How Did Hal Foster Pick John Cullen Murphy To Draw Prince Valiant



Author(s)	Hal Foster John Cullen Irish potato Cullen Murphy Mairead Irish potato Gray Morrow Wally Wood Gary Gianni Mark Schultz Thomas Yeates
Electric current condition/schedule	Running / weekly
Launch date	Feb 13, 1937
Syndicate(s)	Rex Features Syndicate
Genre(s)	Ballsy historical chance

Prince Valiant in the Days of Rex Arthur , often but called Prince Valiant , is an American comic strip created by Hal Foster in 1937. It is an epic take chances that has told a continuous story during its unabridged history, and the full stretch of that story now totals more than 4000 Sunday strips. The strip appears weekly in more 300 American newspapers, according to its distributor, King Features Syndicate.

Every bit the Duke of Windsor, Edward VIII called Prince Valiant the "greatest contribution to English literature in the past hundred years".^[1] Generally regarded by comics historians as i of the nearly impressive visual creations ever syndicated, the strip is noted for its realistically rendered panoramas and the intelligent, sometimes humorous, narrative.^[2] The format does not employ word balloons. Instead, the story is narrated in captions positioned at the bottom or sides of panels. Events depicted are taken from various time periods, from the late Roman Empire to the High Middle Ages, with a few brief scenes from modern times (commenting on the "manuscript").^[iii]

While drawing the Tarzan comic strip, Foster wanted to practise his ain original newspaper feature, and he began work on a strip he called Derek, Son of Thane , later changing the championship to Prince Arn . Male monarch Features director Joseph Connelly eventually renamed it Prince Valiant. In 1936, after extensive research, Foster pitched his concept to William Randolph Hearst, who had long wanted to distribute a strip by Foster. Hearst was then impressed that he gave Foster buying of the strip.^[i]

Prince Valiant began in total-color tabloid sections on Saturday Feb xiii, 1937. The starting time full page was strip #16, which appeared in the Sun New Orleans Times Picayune. The internal dating changed from Saturday to Dominicus with strip #66 (May 15, 1938). The total-page strip continued until 1971, when strip #1788 was not offered in total-page format—it was the last strip Foster drew. The strip continues today by other artists in a half-folio format.^[three]

Characters and story [edit]

Hal Foster's Prince Valiant (February 26, 1950)

The setting is Arthurian. Valiant (Val) is a Nordic prince from Thule, located about present-24-hour interval Trondheim on the Norwegian coast. Early in the story Valiant arrives at Camelot where he becomes friends with Sir Gawain and Sir Tristram. Earning the respect of King Arthur and Merlin, he becomes a Knight of the Round Table. On a Mediterranean island he meets the beloved of his life, Aleta, Queen of the Misty Isles, whom he later marries. He fights the Huns with his powerful Singing Sword, which, in a 1939 strip, a witch identifies with the legendary sword Flamberge,^[4] a magical blade patently created by the same enchanter who forged Arthur's Excalibur. Val travels to Africa and America and later helps his father regain his lost throne of Thule, which has been usurped past the tyrant Sligon.^[5]

When the strip starts in 1937, Val is five years quondam. The first episodes follow the youth through the wild Fens district of Britain with his father, the deposed King Aguar of Thule. When Val encounters the witch Horrit she predicts he will accept a life of adventure, noting that he will soon experience grief. Arriving home, Val discovers that his mother has died. Not long later this come encounters with Gawain, with gigantic creatures and with the glory of Camelot. Steve Donoghue comments:

At outset, in the earliest months of Prince Valiant, Foster's Arthurian England might easily be confused with the Cimmeria of Conan the Barbarian: monsters grow. As a boy, Val fights a 'dragon' that looks a lot similar a plesiosaur, and he fires his arrows at a rampaging swamp-turtle the size of a Zamboni. Only just a few installments later, this has sublimated somewhat into history: when Val saves his new friend Sir Gawain from a robber knight and Gawain decides to take the villain to Camelot for summary judgement from King Arthur, the whole party is at ane indicate attacked by some other enormous fauna—only this time it'due south a table salt water crocodile!... When they all at length succeed in killing the creature, Val is outraged that Gawain still seeks to accept the man tried earlier King Arthur. The young prince naturally speaks upwardly in his outrage before the not bad rex, his queen Guinevere and his feared wizard Merlin—and then a career at Camelot is born. Val becomes Gawain'south squire and almost immediately accompanies him on a quest, during which Gawain is captured and Val must use his wits—smile and laughing the whole fourth dimension—to free his mentor. On the trip, Gawain is seriously wounded, and the big console where Val finally gets him dorsum to Camelot is Foster's starting time genuine visual bear witness-stopper in the strip.^[6]

Val acquires the Singing Sword in strips from 1938. The original possessor of the Singing Sword is Prince Arn of Ord, Valiant's rival for the maid Ilene. The ii men put aside their differences when Ilene is kidnapped by Viking raiders on her style to Ord. Arn hands Valiant the charmed sword to help him hold dorsum their pursuers while he himself rides ahead to free Ilene. The pair continue in their efforts to rescue Ilene, eventually discovering that she has been killed in a shipwreck. Arn gives the Singing Sword to Valiant after that gamble and the two function as friends. Later in the serial it is mentioned that the Singing Sword is a sis to King Arthur'southward Excalibur.^[five] ^[vi]

In the strips from 1939 Val is knighted by King Arthur, and the following year, he helps to restore his begetter equally King of Thule. Moving across Britain, Europe, and the Holy Country, Val fights invading Goths, Huns and Saxons. In 1946, shortly afterward Val marries Aleta, she is kidnapped by the Viking raider Ulfran. Val's pursuit takes him by the Shetland Islands, the Faroe Islands, Iceland, Greenland, Newfoundland and the Saint Lawrence River, arriving at Niagara Falls ane,000 years earlier Columbus. Defeating Ulfran, Val is reunited with Aleta, and the couple spend that winter with friendly Native Americans.^[5] ^[seven]

In the strip dated August 31, 1947, Prince Arn, their first son, is born in America, and Val celebrates by getting drunkard. The infant Arn is named later Val'due south old friend, Prince Arn of Ord. Val and Aleta'south other children are the twins, Karen and Valeta (born 1951), Galan (1962) and Prince Nathan (1979). Agents of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian abduct Nathan shortly after his nascency, and he is eventually rescued by Arn. Earlier, in strips from 1964, Arn leads an expedition to America. In strips from 1987 Val becomes a grandfather when Arn and his married woman, Maeve, daughter of the traitorous Mordred, requite nascency to Ingrid.^[five] ^[7] ^[eight]

History and myth [edit]

The historical and mythological elements of Prince Valiant were initially chaotic, only shortly Foster attempted to bring the facts into club. Many elements of the story place information technology in the fifth century, such as the death of Attila the Hun in 453 and Geiseric's sacking of Rome in 455, which Prince Valiant and Aleta witness. The murder of Aëtius in 454 differs from the historical version; Valiant and Gawain are blamed for the murder and must flee.

Slightly fantastic elements, similar "marsh monsters" (a dinosaur-like creature) and witches, were nowadays in the early on years but were later on downplayed (as was Merlin's and Morgan le Fay's use of magic), then that by 1942, the story became more realistic.^[iii]

The storyline is by no means historically accurate. While obviously meant to take place during the Afterwards Roman Empire, Foster incorporated anachronistic elements: Viking longships, knights, Muslims, alchemists and technological advances non fabricated before the Renaissance. The fortifications, dresses, armor and armament resemble the High Middle Ages rather than the fifth century.^[three]

Other artists [edit]

Hal Foster's Prince Valiant (June 19, 1938).

In 1970, after tryout strips by several artists, Foster invited John Cullen Murphy to collaborate on the strip.^[five] Here is a list of the transition artists:

#1756 Foster
#1757 Greyness Morrow
#1758 Foster
#1759 Foster
#1760 Murphy
#1761 Foster
#1762 Wally Woods
#1763 Foster
#1764 Irish potato
#1765 Greyness Morrow
#1766 Potato
#1767 Gray Morrow
#1768 Foster
#1769 Murphy
#1770 Gray Morrow
#1771–1772 Tater
#1773 Foster
#1774–1775 Murphy
#1776 Foster
#1777 Gray Morrow
#1778-1779 Murphy
#1780 Greyness Morrow
#1781-1787 Murphy
#1788 Foster (Last)
#1789-3502 Potato

From 1971 on, Spud drew the strip from Foster scripts and pencil sketches. Foster continued to write the continuity until strip #2241 in 1980. Murphy then drew it solo with scripts past his son Cullen Murphy, an editor of The Atlantic. Stories past Cullen Murphy included many adventures in which Val is opposed by the Emperor Justinian. John Cullen Murphy's daughter, Mairead, did the lettering and coloring. In March 2004, Murphy retired and turned the strip over to his called successor, illustrator Gary Gianni. Scripting duties were passed on to Mark Schultz with Scott Roberts providing the coloring.^[3] Schultz connected as the writer when Thomas Yeates began as the strip'south artist on April 1, 2012.

Awards [edit]

Hal Foster was recognized for his piece of work on the strip with the Banshees' Silvery Lady honor in 1952, followed by the National Cartoonists Lodge'due south Reuben Honor in 1957, their Story Comic Strip Honor in 1964, their Special Features Award in 1966 and 1967, the Gilt Key award in 1977, and the Elzie Segar Award in 1978. He was inducted into the Will Eisner Hall of Fame in 1996, and in 2005 he was inducted into the Joe Shuster Canadian Comic Book Creators Hall of Fame for his contributions to comic books. In 2006, Foster was inducted into the Order of Illustrators Hall of Fame. At age 73, Foster was elected to membership in Not bad Britain'due south Royal Society of Arts, an laurels given to very few Americans.

Murphy received the National Cartoonists Social club Story Comic Strip Honor for his work on the strip in 1971, 1974, 1976, 1978, 1984 and 1987. In 1995, the strip was one of twenty included in the Comic Strip Classics series of commemorative postage stamps.

Reprints [edit]

Hastings Business firm produced seven hardback Prince Valiant books in the 1950s, using the illustrations by Foster but with the text simplified by Max Trell and for the last two books by James Flowers. This serial was reprinted in Federal republic of germany every bit Prinz Eisenherz (Prince Ironheart) and connected at that place for an additional v volumes.
Nostalgia Press published four hardback reprints in conjunction with King Features. Some entire panels were colored solid pink or solid majestic.
Prince Valiant: An American Epic, from Manuscript Press, reprinted the first three years in 3 volumes, in the full original color and full page size. They also published a hardback jitney of the three years, in a limited edition of 26 copies ISBN 0-936414-09-X, and a print of Hal Foster's last Prince Valiant page, so that all Foster pages would be available in total page format.
Fantagraphics published a set of l trade paperbacks reprinting all of the strips written past Hal Foster, including those drawn by John Cullen Irish potato.
Andrews McMeel published Prince Valiant: Far from Camelot, the only collection of creators Gary Gianni and Marker Schultz'due south current strips, dating from November 21, 2004, to May 11, 2008.
A French reprinting of all the Foster-drawn strips was published by Editions Zenda in a greenish cloth, embossed hardcover serial with dustjacket. Featuring two years' worth of strips per book, it was printed from the original color pages with typeset lettering.
Prince Valiant has oft been reprinted in comic books. Feature Book #26 reprints most of the first year of the strip, and is the only comic book to have an original embrace past Hal Foster. Many Foster strips were reprinted in the pages of Ace Comics and Rex Comics. Non reprints are vii Dell 4-color Prince Valiant comic books (#567, 650, 699, 719, 788, 848, 900) drawn by Bob Fujitani,^[nine] writer unknown. A 1973 Prince Valiant comic book reprinted Foster art with a simplified text intended to teach reading to children.
Prince Valiant by Fantagraphics Books. A hardcover collection of the comic strip in full color, published since 2009. In 2018 they completed their reprint of all the Prince Valiant pages drawn by Hal Foster in eighteen volumes. This excluded his work for page 2000, published on June 8, 1975. By 2021 they plan to finish reprinting all the pages written and penciled by Foster, drawn by John Cullen Murphy, which began with Volume 19. The Dutch edition was published by Silvester Strips in a translation past comic strip artist Marker van Broekhoven.

Picture show and Television adaptations [edit]

Prince Valiant is a 1954 Us motion moving-picture show past 20th Century Flim-flam, filmed in colour and Cinemascope. Directed by Henry Hathaway, it starred James Mason, Robert Wagner (in the title role), Janet Leigh and Sterling Hayden. The film was likewise adapted into a comic book.
Prince Valiant too appeared in the episode "Terror in Time" of Defenders of the Earth.
The Legend of Prince Valiant, a 1991 animated US television series seen on The Family Channel in the US and CBBC in the United kingdom, is available on DVD.^[ten]
Prince Valiant is a 1997 UK/Ireland/Deutschland movie starring Stephen Moyer, Katherine Heigl, Thomas Kretschmann, Edward Play tricks, Joanna Lumley and Ron Perlman. The soundtrack of the motion picture score by David Bergeaud was released February 20, 2003 on Perseverance Records.

Other media [edit]

The Medieval Castle (1957) nerveless the comic strip which ran beneath Prince Valiant from April 23, 1944 - November 18, 1945 ^[xi] as a result of the government'due south WWII request that syndicates reduce strip size to salve newspaper for the war effort. The three-panel strip followed the adventures of two immature English squires, Arn and Guy, during the First Cause.

In addition to two Prince Valiant phonograph records (released in 1947 and 1968) and 3 coloring books, Treasure Books published a modest 1954 children's book with Foster fine art in color.
Marvel Comics published a four-office miniseries titled Prince Valiant in the 1990s.
Bastei in Germany published a 6-event series titled Die Legende von Prinz Eisenherz in 1994, based on the blithe TV series.
Chaosium produced a Prince Valiant: The Story-Telling Game part-playing game.^[12] ^[13] In 1999, Pyramid magazine named the Prince Valiant Role-playing Game as i of "The Millennium's Most Underrated Games". Editor Scott Haring commented, "Prince Valiant was designed every bit a beginner'southward introduction to roleplaying... Perhaps the subject matter'south perceived lack of 'cool' killed this game, but it deserved better."^[xiv] In 2016, Stewart Wieck used crowdfunding platform Kickstarter to reprint the game.^[15]

Cultural references [edit]

The "Prince Valiant" haircut, a variant of the pageboy resembling Val'southward, was once popular, especially for children.
Harvey Kurtzman and Wally Wood satirized the strip with Prince Vehement in Mad #13 (July 1954), which ends in Fierce losing his page-male child haircut to "the fair maid Alota" in the best of all causes.
Prince Valiant once used the guise of a demon, and that costume was an inspiration to Jack Kirby for his character Etrigan the Demon.^[16] The same panel likewise inspired the Italian creative team EsseGesse on their comic series Kinowa.
Bugs Bunny parodied the strip in Prince Tearing (renamed Prince Varmint for television set release) with Bugs defending a castle confronting Viking raider Yosemite Sam.
In the Academy Award-winning short Knighty Knight Bugs, King Arthur sends court jester Bugs to recover the Singing Sword from the Black Knight, portrayed past Yosemite Sam in blackness armor.
Dave Sim did a weekly Prince Valiant parody, Silverspoon, in The Buyer's Guide to Comics Fandom. The strip employed Foster's illustrations-with-captions format. Sim's comic volume serial Cerebus the Aardvark besides contained a Prince Valiant parody with illustrations/captions.
In the K*A*S*H Flavour 4 episode The Price of Tomato plant Juice Hawkeye tells Radar that he will help him out of a jam as he, Hawkeye, is "a man raised on the legend of Prince Valiant."
A 1985 effect of Mad had a recurring department, "The Nasty File", billed as "Snippets that were considered as well insulting to publish!" One such "file" was on Phil Donahue, noting that he had his pilus done by the same famous hairdresser who "beautified Prince Valiant, Pete Rose and Lassie".
In Spaceballs, role player Jim J. Bullock plays Prince Valium, the consistently sleepy suitor of Princess Vespa (Daphne Zuniga), whom Vespa leaves at the altar.
In Who Framed Roger Rabbit, the main character, Eddie Valiant, used a singing sword against Guess Doom. The sword was drawn as Frank Sinatra singing "Witchcraft", a play on the name of the sword.
In Beetlejuice, Lydia (Winona Ryder) tells Adam and Barbara (Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis) that her stepmother (Catherine O'Hara), who is shown in a semi-drugged daze, is "sleeping with Prince Valium."
In that location is a street sharing the grapheme's proper name; a Prince Valiant Courtroom exists in Franklin, Tennessee (Usa).
"Valiant", the 2nd episode in the first serial of the BBC's Merlin, features a Knight Valiant played by Volition Mellor who dishonourably uses an enchanted shield and dies in a duel with Arthur during the tournament finale.
Richard Marcinko in his autobiographical work Rogue Warrior notes that one of his men was given the call sign "Prince Valiant", or PV for curt, as he had a hairstyle like the comic'south protagonist.
From "Death of the Island Doctor", the terminal of Gene Wolfe'due south iv "doctor—death—island" stories: "And then he asked the boyfriend if he knew where Thule was. 'It's where Prince Valiant comes from'"^[17]
Prince Valiant and Wink Gordon appear on the embrace of the October 2009 Comics Revue, fatigued by Mark Schultz.
In the Albert Brooks film Defending Your Life, Meryl Streep'due south character discovers that in a previous lifetime she was Prince Valiant. No explanation is given for why the characters believe that Prince Valiant was an actual person and non a comic creation.
In the Adam Sandler film Composite, the tomboyish girl is referred to equally looking like Prince Valiant.
In Kevin Smith's movie Jay and Silent Bob Strike Dorsum, Jay calls Brent "Prince Valiant" in reference to his hair.

References [edit]

^ ^a ^b Syracuse University: Hal Foster Papers.
^ "Beautifully drawn, the strip was an exciting re-cosmos of the period, rich with carefully researched details of armor, dwellings, and scenery.', Encyclopædia Britannica
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e Goldberg, Todd and Carl Horak, edited by Don Markstein and Rick Norwood. A Prince Valiant Companion. Manuscript Press. ISBN 0-936414-07-three
^ Foster, Hal. Prince Valiant, Page 92, console 7. Prince Valiant Annotations.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^east Markstein, Don. Toonopedia: Prince Valiant
^ ^a ^b "Donoghue, Steve. Open up Letters Monthly, "Prince of a Lost Realm"". Archived from the original on 2019-03-23. Retrieved 2010-09-eighteen .
^ ^a ^b Bayly, Michael. "Valiant Prince Turns 50". Canberra Times, Apr 1987.
^ The Characters
^ Prince Valiant, blogg by Roger Schaeder at [ane] (Rogersmagasin.com 2021-08-29)
^ Carter, R. J. "DVD Review: The Legend of Prince Valiant: The Complete Series, Vol. 1," July seven, 2006. Archived March xv, 2009, at the Wayback Machine
^ Holtz, Allan (2012). American Paper Comics: An Encyclopedic Reference Guide. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Printing. p. 258. ISBN9780472117567.
^ Stafford, Greg, Krank, Charlie, Willis, Lynn and Dunn, William G., Prince Valiant: The Story-telling Game, Chaosium, Albany, 1989, illustrations by Hal Foster and John Cullen Murphy, 128 pp. soft cov., ISBN 0-933635-50-8
^ "RPGnet entry: Prince Valiant". RPGnet.
^ Haring, Scott D. (1999-11-25). "Second Sight: The Millennium's Most Influential Company and The Millennium'due south Nigh Underrated Game". Pyramid (Online) . Retrieved 2008-02-17 .
^ https://world wide web.kickstarter.com/projects/1861515217/prince-valiant-storytelling-game-past-greg-stafford
^ The Demon – Don Markstein'due south Toonopedia
^ Factor Wolfe, "The Wolfe Archipelago", Ziesing Brothers, 1983, ISBN 978-0-917488-13-9

Sources [edit]

Hal Foster: Prince of Illustrators by Brian M. Kane, Vanguard Productions, 2001. IPPY Honour-winning biography of Hal Foster. ISBN i-887591-25-7
A Prince Valiant Companion by Todd Goldberg and Carl Horak, edited past Don Markstein and Rick Norwood, Manuscript Press. ISBN 0-936414-07-iii
The Definitive Prince Valiant Companion compiled by Brian M. Kane, Fantagraphics Books, 2009. ISBN 978-i-60699-305-vii
The Prince Valiant Folio by Gary Gianni, Flesk Publications, 2008. ISBN 978-1-933865-04-i

External links [edit]

Prince Valiant on Comics Kingdom
A Prince Named Valiant: A celebration of the finest work ever produced in the comic fine art medium
Prince Valiant Resource Center
King Features: Prince Valiant
Foster biography past Brian Kane
Fable of Prince Valiant Forum
IMDb: Prince Valiant (1954)
IMDb:The Legend of Prince Valiant (1991)
IMDb: Prince Valiant (1997)