Great Story, Superbly Presented
I Suspect many people will buy this because they already know the artist, as well as the story. Over the years since this, and many other stories by Barks, have appeared, they have come in many formats, of which the best is the COLLECTED WORKS OF CARL BARKS, and now this series, including this title, comes in a nicely done cover, with Library quality paper. I have copies of this in a previous incarnation of the GLADSTONE prints, prior to the Publishers going bust. Thankfully, someone has realised that these titles are being bought by Adults who could not afford the collected works, but who wanted a title done in a collectable format that would last. Way too many versions of this title published since the late 50's and again in the 70s have been done on poor quality paper, and were priced accordingly.
This Ancient Persia title works well in this comic format, however, some of the titles occurred originally in a strip format, and suffer when transferred to the comic page format. However, I managed to get some of these titles in a "hard" cover binding that preserved the strip ratio, without resorting to the comic page ratio that was edited with apparently little thought ( these editions in original strip format came out about 1982-84, and as far as I am aware are not currently available anywhere... so I hope someone can examine some of the original formats, and see what best goes back to the strip format).
Enjoy ANCIENT PERSIA, if you read the original story years ago, this will echo beautifully in your mind in this lovely high quality paper print edition.
Another deep dive into our murky minds
Carl Barks is to little known in the US; in my homecountry of Sweden he is a minor deity on the other hand. Whole generations of Swedes have grown up reading his fantastic tales about Donald Duck, his nephews, Gyro Gearlose, and Scrooge McDuck.
Barks himself never understodd his own greatness. He thought that he only wrote dime-a-dozen stories for kids. Yet, once you are hooked on Barks you read him also as an adult - the genius is so obvious.
On the surface this is a simple adventure tale with comic interludes, but lurking beneath is fear and madness. This is perhaps his darkest tale. Set in an ancient Persian royal tomb. The cramped corridor, where the darkness waits just outside the circle of the torches gives a claustrophobic feel, which follows us throughout the story.
One moment the professor appears rational and sane, then he is revealed to be an insane megalomaniac. While the antics of the resurrected royal family are funny, there, again, are traces of hysteria and mental unbalance.
In the end they are so disgusted by the modern ways that they voluntarily seek oblivion in death. Donald Duck survives only by dying and being resurrected several times.
The tale is funny, but it also gives the impression that the artist had far darker things in mind when he wrote it: this was the fifties, we were living in fear of the atom bomb, and what else the scientists were dreaming up in their laboratories. The tunnels and darkness are our feeling of insecurity in a world bordering on war, and our helplessness to prevent it.
