a top 10 list or so of african comics

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Egyptian artist, Guy “ Golo”Nadeau , renders Egyptian author Albert Cossery’s 1955 masterpiece, Mendiants et orgueilleux (Proud Beggars). Placed next to their 2003 collaboration, Les Couleurs de l'infamie, I think we get from Golo 2 Cairos: one Francophone African, the other Franco-Belgian – both perfect. Sample pages of this yet to be published English translation (by Lulu Norman) is over at Words Without Borders . Egypt Mendiants et Orgueilleux by Albert Cossery and Golo. Publisher: Gallisol, 2009.

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An English reader's list of African Comics in no particular order. Bombastic Element blog

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Page 1: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

Egyptian artist, Guy “Golo”Nadeau, renders Egyptian author Albert Cossery’s 1955 masterpiece, Mendiants et orgueilleux (Proud Beggars). Placed next to their 2003 collaboration, Les Couleurs de l'infamie, I think we get from Golo 2 Cairos: one Francophone African, the other Franco-Belgian – both perfect. Sample pages of this yet to be published English translation (by Lulu Norman) is over at Words Without Borders.

Egypt

Mendiants et Orgueilleux by Albert Cossery and Golo. Publisher: Gallisol, 2009.

Page 2: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

Ivory Coast/ Cameroon

An Eternity in Tangier by Faustin Titi and Eyoum Ngangue. Publisher: Lai-momo, 2007

The comic gives you time to absorb the tragic experience of displacement experienced by Africans forced to leave their country to escape the economic, political or social hardships. As we follow Gawa’s thwarted attempt to make it to Europe in search of a better future, the story shows the peripheral life of the illegal migrant in Tangiers even as it flashes back to Gawa at his village, Gnasville, for contrast and as a reminder that he could be anyone’s kid.

Page 3: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

Les Mercenaires (1979-80). Publisher: Elvifrance

For a publisher of pocket sized gore, horror and erotica comics, what could be more violent, gruesome and horrific than war? Wars in exotic Africa, of course. Elvifrance , between1979 and 80, published 12 stand alone issues of Les Mercanaires, looking at war, conflicts and tyrants in Uganda and Central African Republic, Ethiopia and so on - there is even an issue titled, Polisario. How cool is that? War comics don’t get more giallo or pulpier than this.

Page 4: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

Yes, Pat Masioni did draw “The Way Home” story arc for issues #13-14, but that’s not why Vertigo’s ongoing series, Unknown Soldier, makes our African comics list. Like with the Hulk, the “gimmick” here is also a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde routine. But unlike the Hulk (or even Jason Bourne :-), Dysart’s unique take on the gimmick comes after a distraught Moses literarily takes off his own face early on. As a result, Unknown Soldier and Moses Lwanga now share the anonymity the bandages bring but end up with a face belonging to neither of them. The same way neither Moses nor Unknown Soldier have claim over the conflict in Uganda nor the right approach how to go about helping the victims or bringing an end to it.

Unknown Soldier by Joshua Dysart and Alberto Ponticelli. Publisher: Vertigo

Page 5: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

Chances are Congolese cartoonist Pat Masioni is the first African cartoonist to have worked on a Vertigo title when he took over penciling chores from Alberto Ponticelli back on issue 13 of Unknown Soldier. Masioni, who resides in Paris had already won international fame for his work on the two part treatise on the Rwandan conflict - 'Descente en enfer' and 'Le camp de la vie.’

On flipping through this, you will notice that even as Masioni captures genocide’s gruesome details, the way each page is rendered, makes sure you never lose sight of Rwanda and how beautiful the country is.

DRC

Le camp de la vie. by Cecile Grenier, Ralph and Pat Masioni. Publisher: Albin Michel, 2005

Page 6: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

Egypt

Metro by Magdy el-Shafei. Publisher: El-Malamih (2008)

Magdy el-Shafei’s “Metro” is said to the first adult Arabic graphic novel set in Cairo and tells the story a young software designer who has been forced into debt by corrupt officials, and then decides to get out of his dilemma by taking direct action - robbing a bank. But the graphic novel was pulled off of Cairo’s bookshelves in April 2008 upon police orders, for the book was deemed indecent. Words Without Borders has a 15 page preview.

Page 7: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

Senegalese cartoonist, Fayez Samb, himself the son of a tirailleur, continues the adventures of these little known Senegalese infantrymen who were parts of colonial units, fighting for France during WWI and II. In Le Tirailleur des Vosges, for example, Samb tells of the exemplary behavior of colonial units during the debacle of 1940 and the horrors experienced by 25th RTS at the hands of SS units of the Wehrmacht. Outside Ousmane Sembene’s Camp de Thiaroye (‘87), experiences of Africans who fought for their colonial masters in WW I and II are stories you rarely see in comics or film.

Senegal

Comics of Fayez Samb. Publisher: L’Harmattan.

Page 8: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

When fellow cartoonist Almo asks Pahe why he hasn’t flown the coop to Europe since he has a Swiss publisher and all his books get published in Europe anyway. Pahe says something about having to remain in Bitam (his hometown in Northern Gabon) because he has to eat 6 times a day or something. His books are his journals illustrated, where he ends up being his own object rather than subject. Think of him as a Harvey Pekar, but funnier.

Gabon

La Vie de Pahe by Pahé . Publisher: Paquet.

Page 9: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

Ivory Coast

Aya of Yop City – Vol 4 (2008) and Vol 5 (2009) by Marguerite Abouet and Clément Oubrerie - Editions Gallimard

Volume 4 and 5 of Abouet and Oubrerie’s Ivorian opera have already hit bookshelves in France. Meanwhile Abouet’s U.S. publisher, Kitchen Sink Press, only released volume 3 (Secrets Are Out) last fall. If like me, your French sucks, keeping up with Aya and her friends may be a good reason to take French classes instead of Chinese.

Page 10: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

Abraham Oshoko’s graphic novel retells events surrounding a major turning point in Nigeria’s history -- the annulment of the June 12,1993 presidential election. I’ve included Oshoko’s book here not because it is the first graphic novel of its kind published in Nigeria. Rather, the work, flaws and all, is a clear indication that the growing trend whereby the graphic novel has proven a veritable medium for war reporting and analysis (Joe Sacco or Emmanuel Guibert), can also be applied to corruption or even election reporting and analysis, but, still, it must aim to tell a story propelled by more than just the vector of how events unfolded.

Nigeria

June 12 – The Struggle for Power in Nigeria by Abraham Oshoko. Publisher: Farafina (2006)

Page 11: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

Anton “Joe Dog” Kannemeyer likes rendering the mind-set of Apartheid using Herge’s palette of colonial assumptions from Tintin in the Congo. But while Herge specifically designed black Africans to look helpless and in need of colonizing, Kannemeyer carrying over those same designs into a Post-Apartheid in which blacks are no longer colonized or helpless and can be anything– even angels—now makes for some interesting juxtapositions. Especially when it is also the blacks voicing out the hush-hush thoughts (and fears) of the same Colonial/Apartheid mind set that once saw and designed them Herge style. That said, Herge made up for Tintin in the Congo over the course of his brilliant output writing about other parts of the world. So let’s cut the guy some slack shall we. Thanks.

“A Dreadful Thing Is About to Occur” - Anton Kannemeyer's second solo exhibition at the Michael Stevenson gallery, Cape Town, 2010.

South Africa

Page 12: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

DRC/France

Eva K. Trilogy by Frank Giroud and Bally Baruti. Publisher: Soleil, 1995-98

Master of the medium, Congolese cartoonist Kandolo Lilela “Bally” Baruti, and one of the medium’s most successful writers, Frank Giroud, met each other in Dakar. Their first collaboration starts with the story of a train carrying the most fabulous collection of sacred art ever assembled on the continent and the man who tries to steal it. Notice how Baruti keeps a horizontal paneling (emphasizing the speed and direction of the train) going through even those short vertical panels indicating the step by step Rififi details of the heist. Did we say master already?

Page 13: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

“What’s a Nubian?”

Remember Hooper X in Kevin Smith’s Chasing Amy (’97) and all the so called “black rage” needed to sell Afrocentric comic books? Tempting as it might be to want to dismiss such Afrocentricism--a backlash against the 90s American comic book scene I imagine—Afrocentric writing is however a precursor to all kinds of black speculative fiction, opening up areas of African sci-fi and fantasy that need to be explored.

Diaspora Writing African Comics

Dwight Ewell /Chasing Amy (1997)

Page 14: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

In Shaango, French creators Kade, Tir and Jar come up with a character who discovers he has inherited the powers of the Yoruba god of thunder, Shango. (Digging the Bini Mask by the way). The hero, Ishan, is said to be “caught between his doubts, his fears… and will take a gift (a super power) he does not understand; power, from its African roots, which he knows nothing about.”

It’s a twist on the “in-between” dilemma of first generation immigrant African children taken to or born in the new world. Sometimes alienated within their host communities, yet having no understanding of the countries they emigrated from.

FRANCE: Shaango by Kade and Tir. Publisher: Los Brignoles Edition, 2010

Page 15: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

USA

Dossouye by Charles R. Saunders. Publisher: Sword & Soul Media, 2008.

Dossouye is a novel. But it’s screaming out graphic novel. Asked to submit a story to a feminist anthology, Charles R. Saunders, who writes sword-and-sorcery Robert E. Howard type novels set in a pre-colonial African milieu, used his research into the 18th century West African kingdom of Dahomey and the legend of warrior women who fought in its armies to give his take on a sword wielding, kick down shields, take down names, African Amazon.

Page 16: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

USAPilot/trailer for “Power Force Five” – Producers: Angel Harper, Carol Mayes, Paul Collins. National Black Programming Consortium

Since we’ve included a book, why not animation. I was reminded of this other example of Diaspora updating African folklore for a team of contemporary superheroes. Trailer – here. Forget that Ogun (god of fire) feels like he can crush coconuts with his biceps and looks like a bouncer, the literary sci-fi and fantasy elements at play here are tremendous.   

Page 17: A Top 10 List or So of African Comics

“In a 1986 article, J-P. Jacquemin wrote, African Comics ‘are not the desert nor are they a rainforest. A woodland, perhaps…’” - Hilary Mbiye Lumbala from Bubbles and Boxes - From Congo Mbumbulu to Mfumu'Eto.