to let her see her TV debut, so she has to go to a TV shop in pouring rain to see it. Maggie has a good mind to tell Miss Keyes about the abuse, but she’s staying quiet because Mum doesn’t want word to get around.

Alley Cat is back. Arch-enemy Spotty Muchloot picks on him for first aid practice, and now poor Alley Cat looks like an oversized cocoon. But can he still turn things around?

Phil finds out the girl she saw being bundled off in the middle of the night is named Carol, and her mother is clearly not telling the truth about things. Phil manages to wheedle Carol’s current address out of the mother, enabling her to write to Carol. Carol’s reply is a coded message for help. The plot thickens!

Jinty 17 December 1977

Come Into My Parlour – artist Douglas Perry

Sue’s Fantastic Fun-Bag! – artist Hugh Thornton-Jones

A Jinty Christmas Poem: The Story of the Mince Pie

Two Mothers for Maggie – Jim Baikie

My Favourite Thing! – Competition results

Guardian of White Horse Hill – artist Julian Vivas, writer Pat Mills

Stage Fright! (final episode) – artist Phil Townsend

“The Yew Walk” (Gypsy Rose story) – artist unknown

Land of No Tears – artist Guy Peeters, writer Pat Mills

Alley Cat – artist Rob Lee 

Race for a Fortune – artist Christine Ellingham

Fruity Sweets for Christmas – Feature 

Jinty’s gearing us all up for Christmas with Christmas covers, Christmas features, Christmas jokes, and a Christmas party story from Sue and her Fantastic Fun-Bag. 

There is a dash of Christmas with a yew tree walk in this week’s Gypsy Rose story, but definitely not in the Christmas spirit. New owners are warned not to cut down the yew trees or they will evoke a druid’s curse. Of course they do precisely that, and if they can’t find a way to lift the curse their very lives could be danger. 

“Race for a Fortune” also gives a hint of Christmas, because it’s party time this week. Katie drops in on the Larrup Stick Dance and takes the opportunity to give her cheating cousins some “stick” after that dirty trick they played on her in the last issue. 

It may not be Christmas in “Land of No Tears” – something we highly doubt is celebrated in that cold-hearted world where all emotion is banned. Still, it is as good as Christmas when Miranda’s mysterious mother offers to train the Gamma girls for the Golden Girl Award after Cassy takes a brunt to protect her and Miranda from being caught by the ruthless Perfecta. 

What about presents? Maggie gets presents, in the form of lovely dresses, from both her real mother and her TV mother. Unfortunately the presents are creating conflicting loyalties.

In Alley Cat it’s Christmas stockings. Spotty is unravelling people’s sweaters and pinching the wool right off their backs, in order to knit his own giant Christmas stocking. What a grinch! We can imagine what his stocking will be filled with on Christmas Day.

In the last episode of “Stage Fright!” it takes a fire and the loss of his mansion because of the deranged Lady Alice to make Lord Banbury realise all he had cared about was the acting trophy and not enough about his family. Granddaughter Melanie is not quite ready to forgive him, but the story ends on a hopeful note that a better relationship will build between them. 

Not much happens this week to advance the plot in “Come Into My Parlour”, except wait for the full moon in order to cast the spell to help unravel the mystery of the vanished Saxtons. But bullies get a surprise when the power of Mother Heggerty’s necklace enables Jody to give them a good walloping! 

So the mysterious white horse is a mare! After a time trip to the past, Janey realises the white horse is Epona, the horse goddess, and it is a power that has awakened in response to the threat of the motorway. She returns to her own time with the sword she has taken as a symbol of Epona’s strength and compassion, and finds Epona has gathered a horse army. Now what can Epona have in mind? Let’s not forget she’s a goddess, and not even bulldozers are a match for a goddess.

Jinty 10 December 1977

Come Into My Parlour  – artist Douglas Perry

Christmas Mobile part 4 – feature

Give a Victorian Party! Feature

Two Mothers for Maggie – Jim Baikie

Sue’s Fantastic Fun-Bag! – artist Hugh Thornton-Jones

Guardian of White Horse Hill – artist Julian Vivas, writer Pat Mills

Stage Fright! – artist Phil Townsend

Eddie Kidd – feature 

The Runaway Bride (Gypsy Rose’s Tales of Mystery and Magic) – artist Keith Robson

My Favourite Thing! – Competition results

Land of No Tears – artist Guy Peeters, writer Pat Mills

Alley Cat – artist Rob Lee 

Race for a Fortune – artist Christine Ellingham

Topping Ideas! – Feature 

It’s the final part of Jinty’s Christmas mobile. Jinty readers should be feeling more Christmassy now. 

In “Land of No Tears”, the mystery of Miranda’s mother deepens, but some things are unravelling about it. Cassy finds out Miranda and her mother are secretly meeting each other, an illegal thing in a world where all emotion and normal human contact are forbidden. One is reminded of the Orwellian “Imagine a boot stamping on the human face – forever.” But who is the woman anyway? Why does she turn up in disguise? And why can’t she come up with a better disguise than a ridiculous wig and heavy makeup that would immediately draw attention and put her secret even more at risk?

Sue asks Henrietta to put a stamp on it – meaning on a letter. But, as is so often the case, Henrietta misunderstands and gives Sue a foot that stamps on anything – and with the force of an elephant. 

Katie’s sneaky cousins pull the old signpost switch on her. This causes her to bump into a band of smugglers, and she has to find a way to escape from them. We are informed Katie will get revenge on her cousins next week. 

“Stage Fright!” reaches its penultimate episode. The deranged Lady Alice has been blocking Linda and Melanie from acting because she stands to gain Banbury Manor out of it. But upon hearing Linda has foiled her attempt to stop Melanie entering the acting trophy, she decides that if she can’t have the manor, nobody else will. She’s going to burn it down – with Linda locked inside!

In the Gypsy Rose story, Dee also falls foul of a deranged woman who locks her in. The nutty old woman thinks Dee’s her lost daughter Celia, who eloped to marry the man she loved, not the man her mother chose. She does not realise Celia died before she got the chance to reconcile with her. Fortunately, Celia’s ghost is on hand to help. 

Maggie’s first TV rehearsal is ruined because Mum lumbered her with babysitting. Miss Keyes, her TV mother, is the only bright spot in her life now. Why is it that the make-believe mother she has on the set is far more desirable than the real one who married an unsuitable stepfather?

Mother Heggerty forces Jody to search for the Saxton family she wants revenge on. The search leads Jody to the remains of their old home, and the next step is a spell cast there to find out what happened to them.

Janey goes time travelling to the time of the ancient Celts, where she becomes the chosen one of Epona the horse goddess. In this time period the villagers face a threat, just like the 20th century ones, though the threats are of very different sorts. Is this why Janey keeps seeing this white horse? Is she some sort of chosen one or a reincarnation?

Alley Cat makes a new home in a pipe after Spotty blows up his bin. Spotty sends it rolling downhill, and right where it foils a bank robbery. Alley Cat spends his reward money on a new home that Spotty can’t blow up. Foiled again, Spotty!

Portuguese Translations of Jinty Titles

Following on from Mistyfan’s post where she had a go at translating a number of Jinty story titles into Latin, I am going to do the same for a (smaller) number of titles. Latin is not one of my strengths though, so I will be using a modern language – namely, Brazilian Portuguese. (I was born in Brazil and speak Portuguese fluently, though it’s a long time since I have had to speak it day in and day out, so there are definite rusty patches in my vocabulary.)  won’t be doing as many as Mistyfan managed, but I will be putting a little commentary behind my thought processes so that will bring something different to the proceedings.

I started with “Combing Her Golden Hair“, turning it into “Pente de prata, cabelo de ouro” [literally, silver comb, golden hair]. I thought that it was important to stick to the allusive nature of the story title – it wouldn’t have been appropriate to call it something spoiler-y like “the mermaid’s daughter” or anything. Having said that, there is a song lyric which goes “Qual é o pente que te penteia” which might have possibly worked [literally, what is the comb that combs your hair?], but the song has specific references to Black Brazilian hair types so probably not a great match.

“The Human Zoo” is another nicely allusive story title in Jinty. The Portuguese for ‘zoo’ is quite long – jardim zoologico – so instead I turned it into “Somos pessoas, não animais!” [literally, we are people, not animals!]. I wonder if it might have overtones of political or racial repression rather than the animal rights references that the original story had – not that I think the original writer would have been against that sort of extension as such, but it might be a shift in meaning.

It wouldn’t be a representative sample of girls’ story titles if it didn’t have an alliterative title or two somewhere in the mix. “Paula’s Puppets” and “The Disappearing Dolphin” seemed like good ones to try. If you are going to reference a girl’s name then you have to match it to the locality it’s going to be read in – Paula would be fine to use as a Brazilian girl’s name but it wouldn’t alliterate with the word for puppet [marionete] so that had to be changed. I’d initially thought of using the name Maria, which is a very normal name in Brazil, but it seemed a bit too ordinary and so I went with “As marionetes da Mônica”. Another option might perhaps have been “Mônica dos marionetes” [Monica of the puppets] but the first one might be more likely to also mean that other characters in the story are being played for puppets by Paula.

“O boto que desaparece” is a very straightforward translation of the original title – it just means ‘the dolphin which disappears’. I didn’t think that this story really called for something cleverer – it’s a straightforward thriller / action story at its heart. It’s a shame to miss out on the alliteration though – not always going to be possible to transfer everything to the target language, of course! Perhaps someone whose Portuguese was less rusty would make a neater job of it. Having said that, I well remember that the popular film “Airplane” was rendered into “Fasten your seatbelts, the pilot has disappeared!” on its cinema release in Brazil – so it’s not always about a faithful adaptation, to be fair.

On our pages about translations into other languages (the one on Dutch translations is the longest I think) you can see a similar range of translation choices – some are fairly literal / exact translations (Wenna the Witch / Wenna de heks), some are very similar but with choices to match the local market more closely (Kerry in the Clouds / Klaartje in de wolken), some are about as allusive as the original (The Human Zoo / Als beesten in een kooi [Like Animals in a Cage]; or another great example is Come into My Parlour (1977-78): Kom maar in mijn web [Just Come into My Web]).

I find the cases where the translator has gone in quite a different direction to be almost more intriguing – did they think the original title wasn’t exciting enough? was there a risk of giving away plot twists ahead of time? – but then it was also in keeping with some of the other off-piste titles seen in some of the girls’ comics publishing. Of this last group, I think my top pick might be the choice to turn “Gail’s Indian Necklace” into the name of the Indian deity on the necklace, Anak-Har-Li – not a very obvious choice, and one which makes the rather run-of-the-mill original title into something rather more unexpected I think.

Douglas Perry

Douglas Perry is an artist whose style will be recognized by most readers of girls comics as he has had a very prolific history of drawing for IPC/Fleetway and for DC Thomsons across many decades. I think of him as a Jinty artist because he drew two particularly striking serials for this title, and a number of Gypsy Rose stories too. In fact, however, the bulk of his artistic output was clearly done for other titles, particularly IPC’s Tammy and DCT’s Bunty.

As my particular memories of Douglas Perry are from his spooky stories in Jinty, I want to illustrate this post with some pages from 1978’s “Shadow on the Fen“; they show his distinctive style (loose but effective) well, and give a chance to shiver at the creepy atmosphere he brings to life.

You can see from the above that Perry’s art has a lot of movement and energy in it, with some lovely touches in the composition, like Rebecca’s hair breaking the boundaries of the panel in the last page.

Douglas Perry stories in various girls comics (incomplete bibliography)

• Jinty
  • Come Into My Parlour (1977-78) ‘Kom maar in mijn web’ in Dutch Tina 1981
  • Shadow On The Fen (1978)
  • Various Gypsy Rose stories including “The Thirteenth Hour”, reprinted in the 1983 Annual
  • Miss Clever Thinker (1986 Annual) reprinted from another annual, probably Girls’ Crystal
• June / June & School Friend
  
  • The Haunted Playroom (1965)
  • The Dream (1965)
  • Crash Point (1965)
  • The Missing Manuscript (1966)
  • The Wishing Well (1966)
  • The Gay Dolphin (1966)
  • Milly the Mindreader (1967)
• Misty
  • The Chase (complete story)
  • A Voice from the Past (1979 Annual)
  • String of Seven Stones (1980 Annual) reprint
• Sandie
  • The Return of Rena (1972)
  • Sandra Must Dance (1972) ‘De pas-de-deux van Sandra en Jessie’ in Dutch Tina in 1972
  • The House of Toys (1973)
  • The Plan That Rocked the School (1973 Annual)
• Tammy
  • Various Uncle Pete / Storyteller stories (his art was often used for the ‘talking head’ intro or outro on these)
  • Palomo (1971) reprinted in Penny Annual 1980 and Dutch Tina book 1980
  • Bernice and the Blue Pool (1971)
  • The School on Neville’s Island (1971)
  • The Dragon of St George’s (1972)
  • The Camp on Candy Island (1972-73)
  • Cherry’s Charter (complete story) (1973)
  • Sarah the Scapegoat (complete story) (1973)
  • The Revenge of Edna Hack (1973)
  • Granny’s Town (1973-74)
  • Leader of the Pack (1974)
  • Crystal Who Came in from the Cold (1974)
  • Swimmer Slave of Mrs Squall (1974)
  • Secret Ballet of the Steppes (1974)
  • Rona’s Rainstones (1974-75)
  • Slaves of the Hot Stove (1975)
  • Carol in Camelot Street (1975)
  • Serfs of the Swamps (1975)
  • A Lead through Twilight (1976)
  • The Sungod’s Golden Curse (1976)
  • Curtains for Cathy (1976-77) ‘Applaus voor Kitty’ in 1978 in Dutch Tina
  • Dark Star Wish (1977)
  • The Dance Dream (1977) (writer Anne Digby – see the interview with her for a sample from this story)
  • Molly Mills (1977 – 1982)
  • My Shining Sister (1980)
  • Black Teddy (complete story) (1982)
  • The Grand Finale (complete story) (1982)
  • Midsummer Tresses (complete story) (1983)
  • Swansea Jack (complete story) (1984)
  • Listing supplied by Mistyfan in comments below – many thanks!
• Bunty
  • “Visit to Venus” (1967)
  • “The Legend Of Lorraine” (1970) De geheimzinnige ballerina in the Dutch edition of Debbie 1984
  • The Little Shrimp (1971) ‘De kleine garnaal’ in the Dutch edition of Peggy 1984
  • “The Laughing Lady of Hamble Hall” (1972 Annual)
  •  Supergirl (1977-78) ‘Bionische Susie’ in Dutch edition of Debbie in 1985
  • Parker versus Parker (1981-82) ‘Parker tegen Parker’ in 1982-83 in Dutch Tina
  • The Fate of the Fairleys (1982-83) ‘Het geheim van Bella Vista’ in a Dutch edition of Debbie Parade Album from 1985 or 1986
  • “Shivery Shirley” (1983)
  • “T for Trouble” (1985 Annual)
  • ‘Sally on Planet Serbos’ (1985)
  • ‘Trapped in Time’ (1986)
  • “The Seven Sisters” (c1988)
  • “Little Miss Lonely” (c1988)
  • “The Trouble With Boys” (1989)
  • “Pinkie” (1989)
  • “I’ll Never Forgive You!” (1989)
  • “A New Life For Lily” (1994) ‘Lotje’s nieuwe leven’ in Dutch Tina 1994
  • “Lonely Lynn” (1994)
  • “Stop, Thief!” (1995)
  • “The Impostor!” (1995)
  • “The Seeker” (1996-97)
  • These items were taken from a discussion thread on the Comics UK Forum and added to by Marc in comments below
    
• Mandy
  • “Go Girl Go” from the 1971 Mandy album
• Dutch translations with original titles unknown
  • ‘Billy MacGuire, hoofd van de clan’ [‘Billy MacGuire, head of the clan’] (Dutch Tina book 1981), original unknown
  • Een hoofdrol vol gevaren! (1987, Dutch Tina)

See also this discussion thread about him on the Comics UK Forum, which includes some example art uploads. The Girls Comics of Yesterday site, which focuses on DC Thomson titles, also has a Douglas Perry tag. Here is a Catawiki tag list too.

I am sad and surprised to see how little information there is available about this fine artist on the internet. There is nothing on Bear Alley, or the UK Comics Wikia entry, nor even anything on Lambiek’s Comiclopedia. I suppose we must count ourselves lucky that Perry drew for Tammy during the years they were running credits.

As ever, further information (particularly in order to add to the Bibliography) would be extremely welcome.

—

Edited to add: Mistyfan has sent through scans of the Misty story that Perry drew: “The Chase”. It is a great spooky tale and I include it here to show more of his artwork.

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Jinty 26 November 1977

• Come into My Parlour (artist Douglas Perry)
• Christmas mobile part 2 – feature
• Two Mothers for Maggie (artist Jim Baikie)
• Sue’s Fantastic Fun-Bag! (artist Hugh Thornton-Jones)
• Guardian of White Horse Hill (artist Julian Vivas)
• Stage Fright! (artist Phil Townsend)
• Jinty Pops the Question! (quiz)
• The Scarecrow of Dread – Gypsy Rose story (artist Terry Aspin)
• Land of No Tears (artist Guy Peeters, writer Pat Mills)
• Race for a Fortune (artist Christine Ellingham unknown Concrete Surfer artist)
• More Flowery Fun (feature)

Jinty is gearing up for Christmas with her Christmas mobiles. And things gear up elsewhere in the issue as well. In Land of No Tears, Cassy’s getting her ideas together to liberate the Gamma girls. And her plan is to train them up to win a top sports award. In part two of Race for a Fortune, Katie has to get her thinking cap on to raise money because under the terms of her Uncle’s will, both she and her scheming cousins had to set off without money. In Stage Fright, a doctor is called in and Linda tries to get him to help Melanie. Can he help Melanie to remember her past and break her free from the scheming Lady Alice? Janey learns that her Guardian of White Horse Hill was a Celtic goddess! And in Two Mothers for Maggie, step-dad still thinks acting is a waste of time for Maggie, and he gets abusive when he finds out she has gotten a job on television.

Douglas Perry is drawing his first serial for Jinty, Come into My Parlour, about an evil witch who enslaves a girl with a spider-like necklace. It’s strange that both serials Perry drew for Jinty had witch themes. The first features the typical evil crone who is out to cause trouble with her evil magic, while the pendulum swings to the other end with the second, Shadow on the Fen, which depicts witches as they really were – wise women who helped people with folk magic and the real evil lay with the people who persecuted them. Maybe it’s Perry’s style that made him the choice for drawing these serials?

Although Halloween was a month ago, there is a distinctive Halloween flavour with this week’s Gypsy Rose story. A terrifying scarecrow and horrible turnip faces are scaring Oonah Jack at the farm she is trying to run. Fortunately for her, she has Gypsy Rose for company.

Stories translated into Dutch

Following up on the previous post on European Translations, Sleuth from Catawiki has kindly sent me a list she has prepared of Jinty stories which were translated into Dutch. (See also some comments from her in that post, about Dutch translations.) They were mostly published in the weekly comic Tina and/or in the reprint album format Tina Topstrip. The list below shows the original title, followed by the title in the Dutch translation, with a literal translation in [square brackets] where appropriate, and then the details of the publication that the translation appeared in. It is ordered by date of original publication.

• Gwen’s Stolen Glory (1974): De droom van een ander [Someone else’s dream] (in: Tina Club 1975-2)
• Dora Dogsbody (1974-76): Hilda Hondemoppie (in: Tina 1974)
• Gail’s Indian Necklace (1974): Anak-Har-Li [the name of the Indian deity on the necklace] (in: Tina Club 1975-01)
• Always Together (1974): Voor altijd samen (in: Tina 1985/86)
• Wild Horse Summer (1974): De zomer van het witte paard [White Horse Summer] (in: Tina 1976, Tina Topstrip 15 (1980))
• Left-Out Linda (1974): Linda (in: Tina 1975/76)
• Wenna the Witch (1974): Wenna de heks (in: Tina 1976, Tina Topstrip 34, 1981)
• Slave of the Mirror (1975): De spiegel met de slangen [The Snakes Mirror] (in: Tina 1976)
• The Kat and Mouse Game (1975): Als kat en muis [Like cat and mouse] (in: Tina 1985)
• Tricia’s Tragedy (1975): Tineke – Strijd om de Lankman-trofee [Tineke – Fighting for the Lankman Trophy] (in: Tina 1975/76, Tina Topstrip 18 (1980)).
• The Valley of the Shining Mist (1975): Het dal van de glanzende nevel (in: Tina 1977)
• Barracuda Bay (1975): Susan Stevens – Barracudabaai (in: Tina 1971); reprint from June & School Friend 1970.
• The Haunting of Hazel: Hazel en haar berggeest [Hazel and her Mountain Ghost] (in: Tina 1976/77, Tina Topstrip 27 (1981))
• For Peter’s Sake! (1976): De opdracht van Josefien [Josephine’s Assignment] (in: Tina Boelboek 5 (1985))
• The Slave of Form 3B (1976): In de ban van Isabel [Under Isabel’s Spell] (in: Groot Tina Zomerboek 1984-2)
• Then there were 3 … (1976): Toen waren er nog maar drie (in: Groot Tina Lenteboek 1982-1
• Horse from the Sea (1976): De legende van het witte paard [The Legend of the White Horse] (in: Tina 1985)
• Snobby Shirl the Shoeshine Girl! (1976): Freule Frederique [Lady Frederique] (in: Tina 1979)
• Stefa’s Heart of Stone (1976): Steffie’s hart van steen (in: Tina 1986). Reprint in Tammy 1984
• Girl in a Bubble (1976): Gevangen in een luchtbel [Prisoner in a Bubble] (in: Tina 1977, Tina Topstrip 29, 1981).
• Sceptre of the Toltecs (1977): De scepter van de Tolteken (in: Tina 1978; Tina Topstrip 44, 1982)
• The Mystery of Martine (1976-77): De dubbelrol van Martine [Martine’s Double Role] (in: Tina 1978).
• Mark of the Witch! (1977): Het teken van de heks (in: Tina 1982/83)
• Freda, False Friend (1977): Frieda, de valse vriendin (in: Tina 1978/79)
• Spell of the Spinning Wheel (1977): De betovering van het spinnewiel (in: Tina 1978; Tina Topstrip 42, 1982)
• The Darkening Journey (1977): Samen door het duister [Through the Darkness Together] (in: Tina 1981/82)
• Creepy Crawley (1977): In de macht/ban van een broche [Under the Spell of a Brooch] (In: Tina 1979; Tina Topstrip 60, 1984)
• Kerry in the Clouds (1977): Klaartje in de wolken (in: Tina 1978)
• The Robot Who Cried (1977): Robot L4A ontsnapt! [Robot Elvira Gets Away] (in: Tina 1985/86).
• Curtain of Silence (1977): Achter het stille gordijn [Behind the Silent Curtain] (in: Tina 1978/79, Tina Topstrip 52, 1983)
• Fran’ll Fix it! (1977; 1978-79): short story 3/4; Annabel versiert ‘t wel [Annabel will fix it]; episodes in Tina from 1983 till 1994; there were also “Dutch” episodes written by Bas van der Horst and drawn by Comos, and there is an episode in 1994 written by Ian Mennell and drawn by Comos.
• Who’s That in My Mirror? (1977): Het spookbeeld in de spiegel [The Ghost in the Mirror] (in: Tina 1980)
• Cursed to be a Coward! (1977): Zoals de waarzegster voorspelde [Like the Fortune-Teller Predicted] (in: Tina 1979, Tina Topstrip 49, 1983)
• Destiny Brown (1977): De vreemde visioenen van Seventa Smit [Seventa Smit’s Strange Visions] (in: Tina 1980)
• The Goose Girl (1977): not translated directly but the storyline was probably used for Maartje, het ganzenmeisje [Marge, the Goose Girl] in Tina 1979, art by Piet Wijn; Tina Topstrip 40, 1982).
• Stage Fright! (1977): De gevangene van Valckensteyn [Prisoner of Valckensteyn/Falconstone] (in: Tina 1981)
• Guardian of White Horse Hill (1977): Epona, wachter van de paardenvallei [Epona, Guardian of the Horse Valley] (in: Tina 1978; Tina Topstrip 37, 1982)
• Land of No Tears (1977-78): Wereld zonder tranen [World of No Tears] (in: Groot Tina Lenteboek 1983-1)
• Come into My Parlour (1977-78): Kom maar in mijn web [Just Come into My Web] (in: Groot Tina Boek 1981-3)
• Race for a Fortune (1977-78): Om het fortuin van oom Archibald [Race for Uncle Archibald’s Fortune] (in: Tina 1980)
• Concrete Surfer (1977-78): Ik heb altijd m’n skateboard nog! [At least I’ve still got my skateboard] (in: Tina 1980)
• Paula’s Puppets (1978): De poppen van Petra [Petra’s Puppets] (in: Tina 1979, Tina Topstrip 54, 1983). Perhaps they changed the name because there was a Stewardess Paula strip in Tina at the time.
• Slave of the Swan (1978): De wraak van de Zwaan [Revenge of the Swan] (in: Tina 1980)
• The Birds (1978): De vogels (in: Groot Tina Boek 1978 winter).
• Clancy on Trial (1978): Nancy op proef [Nancy on Trial – the name Clancy is highly unusual in the Netherlands] (in: Tina 1979)
• Wild Rose (1978): Waar hoor ik thuis? [Where do I belong?] (in: Tina 1980)
• 7 Steps to the Sisterhood (1978): Gevaar loert op Lansdael [Danger at Lansdael] (in: Tina 1980)
• The Human Zoo (1978): Als beesten in een kooi [Like Animals in a Cage] (in: Tina 1986). Reprint in Tammy 1982.
• No Cheers for Cherry (1978): Geen applaus voor Sandra [No Applause for Sandra] (in: Groot Tina Zomerboek 1983-2)
• The Girl Who Never Was (1979): De verbanning van Irma Ijsinga [Irma Ijsinga’s Banishment] (in: Tina 1981)
• Sea-Sister (1979): Gevangene van de zee [Prisoner of the Sea] (in: Tina 1989)
• The Forbidden Garden (1979): De verboden tuin (in: Tina 1982/83). Reprint in Tammy 1984
• Bizzie Bet and the Easies (1979): Dina Doe douwt door [Dinah Do Pushes Through] (just one episode, in: Groot Tina Lenteboek 1982-1).
• Almost Human (1979): De verloren planeet [The Lost Planet] (in: Tina 1984)
• Village of Fame (1979): Het dorp waar nooit ‘ns iets gebeurde [The Village Where Nothing Ever Happened] (in: Tina 1982)
• Combing Her Golden Hair (1979): Kirsten, kam je gouden lokken [Kirsten, Comb Your Golden Locks] (in: Tina 1981, Tina Topstrip 64, 1985: Kam je gouden lokken)
• Waves of Fear (1979): In een golf van angst [In a Wave of Fear] (in: Tina 1983)
• White Water (1979-80): Wild Water [Wild Water] (in: Tina 1984)
• When Statues Walk… (1979-80): De wachters van Thor [Thor’s Guardians] (in: Tina 1981/82, Tina Topstrip 71, 1985)
• The Venetian Looking Glass (1980): Het gezicht in de spiegel [The Face in the Mirror] (in: Tina 1983)
• Seulah the Seal (1979-80): Sjoela de zeehond (in: Tina 1980/81, little booklets in black and white that came as a free gift, stapled in the middle of a Tina).
• A Spell of Trouble (1980): Anne Tanne Toverheks [Anne Tanne Sorceress, a sort of nursery rhyme name] (in: Tina 1984/85)
• Girl the World Forgot (1980): Door iedereen vergeten [Forgotten by everyone] (in: Tina 1987)
• The Ghost Dancer (1981): Dansen in het maanlicht [Dancing in the Moonlight] (in: Tina 1983)
• Holiday Hideaway (1981): Wie niet weg is, is gezien [If you’re not gone, you’re seen – a sentence children use in hide-and-seek] (in: Tina 1982)
• Freda’s Fortune (1981): Could be: Fortuin voor Floortje [A Fortune for Florrie] (in: Groot Tina Herfstboek 1983-3)
• Airgirl Emma’s Adventure (reprint from June 1969, in Jinty Holiday Special 1975): Short story 16; Emma zoekt het hogerop [Emma takes it higher up] (in: Tina 1970)

Various of the stories translated in Tina were also reprinted in the Indonesian title Nina (of course Indonesia is a former Dutch colony, making for a clear link). These will be listed on a new reference page for Translations into Indonesian.

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This long list enables us to see how very popular some creators were – for instance, a large number of Jim Baikie and Phil Gascoine stories are included (though not all, by any means). Of course, these were also the most prolific of Jinty artists too.

Many stories were translated very shortly after initial publication, and then reprinted in album form some time later. There was also a ‘second round’ of translation work done after Jinty ceased publication, to go back and pick some of the earlier stories that had not been selected earlier. This was the case with “Always Together” and “The Kat and Mouse Game”, for instance.

Many but by no means all of the story titles were translated fairly literally or exactly, though the main character’s name was almost invariably exchanged for another one. Some titles ended up particularly poetical or neat in translation: “A Spell of Trouble” and “Holiday Hideaway” perhaps benefit most from their translated titles. Of course, there are also some losers: I think “The Human Zoo” and “The Girl Who Never Was” ended up with less resonant titles through the process.

A wide range of stories were translated: spooky stories, humour stories, science fiction, adventure, sports stories. There are some omissions that I’m surprised by, though of course the editors had to pick and choose from so much that was available. “Fran of the Floods” was probably too long (see Marc’s comment about the length of stories selected for translation). No Gypsy Rose stories were selected – maybe they didn’t want a storyteller, ‘grab-bag’ approach? I am however quite surprised at the omission of the excellent “Children of Edenford” (1979). Could it have been too subversive a story, with its underlying theme of adults undermining their position of trust by hypnotizing children in order to control their moral development? The similarly-themed “Prisoner of the Bell” was also not translated. Of course this is rather a guess! At the end of the day I’m sure there were just more stories to choose from than there were spaces for publication.

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For reference, I also include a complete list of stories published in the album format Tina Topstrip (71 albums in total). This gives us a view of how many of the reprinted stories deemed worthy of collection came from which original title. Note that some of the stories in this album format were themselves originally written in Dutch as they are credited to a Dutch writer. (NB I will add this to the new page created for Translations into Dutch)

1. Becky Never Saw The Ball
2. Twinkle, Twinkle, Daisy Star
3. Wee Sue
4. Het geheim van oom Robert (original story in Dutch)
5. Kimmy op de modetoer (original title unknown)
6. Marcella het circuskind (original title unknown)
7. Moses and Me
8. Peggy en Jeroen (Patty’s World story)
9. Anja – Dorp in gevaar (original title unknown)
10. Het lied van de rivier (Patty and the Big Silver Bull Band story, original in Dutch)
11. Sonja en de mysterieuze zwemcoach (I suspect this is a translation as no writer is given)
12. De man in het koetshuis (original story in Dutch)
13. Linda’s verdriet (original title unknown, from Tammy)
14. Het circus komt (original story in Dutch)
15. Wild Horse Summer
16. Noortje (original story in Dutch)
17. Ruzie om Jeroen (Patty’s World story)
18. Tricia’s Tragedy
19. Het lied van de angst (Patty and the Big Silver Bull Band story, original in Dutch)
20. Silver Is A Star (from Sandie)

Jinty 3 December 1977

Stories in this issue:

• Come Into My Parlour (artist Douglas Perry)
• Two Mothers for Maggie (artist Jim Baikie)
• Sue’s Fantastic Fun-Bag! (artist Hugh Thornton-Jones)
• Guardian of White Horse Hill (artist Julian Vivas)
• Stage Fright! (artist Phil Townsend)
• Gypsy Rose: A Picture of the Past (artist and writer Keith Robson)
• Alley Cat
• Land of No Tears (artist Guy Peeters, writer Pat Mills)
• Race for a Fortune

I got this issue out to scan the Gypsy Rose story for the Keith Robson interview, as it is the first script he wrote as well as being drawn by him. It’s a cool time-travel story with a twist, and one that I found memorable; it came to mind many years later when I visited Lacock Abbey where the inventor of photography, Fox Talbot, lived.

“Come Into My Parlour” is spooky: I find Douglas Perry’s artwork very atmospheric for this sort of thing. Evil old Mother Heggerty is proper creepy! She forces Jody Sinclair to be her slave, her literal cat’s-paw, to get revenge on a family called Saxton – and when Jody tries to rebel, she is reminded of how under the spell she is as she can’t even take off the cat’s-paw necklace that binds her to the old witch…

“Two Mothers for Maggie” contrasts Maggie Jones’ glamorous role in a tv soap opera with her humdrum life in a house full of poverty and hard work: she tries to do her homework and instead has to help the kids with breakfast while her slobby stepfather gobbles down his full English. The whole story is Maggie being tugged between her family – especially her mother, who she dearly loves – and her exciting life in tv and the luxury of her telly mother’s home.

“Guardian of White Horse Hill” has runaway Janey finding out that her mysterious white horse is actually Epona, the Celtic horse goddess! No wonder when she gets on the horse’s back she is invisible – an easy task for a goddess presumably. Powerful beings like that have a habit of wanting something in return, and Janey starts to find out more as she is dragged back into Celtic times…

“Stage Fright!” is a thriller mystery based around a girl with amnesia and another girl who is being made to win an acting trophy, otherwise her father will lose his job. (Of course this sort of blackmail is hardly unusual in girls’ comics, as you have gathered by now!) Protagonist Linda has taken her new friend Melanie to be hypotised, hoping it will bring back her memory and even the voice that she lost in the same accident that made her amnesiac. It works, but reveals a greater threat at the house they both live in: Melanie’s aunt is a scheming murderess who caused the death of Melanie’s father and mother in a boating accident – yes, it’s rather melodramatic as a plot item but the scene is drawn beautifully by Phil Townsend. Can the two girls secretly work against the aunt?

“Land of No Tears” is still at an early stage at this point, but Cassie already has a plan to get back at the bitchy Alpha girls in the dystopian world she has landed in: she will lead her pack of Gamma girls to win the Golden Girl trophy! It would be a hopeless task except that one of them turns out to be superb at gymnastics. Hmm, now what secret is Miranda hiding?

“Race for a Fortune” is a light-weight amusing comedy story with a scruffs-vs-snobs theme: Katie is up against her two posh cousins in a race to get to the Scottish ancestral land of their late grandfather, starting off with nothing in their pockets. Katie is clearly far more resourceful than the two poshos; it doesn’t always work out for her but this week she manages to get her cousins stuck in a medical research facility, being well-paid to help science by trying to catch a cold! And of course in the meantime Katie gets a few days’ head start, grinning as she goes… This is drawn by the same unknown artist who drew one of my favourite stories, “Concrete Surfer“.

Jinty January 28 1978

• Come into My Parlour (artist Douglas Perry)
• Sue’s Fantastic Fun-Bag (artist Hugh Thornton-Jones)
• Two Mothers for Maggie (artist Jim Baikie)
• Alley Cat
• Waking Nightmare (artist Phil Townsend)
• Concrete Surfer – first episode (writer Pat Mills)
• Meet the Singing Stuntman Actor Gareth Hunt (feature)
• Rinty ‘n’ Jinty
• Darling Clementine (artist Richard Neillands, writer Alison Christie)
• Land of No Tears (artist Guy Peeters, writer Pat Mills)
• Race for a Fortune – final episode

Well, this is the issue that begins one of Jinty’s best remembered stories, Concrete Surfer. Skateboarding is the only thing to come out of Jean Everidge’s stay in Australia. Her family are losers who failed at everything in Australia. Jean comes back to Britain, where cousin Carol and her family are the opposite – successful and well off. And Carol likes nothing better than being the centre of attention. The trouble is, when Jean is on a skateboard, she is the centre of attention. This will make skateboarding the bone of contention between the two cousins for the duration of the story.

Ironically, skateboarding also features in the final episode of “Race for a Fortune”. Katie’s sneaky cousin Rodney barters for a skateboard to get ahead of Katie’s roller skates in the final lap on the race. Fortunately for Katie, Rodney is nowhere near as good as Jean on a skateboard. But with a name like Ebenezer, you have to wonder what the uncle has really left for the winner of the race. “Race for a Fortune” will be replaced next issue by a much darker story, “Paula’s Puppets”. In fact, Jinty dares us to be honest – would we do as Paula does when she finds some weird puppets with strange powers? Maybe, maybe not. But then, surely we are not embittered by the same ordeal that Paula faces in this story – being bullied and stigmatised after her father is imprisoned for insurance fraud. He protests his innocence but is not believed. However, that is a story for another entry on this blog.

In the other Pat Mills story in this issue, “Land of No Tears“, the Gamma girls are doing really well in the finals. And judging by the Hive Inspector’s attitude towards the Gamma girls, we can imagine that he is not pleased. But Cassy is still bound by her bargain with Perfecta to throw the swimming marathon, which will mean they lose the trophy and their one chance of better treatment. However, the blurb for next week tells us that fate is going to take a hand, so there be even more readers eager to buy the next issue!

In “Two Mothers for Maggie”, Maggie gets a break from her abusive stepfather. But then her mother falls ill and is taken to hospital. Good breaks never last long for heroines – until the end of the story, that is. In “Waking Nightmare”, Phil is trying for a break of a different kind – breaking into Hardacre House to rescue Carol. So far she has not had much success, and now she is finding there is a mystery about the house itself. Another reason readers will be lining up for the next issue. And in “Darling Clementine”, Ella is trying for jobs to raise money for her water-skiing equipment to get into the club. But the snobby girls at the club are not making her welcome, and we are told that next week they will get even more spiteful. And in “Come into My Parlour”, Mother Heggerty forces Jody into even more spiteful acts, this time at a department store.

Gypsy Rose disappears from Jinty with this issue and is not seen again until 13 May 1978. Also, she had previously used her own material and interacted with the characters in her stories as a consultant. However, when she returns she is recycling Strange Stories from June/Tammy and is bodged over the Storyteller.

Lastly, this issue advertises the first issue of Misty. For some reason we are told the issue will be on sale on 30 January although the issue will be dated 4 February.