This is your life, $crooge McDuck
Sunday the 23rd november 1997 Morgenavisen Jyllandsposten (Morning Paper from the main part of Denmark)
On the bookfare in Forum (Big danish exhibtion-house) a historicly correct biography of the 50th jubilee-holder $crooge McDuck.
Written by Peter Raarup Madsen, translated back into english by A C
50th-jubille-holder $crooge McDuck has now got his own historicly correct biography. 3 Years of scientific surveys in an enormous amount of pressed and drawn material especially from the hand of the famous Disney-drawer Carl Barks, lies behind the great $crooge McDuck biography "This is your life", which has danish premiere at the Bookfare in Forum.
The american Disney-artist [Don wont like that word!, but I just translate...] Don Rosa took it as a deeply serious task when Disney and the comic publisher Egmont decided to publish an official biography, which in comic form describes $crooge Mc Ducks life aand times from the poor childhood in Scotland untill his nowbeing position as billionaire in Duckburg.
"It was a both big and fun challenge to map $crooge McDuck's life and activities, and then show it in full in a row of new stories - based almost solely on Barksian facts" Don Rosa proves.
Reliable Information
The "Barksian facts" are reliable information taken from the uncountable stories, that $crooge McDuck original maker, Carl Barks, started in 1947.
Don Rosa sees every Uncle $crooge story that hasn't been made by Carl Barks as apocryphal (according to the foreign dictionary this means a doubtable Bible-writing that the Church doesn't approve of).
Some [one?] "non-Barksian" facts have ha´d their place in the book.
E.g. Don Rosa finds it reliable that the drawer Tony Strobl in the american Uncle $crooge-comic issue 50 let $crooge McDuck earn his first dime (25-øre, [the danish $crooge's dime]) by polishing a golddigger's boots - a very logical employment for a poor, immigrated young duck from Scotland. [The wrtier seems not to note that Don and hopefully Tony has $crooge earn his first dime *in Scotland*!]
The famous $crooge McDuck has many names - e.g. Dagpbert in Germany - but the original american name has litteral roots in Charles Dickens' classic "A Christmas Carol", where the stingy skinflint is called Ebeneezer Scrooge.
"Carl Barks published his first comic. [*with Uncle $crooge!* and he didn't publish it, Western did, and Barks began doing comics in 1943] just before Christmas 1947 and he thought that it should have a touch of Christmas fairy-tale, and he let himself inspire from Dickens' famous Christmas story," says Don Rosa who doesn't see Uncle $crooge as a cynical skinflint.
Toilsome and Profitable
The many many money in the bin is a trophy over his live and victories. They represent pleasant memories Don Rosa says.
Even though uncle $crooge and the life in Duckburg is fiction with fantasy-animals in the leading roles, Don Rosa thinks that they make their mark by in their action describing a univers, which is close to reality.
"Children see the ducks as persons with good and bad qualities. A big quality is that the stories about life in Duckburg often takes a starting point in events that could easily take place in reality. Why should kids allways just be shown an unrealistisc dream-fantasy-fairy-tale country far from the real world - they aren't idiots," Don Rosa demosntrates who over 270 pages show Uncle $crooge's toilsome - and profitable - life.
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