Death and the Maiden (comic)
Death and the Maiden is a comic series by the Austrian illustrator and story developer Nina Ruzicka . The comic refers to the artistic motif Death and the Maiden found in European visual arts, literature and music since the Renaissance . The comic has been published weekly on the ORF comic pages since 2001 and, after they were discontinued, on the artist's website. It was published in book form in 2005 and 2006 in 3 volumes.
Plot of the first part
The protagonist Mercedes encounters death, depicted as a grim reaper in a robe, while driving a car on a motorway . However, from the earlier encounter she knows his secret, namely that you only die if you address death by name.
Since she humiliates death by escaping, he clings to Mercedes' heels. In the course of the story, a relationship develops between them, which is characterized at the beginning by the constant attempt of death to trick the girl into calling him by name, which would be her death sentence, since in this case he would be allowed to take her with him . In the further course of the story this relationship changes and becomes more emotional, a fragile affection develops, which in some places strongly reminds of a secret love that both of them deny.
people
The central characters of the first part of the story include the two main characters from which the title was given, namely death and the girl, and the “little death” wrapped in a red hoodie with the inscription “YO!”, Which alludes to “ la petite mort “As well as the girl's friend and her light beige VW Beetle , a custom-made product with lowerable rear windows.
In the second part, a group of women appears, supposedly servants of death, who will apparently play an important role in the further story, which is, however, completely unclear and mysterious at the beginning.
style
While the first section of the story contains strong elements of slapstick , with death sometimes being portrayed as extremely clumsy, sometimes even almost clownish , towards the end an increasingly gloomy tone develops, and death takes on the more threatening role of " Soul Harvester ”back.
The comic is full of allusions. Ruzicka borrows leitmotifs and entire scenes, but also hidden small and mostly not directly visible cross-references from the context of classic images, films and stories, for example Ingmar Bergman's film The Seventh Seal . or Ray Bradbury's tale Death and the Maiden. Also in the first volume of her series she draws Lucinda Grenton-Witherspoon as the better half of the old farmer couple from the painting American Gothic by Grant Wood , one of the most quoted modern picture of the world.
She also refers to the tradition of the dance of death in the fine arts, which she mixes with elements of the musical Elisabeth and The Phantom of the Opera , for example when death, pressed into a costume, invites the girl to dance in order to comfort her.
Another example is the Beetle's license plate, D810, which is an allusion to Franz Schubert's string quartet in D minor, called Death and the Maiden . The D stands for the German directory in which all of Schubert's works are listed, and the 810 is the number of the piece. You can also see the " fucking formula " in a speech bubble of death when he learns that Mercedes' friend is cheating.
But she also uses various puns . Mercedes drives a Beetle , which people make a lot of jokes about: “Your name is Mercedes ? Let me guess: your last name is Käfer. Mercedes Beetle! "
In the first part, the strips were largely episodic and self-contained. In the second part, due to the changed release situation, the overall story is in the foreground, so that the punch lines that more or less conclude each strip have taken a back seat.
Release history
For a while, the ORF website published comic series by young and still (quite) unknown cartoonists, including Nina Ruzicka's Death and the Maiden . The corresponding section of the online presence closed at the end of June 2005.
After initial problems in looking for a publisher who was ready to print the work according to their ideas and who also did not claim all licenses and rights of use , the publisher newly founded by Lydia Schönberger found the library where the publication was located Realized the author's wishes accordingly.
At the beginning of September 2005 the first volume of the series was published, which is now out of print. This was followed by the second volume in spring 2006 and the third volume at the end of 2006.
The published volumes contain the plot of the first part of the story, although it has been embellished in some places with new pictures and short page plots in order to make the purchase more interesting on the one hand, but also because the detachment from the strict panel format of the Internet template is a larger one artistic freedom allowed. In addition, some of the storylines were already in the making at the time of publication on the ORF site, but had to be dropped due to the length of the story.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Death and the Maiden. Nina Ruzicka's online comic as an album
- ↑ see in the strip ( memento of the original from October 19, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ http://www.artic.edu/artaccess/AA_Modern/pages/MOD_5_lg.shtml
- ↑ see the strip ( memento of the original from December 25, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ The author on the character of the series ( Memento of the original from December 25, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ The author and the publisher on the search for a publisher and printing ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
