To The Last Page

The third volume of the complete adventures of Corto Maltese - surely the greatest comic book creation ever in terms of its scope and the brilliance of Hugo Pratt's illustrations - neatly brings the adventurer from one side of the world to the other. Having learned in Peru that in Nonni e Fiabe  (at the end of Volume 2 of the collected Corto Maltese ) that there is a map in Venice detailing the location of the legendary city of El Dorado, the next story L'angelo della finestra d'oriente takes Corto to Venice while Europe is in the middle of war. The lust for gold however is not confined to El Dorado, but is chased by an Austrian army officer and it seems half of the nations of Europe in Sotto la bandiera dell'oro . Money doesn't just make the world go around, it keeps wars going. The white man's madness however extends further than Europe, this volume also taking in Corto's travel to Abyssinia where his guide and colleague Cush also finds that the lust for...

Many of the early stories collected in Volume 2 of the complete Corto Maltese have a feverish quality, taking place in the tropics, in the Amazon, in South American jungles, Caribbean islands and British Honduras. Corto's companion on most of these adventures is Professor Jeremiah Steiner, an academic with interest in the arcane, who has a habit of getting drunk and in trouble, as well as finding ways to open doorways to adventure, hidden treasure and mystical lands. The stories are relatively short, but they cover a lot of adventure, with native uprisings, pirates, witches, headhunters, voodoo rituals, slave traders, German steamships in the jungle and deadly female adversaries. The stories present a great variety of settings and action, and Pratt's black-and-white artwork and page layouts are of his very best, creating atmosphere and character in fluid brushstrokes, detailed where necessary, experimenting occasionally with darker, abstract blocks of ink. It's impossible n...

La Giovinezza (1981) I wasn't keen on opening the Corto Maltese l'integrale complete Italian language Corto Maltese collection with a later work as it's far from Hugo Pratt's best work, but chronologically I suppose it belongs at the start. A short introduction by Corto relates how he was a friend of Jack London in Manchuria during the 1904/1905 Russo-Japanese war and it was there that he first encountered Rasputin, who makes his 'first appearance' with a series of typically senseless killings. The war is nearing an end, but one of the Siberian regiment is not ready to put down his arms. Rasputin is introduced immediately as ruthless and challenging of authority not out of principle but it's in his nature. He intends to join up with other like minded rebels and head for the coast, but since he doesn't make himself likeable to the Japanese either - nor indeed anyone - he doesn't get too far. The famous adventure writer Jack London however makes arran...

I've read and admired Hugo Pratt's work on the Corto Maltese series for a long time recognising it as one of the greatest creations of comic art. Unfortunately, English editions have been randomly produced over the years, with little sense of continuity and variations in quality, and quickly go out of print. Some have been colourised with approval of Pratt, but even some black and white editions in an effort to make them more accessible have been reformated for pocket editions, cropping artwork and frames. None of this has taken away greatly from the brilliance of Hugo Pratt's artwork and creation, but I always felt like I wasn't getting the full experience. Having only previously read a few Dylan Dog adventures in Italian while on holiday, I sampled a few of the Italian eBook editions of Corto Maltese: ( Vudù per il Presidente ,  Concerto in O' minore per arpa e nitroglierina ,  Le Elevetiche Rosa Alchemica   to see how readable they were, and found that with aid...