What is a comic book, graphic novel, manga? What are great comics for first-time readers? Discover the universe of children’s comics while enjoying vave.casino.
From Snoopy to Marsupilami, from Son Goku to Lucky Luke – many, many comic characters are world-famous precisely because comics are extremely popular all over the world. After all, picture stories offer a very unique, intense reading experience, and their comic book heroes often achieve downright cult status. Simultaneous storytelling with pictures and text is sophisticated and a special kind of art that fascinates children and adults alike. For children, comics also create a great transition from picture books to pure text books. They motivate reading and promote a positive perception of books.
Picture stories have been around forever. Even in ancient times, sequences of pictures were painted to depict certain actions or events. Such comic-like picture series exist from the most diverse epochs and everywhere in the world, for example in tombs, churches, monasteries or on tapestries. In part, these historical images were also already provided with banners. Later, they evolved into speech bubbles. Today, comics, mangas and graphic novels are everywhere, have huge circulations and world-famous heroes. You probably grew up with comic heroes like Donald Duck, Asterix and Obelix, Peanuts, Lucky Luke, Tintin or the DC and Marvel Heroes. Their stories can be funny or action-packed, serious or dramatic, romantic or otherwise.
WHAT ARE COMICS?
Some call comics an art form in their own right, others a genre of literature, still others a medium in its own right. Accordingly, there is no exact definition of comics that even academics would be satisfied with. We don’t see things quite so narrowly, however, and refer to comics simply as “pictorial history”. Or in other words: a comic arranges pictures in a narrative order. Typical elements are picture frames (panel frames), the use of speech and thought bubbles as well as onomatopoeia (“knock”, “hammer”, “rrrring”) and the appearance in booklet form. Stylized figures and the combination of image and text are also considered characteristic. Many comics are designed as ‘infinite’ ongoing series with non-aging comic heroes. Historically, today’s comic goes back to a long tradition of picture stories in Europe and America. Just think of Wilhelm Busch’s “Max and Moritz.” Today’s form and distribution of comics as the first pictorial mass medium in history, however, has its origins in the printing of comic strips in American daily newspapers. They also coined the term “comic”. A real boom and a focus on the target group of children and young people then broke out at the end of the 1930s with comics about superheroes.
WHAT TO KNOW ABOUT MANGAS
While the Japanese use the term “manga” for all forms of comics, in the Western world mangas are primarily understood as Japanese comics. Among other things, they are characterized by characters with unusually large eyes, long, thick hair, little text, and cinematic storytelling. Manhuas are comics from China based on them, manhwas the corresponding comics from Korea. Mangas are usually read from right to left and are largely black and white throughout. Incidentally, the term “manga” was first used in the early 19th century by the woodblock artist Katsushika Hokusai. Since then, this comic form has developed into the largest comic market in the world. Today there are mangas for every age, mangas especially for boys and men (Shonen Manga) or for girls and women (Shojo Manga). Thematically, too, all sorts of things can be found in the often long and complex stories: Everyday problems as well as science fiction, action, mystery, romance, but also horror or eroticism. That’s why you should pay attention to the age recommendation when choosing manga for children and take a look in advance.
