Georges Colomb
Encyclopedia
Georges Colomb was a French botanist, science populariser, and France's pioneering bande dessinée artist. He has been credited as the "inventor of comic strips".
Under the pseudonym Christophe (playing on "Christophe Colomb", the French name for Columbus
), Colomb created comics that were popular among the French intelligentsia
, yet were published in Le Petit Français illustré
, a children's paper. His popular L'idée fixe du savant Cosinus (1893–1899) featured a brilliant, absent-minded scientist. His other comics included La Famille Fenouillard (probably the first French comic, 1889); La Sapeur Camembert (1890–1896); Les Malices de Plick et Plock (1893–1904); and Le Baron de Cramoisy (1899).
Colomb's works were comic sketches exploring the quirks of his title characters. Images to him were more vital than words in communicating with children (the dialogue and Colombe's editorial remarks were always outside the picture frame). His frames have been said to anticipate the "visual grammar" of movies and television.
Colomb was Deputy Director of the Sorbonne
's botanical laboratory. Novelist Marcel Proust
was a famous student of Colomb, and seems to have taken an interest in botany from him—Proust's À la recherche du temps perdu (In Search of Lost Time) presents botanical knowledge and speculation to such an extent that botany "constitutes an alternative lens through which the human world of the novel can be viewed."
Under the pseudonym Christophe (playing on "Christophe Colomb", the French name for Columbus
Christopher Columbus
Christopher Columbus was an explorer, colonizer, and navigator, born in the Republic of Genoa, in northwestern Italy. Under the auspices of the Catholic Monarchs of Spain, he completed four voyages across the Atlantic Ocean that led to general European awareness of the American continents in the...
), Colomb created comics that were popular among the French intelligentsia
Intelligentsia
The intelligentsia is a social class of people engaged in complex, mental and creative labor directed to the development and dissemination of culture, encompassing intellectuals and social groups close to them...
, yet were published in Le Petit Français illustré
Le Petit Français illustré
Le Petit Français illustré was a French newspaper for schoolchildren established in 1889, consisting mainly of soap-opera-like stories...
, a children's paper. His popular L'idée fixe du savant Cosinus (1893–1899) featured a brilliant, absent-minded scientist. His other comics included La Famille Fenouillard (probably the first French comic, 1889); La Sapeur Camembert (1890–1896); Les Malices de Plick et Plock (1893–1904); and Le Baron de Cramoisy (1899).
Colomb's works were comic sketches exploring the quirks of his title characters. Images to him were more vital than words in communicating with children (the dialogue and Colombe's editorial remarks were always outside the picture frame). His frames have been said to anticipate the "visual grammar" of movies and television.
Colomb was Deputy Director of the Sorbonne
Sorbonne
The Sorbonne is an edifice of the Latin Quarter, in Paris, France, which has been the historical house of the former University of Paris...
's botanical laboratory. Novelist Marcel Proust
Marcel Proust
Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust was a French novelist, critic, and essayist best known for his monumental À la recherche du temps perdu...
was a famous student of Colomb, and seems to have taken an interest in botany from him—Proust's À la recherche du temps perdu (In Search of Lost Time) presents botanical knowledge and speculation to such an extent that botany "constitutes an alternative lens through which the human world of the novel can be viewed."