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THE BLOG AT THE CROSSROADS
Greetings From Belgrade!
Posted: October 1, 2011
Greetings from Belgrade! I’m enjoying the 9th Salon Stripa at the Student Cultural Centre here in the Serbian capital. Thursday night’s opening was jam-packed with honours to winners of their competitions and to national and international guests, including the talented Italian artists Marco Nizzoli. The festival paid a moving tribute to Sergio Bonelli, the Italian comics publisher who passed away last Monday aged 79. The other Italian guest of the festival, Luca Enoch, could not join us for the opening ceremonies because he was due at Bonelli’s funeral. Bonelli’s imported, translated titles are by far the most popular comics in Serbia, especially Dylan Dog and Zagor. The local publisher here, Happy Thursday (the day when their new comics come out) even runs 30 shops of their own, selling newspaper and other magazines but stocking only their full range of Bonelli comics.
As well as meeting local creators, publishers and experts, I’ve been interviewed about my new book 1001 Comics You Must Read Before You Die for both Politika, the leading quality newspaper here, and for a news agency. Today, Saturday, I’ll be giving an illustrated lecture about Great British Comics at 6pm in the Main Hall, and on Sunday I’ll be explaining the genesis and revealing the list of works that made it into the 1001 Comics book, which is officially available from Monday October 3rd via Amazon.co.uk (and from 25 October from Amazon.com in the US).
The book is unofficially being launched at the Institut Français’s BD & Comics Passion weekend October 7th to 9th in South Kensington, London, in assocation with Comica Festival. Several members of my Team 1001 who helped compile and review this massive global listing will be present and the book will be on sale at the Cosmic Comics Costume Party on Saturday October 8th from 10pm (preceded by a screening of the Barbarella movie). I’m preparing my costume and have already bought some red Wellington boots! Who will you dress up as? And then on Sunday, again tying in with 1001 Comics, I will be debating which creators from the book should be selected as the ‘Five Geniuses Who Transformed Comics Forever’. So which writer / artist / publishers / editor would you pick? It’s sure to be tough choice! Hope to see many of you over this star-packed weekender.
Read The Blog At The Crossroads here.
