Hugo Pratt
Encyclopedia
Hugo Eugenio Pratt was an Italian
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 comic book creator
Comic book creator
A comic book creator is someone who creates a comic book or graphic novel.The production of a comic book by one of the major comic book companies in the U.S...

 who was known for combining strong storytelling with extensive historical research on works such as Corto Maltese
Corto Maltese
Corto Maltese is a comics series featuring an eponymous character, a complex sailor-adventurer. It was created by Italian comic book creator Hugo Pratt in 1967...

. He was inducted into the Will Eisner Award Hall of Fame in 2005.

Early years

Born in Rimini in Romagna
Romagna
Romagna is an Italian historical region that approximately corresponds to the south-eastern portion of present-day Emilia-Romagna. Traditionally, it is limited by the Apennines to the south-west, the Adriatic to the east, and the rivers Reno and Sillaro to the north and west...

 to Rolando Pratt and Evelina Genero, Hugo Pratt spent all his childhood in Venice
Venice
Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...

 in a very cosmopolitan family environment. His paternal grandfather Joseph was of English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 origin, while his maternal grandfather was a Marrano
Marrano
Marranos were Jews living in the Iberian peninsula who converted to Christianity rather than be expelled but continued to observe rabbinic Judaism in secret...

 Jew and his maternal grandmother was of Turkish
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

 origin. He was also related to the actor Boris Karloff
Boris Karloff
William Henry Pratt , better known by his stage name Boris Karloff, was an English actor.Karloff is best remembered for his roles in horror films and his portrayal of Frankenstein's monster in Frankenstein , Bride of Frankenstein , and Son of Frankenstein...

, whose birth name was William Henry Pratt. In 1937, Hugo Pratt moved with his mother to Abyssinia (Ethiopia
Ethiopia
Ethiopia , officially known as the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a country located in the Horn of Africa. It is the second-most populous nation in Africa, with over 82 million inhabitants, and the tenth-largest by area, occupying 1,100,000 km2...

), joining his father who was working there following the conquest of that country by Benito Mussolini
Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini was an Italian politician who led the National Fascist Party and is credited with being one of the key figures in the creation of Fascism....

's Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

. Pratt's father, a professional Italian soldier, was captured in 1941 by British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 troops and in late 1942, died from disease as a prisoner of war. The same year, Hugo Pratt and his mother were interned in a prison camp at Dirédaoua
Dire Dawa
Dire Dawa is one of two chartered cities in Ethiopia . This chartered city is divided administratively into two woredas, the city proper and the non-urban woreda of Gurgura....

 where he would buy comics from guards and later was sent back to Italy by the Red Cross. In 1944, he was at risk of being executed as SS troops had mistaken him for a South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

n spy.

After the war, Pratt moved to Venice where he organized entertainment for the Allied troops. Later Pratt joined the 'Venice Group' with other Italian cartoonists, including Alberto Ongaro
Alberto Ongaro
-Biography:Born in Venice, he lived for a long time in South America and England, before returning to his birth city in 1979.A friend and collaborator of Hugo Pratt, he also worked for Il Corriere dei Piccoli...

 and Mario Faustinelli
Mario Faustinelli
Mario Faustinelli was an Italian comic book artist and editor.Faustinelli was born in Venice in 1924. After the end of World War II, Faustinelli, along with artists Hugo Pratt, Ivo Pavone, and Dino Battaglia, moved to Argentina in search of work; they became known as the "Venice Group." In 1945...

. Their magazine Asso di Picche, launched in 1945 as Albo Uragano, concentrated on adventure comics. The magazine scored some success and published works by young talents like Dino Battaglia
Dino Battaglia
Dino Battaglia was an Italian comic artist, noted for a distinctive and expressive style, best known for his visual adaptations of classic novels.-Biography:...

, Rinaldo D'Ami and Giorgio Bellavitis. His character Asso di Picche ("Ace of Spades") was a success, mainly in Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

, where Pratt was invited in 1949.

Argentine years

In the late 1940s, he moved to Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...

 where he worked for Argentine publisher Editorial Abril and met Argentine comics artists like José Luis Salinas, Alberto Breccia
Alberto Breccia
Alberto Breccia was an Uruguay-born Argentine comics artist and writer.-Biography:Born in Montevideo, Uruguay, Breccia moved with his parents to Buenos Aires, Argentina when he was three years old...

 and Solano López. The passage to Editorial Frontera saw the publication of some of his most important early series. These included Junglemen (written by Ongaro), Sgt. Kirk, Ernie Pike
Ernie Pike
Ernie Pike is a comics series written by Héctor Germán Oesterheld and originally drawn by Hugo Pratt, featuring a World War II and Korean War reporter. It was first published in the magazine "Hora Cero" in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1957. The reporter, loosely based on the real reporter Ernie...

and Ticonderoga. They were all written by Héctor Germán Oesterheld
Héctor Germán Oesterheld
Héctor Germán Oesterheld , also known as his common abbreviation HGO, was an Argentine journalist and writer of graphic novels and comics who has come to be celebrated as a master in his field....

, one of the major writers of Argentine and perhaps world comics. Pratt taught drawing in the Escuela Panamericana de Arte directed by Enrique Lipszyc. He often travelled to South America
South America
South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...

n destinations like the Amazon
Amazon Basin
The Amazon Basin is the part of South America drained by the Amazon River and its tributaries that drains an area of about , or roughly 40 percent of South America. The basin is located in the countries of Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Peru, and Venezuela...

 and Mato Grosso
Mato Grosso
Mato Grosso is one of the states of Brazil, the third largest in area, located in the western part of the country.Neighboring states are Rondônia, Amazonas, Pará, Tocantins, Goiás and Mato Grosso do Sul. It also borders Bolivia to the southwest...

. During that period he produced his first comic book as a complete author, both writing and illustrating Anna della jungla ("Ann of the Jungle"), which was followed by the similar Capitan Cormorant and Wheeling
Fort Wheeling
Fort Wheeling, or simply Wheeling, is the title of a comics series set in colonial North America, by Italian comics creator Hugo Pratt.-Publication history:Wheeling first appeared in the Argentine comics magazine Misterix in 1962...

. The latter was completed after his return to Italy.

Return to Italy and the creation of Corto Maltese

From the summer of 1959 to the summer of 1960, Pratt lived in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

 where he drew a series of war comics for Fleetway Publications
Fleetway
Fleetway, also known as Fleetway Publications and Fleetway Editions, was a UK publishing company which mainly produced comic magazines. For a time owned by IPC Media, they are now a division of Egmont Publishing....

, with British scriptwriters. He then returned to Argentina, despite the harsh economic times there. From there, he moved again to Italy in 1962 where he started a collaboration with the children's comic book magazine Il Corriere dei Piccoli, for which he adapted several classics of adventure literature, including Treasure Island
Treasure Island
Treasure Island is an adventure novel by Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson, narrating a tale of "pirates and buried gold". First published as a book on May 23, 1883, it was originally serialized in the children's magazine Young Folks between 1881–82 under the title Treasure Island; or, the...

and Kidnapped
Kidnapped (novel)
Kidnapped is a historical fiction adventure novel by the Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson. Written as a "boys' novel" and first published in the magazine Young Folks from May to July 1886, the novel has attracted the praise and admiration of writers as diverse as Henry James, Jorge Luis...

by Robert Louis Stevenson
Robert Louis Stevenson
Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson was a Scottish novelist, poet, essayist and travel writer. His best-known books include Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde....

.

In 1967, Pratt met Florenzo Ivaldi, and with him created a comics magazine named after his character, Sgt. Kirk, the hero first written by Héctor Oesterheld. In the first issue, Pratt's most famous story was published: Una ballata del mare salato (A Ballad of the Salt Sea), which introduced his best known character, Corto Maltese
Corto Maltese
Corto Maltese is a comics series featuring an eponymous character, a complex sailor-adventurer. It was created by Italian comic book creator Hugo Pratt in 1967...

.

Corto's series continued three years later in the French magazine Pif
Pif gadget
Pif Gadget was a French comic magazine for children that ran from 1969 to 1993 and 2004 to 2009. Its audience peaked in the early 1970s.-History:Created as an outlet of the French Communist Party, it was initially entitled Le Jeune Patriote...

. Due to his rather mixed family ancestry, Pratt had learned snippets of things like kabbalism and lots of history. Many of his stories are placed in real historical eras and deal with real events: the 1755 war between French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 and British colonists in Ticonderoga
Fort Ticonderoga
Fort Ticonderoga, formerly Fort Carillon, is a large 18th-century fort built by the Canadians and the French at a narrows near the south end of Lake Champlain in upstate New York in the United States...

, colonial wars in Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...

 and both World War
World war
A world war is a war affecting the majority of the world's most powerful and populous nations. World wars span multiple countries on multiple continents, with battles fought in multiple theaters....

s, for example. Pratt did exhaustive research for factual and visual details, and some characters are real historical figures or loosely based on them, like Corto's main opponent, Rasputin. Many of the minor characters cross over into other stories in a way that places all of Pratt’s stories into the same continuum.

Pratt's main series in the second part of his career include Gli scorpioni del deserto (five stories) and Jesuit Joe
Jesuit Joe
Jesuit Joe is a mysterious character who appears in the eponymous story of Italian comics creator Hugo Pratt. This graphic novel was initially serialised in Pilote, before it was released as hardcover albums in 1980, in France entitled Jésuite Joe, and in Italy, entitled L'uomo del grande nord,...

. He also wrote stories for his friend and pupil Milo Manara
Milo Manara
Maurilio Manara – known professionally as Milo Manara – is an Italian comic book writer and artist, best known for his erotic approach to the medium.-Career:...

 for Tutto ricominciò con un'estate indiana and El Gaucho.

Later years

From 1970 to 1984, Pratt lived mainly in France where Corto Maltese, a psychologically very complex character resulting from the travel experiences and the endless inventive capacity of his author, became the main character of a comics series. Initially published from 1970 to 1973 by the magazine Pif gadget, it brought him much popular and critical success. Later published in album format, this series was eventually translated into fifteen languages.

From 1984 to 1995 Pratt lived in Switzerland
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

 where the international success that Corto Maltese sparked continued to grow. In France, most of his pre-Corto Maltese works were published in several album editions by publishers such as Casterman, Dargaud, and Humanoides Associés. A wanderer by nature, Hugo Pratt continued to travel from Canada to Patagonia, from Africa to the Pacific area. He died of cancer on 20 August 1995.

Pratt has cited authors like Robert Louis Stevenson
Robert Louis Stevenson
Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson was a Scottish novelist, poet, essayist and travel writer. His best-known books include Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde....

, James Oliver Curwood
James Oliver Curwood
James Oliver Curwood was an American novelist and conservationist. His writing studio, Curwood Castle, is now a museum in Owosso, Michigan.-Biography and career:Curwood was born in Owosso, the youngest of four children...

, Zane Gray, Kenneth Roberts, Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad was a Polish-born English novelist.Conrad is regarded as one of the great novelists in English, although he did not speak the language fluently until he was in his twenties...

, Fenimore Cooper, Herman Melville
Herman Melville
Herman Melville was an American novelist, short story writer, essayist, and poet. He is best known for his novel Moby-Dick and the posthumous novella Billy Budd....

 and Jack London
Jack London
John Griffith "Jack" London was an American author, journalist, and social activist. He was a pioneer in the then-burgeoning world of commercial magazine fiction and was one of the first fiction writers to obtain worldwide celebrity and a large fortune from his fiction alone...

 as influences, along with cartoonists Lyman Young
Lyman Young
Lyman W. Young was an American cartoonist who created the strip Tim Tyler's Luck. His younger brother, Chic Young, was the creator of Blondie....

, Will Eisner
Will Eisner
William Erwin "Will" Eisner was an American comics writer, artist and entrepreneur. He is considered one of the most important contributors to the development of the medium and is known for the cartooning studio he founded; for his highly influential series The Spirit; for his use of comics as an...

, and especially Milton Caniff
Milton Caniff
Milton Arthur Paul Caniff was an American cartoonist famous for the Terry and the Pirates and Steve Canyon comic strips.-Biography:...

.

On Friday, July 15, 2005, at San Diego Comic-Con's 17th Annual Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards
Eisner Award
The Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards, commonly shortened to the Eisner Awards, and sometimes referred to as the Oscar Awards of the Comics Industry, are prizes given for creative achievement in American comic books. The Eisner Awards were first conferred in 1988, created in response to the...

, he was one of four professionals that year inducted into the Comic Book Hall of Fame.

One of the series created by Pratt, entitled "The Scorpions of the Desert" in English, has been continued after Pratt's death. In 2005 a sixth volume in this series was released, drawn by Pierre Wazeem and entitled "Le chemin de fièvre". A seventh album was scheduled by the French publishers Casterman for release in March 2008. Casterman have also on several occasions hinted at the possible future release of a further episode in the Corto Maltese saga.

Main works

  • Asso di Picche (L'As de pique, Ace of Spades, 1945–1949)
  • El Sargento Kirk (Sgt. Kirk, 1953–1959), written by Héctor Oesterheld
  • Ticonderoga (1957–1958), written by Héctor Oesterheld
  • Ernie Pike
    Ernie Pike
    Ernie Pike is a comics series written by Héctor Germán Oesterheld and originally drawn by Hugo Pratt, featuring a World War II and Korean War reporter. It was first published in the magazine "Hora Cero" in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1957. The reporter, loosely based on the real reporter Ernie...

    (1957–1959), written by Héctor Oesterheld
  • Ann y Dan (Anna nella giungla, "Ann of the Jungle", Ann de la jungle, 1959)
  • Capitan Cormorant (1962)
  • Wheeling
    Fort Wheeling
    Fort Wheeling, or simply Wheeling, is the title of a comics series set in colonial North America, by Italian comics creator Hugo Pratt.-Publication history:Wheeling first appeared in the Argentine comics magazine Misterix in 1962...

    (1962)
  • Corto Maltese
    Corto Maltese
    Corto Maltese is a comics series featuring an eponymous character, a complex sailor-adventurer. It was created by Italian comic book creator Hugo Pratt in 1967...

    (1967–1992)
    • Una Ballata del Mare Salato, La Ballade de la mer salée (1967) - translated into English as Ballad of The Salt Sea (Harvill Press 1996)
    • Sous le signe du Capricorne (1970)
    • Corto toujours un peu plus loin - partly translated into English as The Banana Conga (1979-1971)
    • Les Celtiques - translated into English as The Celts, (Harvill Press 1996) and A Mid-Winter Morning's Dream (1971–1972)
    • Les Ethiopiques (1972–1973)
    • Corte sconta detta Arcana - Corto Maltese en Sibérie (1974–1975)
    • Favola di Venezia - Sirat Al-Bunduqiyyah - Fable de Venise (19)
    • La casa dorata di Samarcanda - La Maison dorée de Samarkand (1980)
    • La Jeunesse de Corto (1981)
    • Tango...y todo a media luz - Tango (1985)
    • Elvetiche - Les Helvétiques (1987)
    • Mu (1988)
  • Gli scorpioni del deserto - Les Scorpions du Desert, The Scorpions of the Desert (1969–92)
    • Les Scorpions du désert (Episode 1, 1969–73)
    • Piccolo chalet... (1975)
    • Vanghe Dancale (1980)
    • Dry Martini Parlor (1982)
    • Brise de mer (1992)
  • Sven - L'homme des Caraïbes (1976)
  • La macumba du Gringo (1977)
  • À l'Ouest de l'Éden (1978)
  • Jesuit Joe
    Jesuit Joe
    Jesuit Joe is a mysterious character who appears in the eponymous story of Italian comics creator Hugo Pratt. This graphic novel was initially serialised in Pilote, before it was released as hardcover albums in 1980, in France entitled Jésuite Joe, and in Italy, entitled L'uomo del grande nord,...

    (1980)
  • Tutto ricominciò con un'estate indiana (Indian Summer, 1983, with Milo Manara
    Milo Manara
    Maurilio Manara – known professionally as Milo Manara – is an Italian comic book writer and artist, best known for his erotic approach to the medium.-Career:...

    )
  • Cato Zulu (1984–88)
  • El Gaucho (1991), with Milo Manara
    Milo Manara
    Maurilio Manara – known professionally as Milo Manara – is an Italian comic book writer and artist, best known for his erotic approach to the medium.-Career:...

  • Saint-Exupéry - le dernier vol (1994)
  • Morgan (1995)

Awards

  • 1969: Gran Guinigi per il disegnatore italiano (award for an Italian artist) at the Festival of Lucca
    Lucca
    Lucca is a city and comune in Tuscany, central Italy, situated on the river Serchio in a fertile plainnear the Tyrrhenian Sea. It is the capital city of the Province of Lucca...

    , Italy, for Una ballata del mare salato
  • 1974: Prix Saint-Michel
    Prix Saint-Michel
    The Prix Saint-Michel is a series of comic awards presented by the city of Brussels, with a focus on Franco-Belgian comics. They were first awarded in 1971, and are the second oldest comics award in Europe still presented, behind the Adamson Awards...

    , for the best realistic story
  • 1976: Angoulême Festival
    Angoulême International Comics Festival
    The Angoulême International Comics Festival is the largest comics festival in Europe. It has occurred every year since 1974 in Angoulême, France, in the month of January.The four-day festival is notable for awarding several prestigious prizes in cartooning...

    , Best foreign realistic comic book, for La ballade de la mer salée
  • 1981: Angoulême Festival, Elle award
    Angoulême International Comics Festival Media award
    This media award was presented at the Angoulême International Comics Festival. It was given by different media over the years, with sometimes different awards in one year...

  • 1987: Angoulême Festival, Best foreign comic book
    Angoulême International Comics Festival Prize for Best Comic Book
    The Prize for Best Album , also known as the Golden Wildcat , is awarded to comics authors at the Angoulême International Comics Festival....

    , for Indian Summer
  • 1988: Angoulême Festival, 15th anniversary special Grand Prix de la ville d'Angoulême
    Grand Prix de la ville d'Angoulême
    Every year, the Grand Prix de la ville d'Angoulême is awarded during the Angoulême International Comics Festival to an author for his body of work and/or for his achievement in the evolution of comics....

  • 1996: Max & Moritz Prizes
    Max & Moritz Prizes
    The Max & Moritz Prize is a prize for comic books, comic strips, and other similar materials which has been awarded at each of the biennial International Comics Shows of Erlangen since 1984...

    , Germany, Best German language comic import, for Saint-Exupéry - le dernier vol
  • 2005: Inducted into the Will Eisner Award Hall of Fame
    Eisner Award
    The Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards, commonly shortened to the Eisner Awards, and sometimes referred to as the Oscar Awards of the Comics Industry, are prizes given for creative achievement in American comic books. The Eisner Awards were first conferred in 1988, created in response to the...



Sources



Footnotes

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