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“He
[Héctor Oesterheld] had a literary background and was a great reader, like me
and most of the young people of the time, novelists such as Jack London,
Melville, Conrad, Alexandre Dumas, Jules Verne, Victor Hugo ... And Hector
began, with that same style, to produce his own personal stories…” —
Francisco Solano López, illustrator of the science-fiction comic El
Eternauta
.
by john adcock
MORT CINDER, now released in English for the first time, was written by Héctor
Oesterheld with art by Alberto Breccia. The bookish antiquarian, Ezra Winston
(Breccia was his model) is summoned by supernatural forces to resurrect the
immortal Mort Cinder from the grave. Shell-shocked at this turn of events he
soon turns enthusiastic; there is some nice black humor when the sedate
antiquarian gives in to his violent atavistic impulses against the unsettling
leaden-eyed men who try to prevent the resurrection.
.
Breccia’s
expressive black and white drawings were influenced by Alex Raymond and other
noteworthy illustrative American newspaper cartoonists. Mort Cinder began in
the weekly magazine Misterix in No. 714, July 20, 1962 and ended with No. 800
on March 3, 1964.
Breccia’s Rip
Kirbyish comic art is haunting and unforgettable, panels filled with brilliant light
exploding out of the velvet blackness, sometimes splitting the panels in two,
sometimes erasing the lines where light meets light, as in the cover image shown
above. The only artist I can think of who came close to this spotlight-style of
imagery was Angelo Torres, with his drawings for the Creepy and Eerie horror magazines,
and he was basing them on photographs. Mort Cinder was the creation of an
artist at the peak of his powers, spinning out masterful panels with pen and
ink, brush, acrylic, sponge and paint-spattered razor-blades. Breccia
added grays in wash and tint for effective contrast.
.
Mort Cinder has long
been considered a classic of world comics, widely known in Europe, but inaccessible
to Canadians and Americans. Mort Cinder is brilliant, disordered, and un-nerving narrative fiction pondering timeless questions of death, decay, control and memory. This
timely English edition is highly recommended. Fantagraphics plans further additions
to the magnificent Alberto Breccia Library — Mort Cinder is one for the ages — get them while you can.
MORT CINDER. Héctor Oesterheld and Alberto Breccia, Fantagraphic Books Edition,
November 2018, 224 pages, HERE
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