Walter - a hero for all

 Comics were very much a part of my childhood and Walter, pictured below in a blue shirt was the kind of boy I liked in it for being very girlie and running "The Softies" who were engaged in a battle with Dennis and his often "queer bashing" menaces gang.

It was the comic strip version of what sissies like me went through at school and on the streets playing but in recent times he's changed.

Walter's personality has changed drastically over the years.

In the beginning, Walter was a "softy", a boy who preferred peace and quiet over mischief, and liked mostly girly things like smelling flowers or playing with teddy bears.

Later, he was characterized as a spoiled but intelligent child.

Now, he is more of a child with the mind of an adult. He is deeply involved in his father's business schemes and hates people having fun without his permission.

Profile

Walter has traditionally been portrayed as a camp and effeminate boy, always very stereotypically girly in his behaviour: this varied from a strong aversion to typically "masculine" interests and situations, to full-blown transvestitism. While these tendencies have vanished in modern years, Walter is still portrayed as a typical "geek", wearing a blue schoolboy's jumper, schoolboy's shorts, a bow tie, and has glasses and slicked-back hair.

Walter lives next door to Dennis and his family. In earlier years, he often spent time in his Wendy house with his gang "the Softies", playing with dolls or pressing flowers etc. He regularly features in the Dennis the Menace strip; when he appears, he is usually either being attacked by Dennis or involved in a plot to attack Dennis himself—traditionally involving either chess or perfume. Though these attacks, in earlier years, arguably represented a legitimate feud between the Menaces and Softies, it was often difficult to interpret them as much deeper than his being bullied by Dennis for his effeminate nature or positive attributes.

Walter is often seen as a devoted and seemingly "perfect" child. He does well in school and is adored by his teachers and parents. Indeed, Walter is a stereotypical mummy's boy and a spoiled brat, luxuriously pampered by his wealthy parents — who, rather uncannily, resemble each other.

In earlier years, Walter had a white cat called Fluffy and a pink poodle named Foo Foo. In 2012, a new cat named Claudius was introduced.

Issue 1712 (10 May 1975) featured a girl named Priscilla, described by Dennis as Walter's sister, but she has not appeared since. In one story, he and Dennis are revealed to be distant cousins, but nothing more has been said of this.

Personal life

Walter is Dennis' neighbour and arch-enemy, most likely because he is the complete opposite of Dennis: Dennis being wild and naughty, and Walter being calm, intelligent and "soft." He is always Teacher's Pet at school. Walter is strongly disliked by Dennis because of his teddy-bear picnics and softy antics.

Walter long had two apparent friends named Algernon 'Spotty' Perkins and Bertie Blenkinsop. They were equally as camp as Walter, and the three of them often wore their mothers' clothes and makeup. In more recent years, the former bit player Dudley Nightshirt has replaced Spotty as third-in-command.

Walter also got himself a girlfriend named Matilda, who bore an eerie resemblance to him, except that she was a redhead, and obviously wore a schoolgirl's uniform. She also spoke with a lisp and can sometimes lose her temper. For example, Walter brings her a bunch of ragged nettles and dandelions because he had lost his glasses, and she angrily slams the door in his face. She appeared in the 1996 TV series of Dennis and Gnasher (although a character with the same name appeared in at least one comic library from 1993), and has also appeared in The Beano Video, to which she makes a cameo appearance during "Pink Glove". Also, his evil uncle, Slasher Brown, who owns a barber shop in Beanotown, tries to cut Dennis' hair live on TV, but fails, as it is revealed that Dennis had a wig, landing Walter in trouble.

Walter is sometimes scared, but can sometimes act spoilt rotten as explained in the 1996, 2009 and 2013 series. He always plays with his fellow Softies, including Spotty Perkins, Bertie Blenkinsop, Jeremy Snodgrass, Dudley Nightshirt and Nervous Rex. They all share the same characteristics as Walter.

Walter has been punished many times despite his well-behaved nature.

In the recent comics, he has dropped his soft personality, and now is ingenious, ambicious, intelligent, and wants to rid Beanotown of all its fun. He is deeply involved in his father's business schemes and hates people having fun without his permission.

Truth be told, the Softies often seem to be bound together much more by fear of Dennis than by any real mutual liking; though they are scrupulously polite and strangely devoted to each other, they have occasionally decided to pick on someone too.

It's unfortunate that in an attempt to remove the queer bashing in the original Dennis The Menace, in Dennis And Gnasher, they also took out someone who was queer or sissy could identify with and seeing the attitudes of boys such as Dennis being punished.

Dandy and Beano summer specials 2023 style

This week we are returning to an age old ritual routed in early childhood where the arrival of summer punctuated by Sports Day and the School Holidays meant we needed a little extra fun reading for when we were out playing for what seemed likes ages in July and August and to get through any rainy days while on our own Hols where going out wasn't going work.

Most of us had the Beano in its regular form and often had annuals for Christmas so the idea of a glossy special for the summer where all our favourite characters like us were on holidays having adventures appealed.

The Beano is the one regular comic that survived the wave of closures of the nineteen nineties and early part of this century and so the sixty eight page special with stickers returns with a common story theme of a Gnasher that's appears supersized, dwarfing the children although in reality it is they who have been shrunk in size.

Can they escape that fate?

The Dandy was one of those unlucky comics that went in paper form in 2012 but we do get a Summer Special ever since the 2013 edition proved very popular.

There have been a few comic strips started in recent years and a little more inclusivity than was the case but it mixes some reprints from the past with the new

This year the “Dandytown Scouts” strip drawn by Mychailo Kazybrid and inked by Bambos Georgiou has been added.

They attend their Scouts sessions on Friday evenings, are and do work on gaining their badges, having adventures and having.

Mychailo created the design for these characters and the characters feature can see on the cover. 

There should also be a couple of strips starring these characters in the Dandy Annual this year to keep that fresh and appealing to all ages.

These should be available from W H Smith -  the dandy only from WH Smiths-  and can be ordered via Amazon.uk.

Unlike previous years they don't appear to be available from D C Thompson's own web sites and indeed the whole thing around if and when they might is rather messy.

Given the rush to get them out while normally there's more of a build up for the May 17th publication suggests the ball was dropped a little and they're playing catch up.

However that happened, normal childhood rituals are restored this year.

Upon the death of David Sutherland - Beano illustrator

 A constant of mine is comics, a thing that started as a young boy that continues as that older person but still a child on the inside me even today.

The year had began when it was announced at the age of 89, David Sutherland, the Beano artist was  given an award of an O.B.E. in this years New Year's Honours a period of transition for all of us following the late Queen's death last year and the start of the reign of our King, Charles III.

It was announced in the early hours of last Friday that David had died.

His career started in 1959 with being a freelance contributor to The Beano and as we got to the end of the 1960's he'd moved more into illustrating some of that comics most iconic characters, Dennis The Menace, the Bash Street Kids and Biffo the Bear.

Annuals were and still are a big thing when you are a child so many of us had Beano annuals of which this is an original of mine from Christmas 1974 that shows the Bash Street Kids and Dennis we fondly remember the way he draw them.

It was big news in September 1974, the start of my last term at Juniors that Dennis had made the Beano's front page taking over from Biffo The Bear who were part of a fictional world we loved as boys.

Impulsive, cheeky, always menacing, having a good run of luck before being caught out and like so many of us back then spanked, David's depiction of Dennis' life was the fictional counterpart to our own so to us these drawings are "our" Dennis, our Bash Street Kids with Toots complete with teacher's cane and so on in a way that to today's children the current versions are theirs set in their world.

The Bash Street Kids in the 1950's and Today.

His Dennis ran from 1970 to 1998, over a thousand episodes and a  few generations seeing changes in society, space exploration and more interest in ecology.

That world the current generation live in is simply something we could never of envisioned.

On a tribute The Beano had this to say:

"‘David viewed himself as a resident of Beanotown, living alongside our characters that he loved and he will live on there forever, and always be in the hearts of Team Beano and the millions of kids who have enjoyed his strips every week.’ "

All this eternal child can say regarding his contribution to Dennis, another is thank you for the funny stories told and drawn so well that added fun to our lives whatever may of been going on at the time.

R.I.P David.

P.s 1967 was officially a Groovy year but so much of this annual would be familiar to those of us who grew up in the 1970's cos the World of the Child was largely the same.

4,000 editions of The Beano

After last week's post we move to something that did happen a few weeks back when the long running children's comic - and there was  time when comic didn't need that bit in front of it - marked its 4,000th edition on September 4th.

The main theme running through Beanoland, the imaginary world of all the comics characters live in is the future through such devices as time travel although for some of us it might seem the comic inhabits a different world than that we grew up in which is hardly surprising I guess.

One issue I have with it in its current form as a child who read this from the age of at least seven is the stories I loved from the time such as Dennis The Menace, Minnie The Minx and the Bash Street Kids set in a fictional school while still carried bare little resemblance to the origins we knew.

That's a simple summary of what's changed with Dennis-he no longer is a menace being mean and getting punished for it as we did and much the same applies with Minnie The Minx who doesn't get smacked and the cane has been removed from the Bash Street Kids school.

The problem I have with it is that simply these are long running stories whose characters haven't changed were formed in the era when that mirrored the lives of boys and girls and  for today's youngsters it's no more odd than the world of Lord Snooty and Pals was to us but we enjoyed the story set that past.

Moreover, when Dennis isn't allowed to menace really he loses his reason for existence, the bit of us who could be cold, mean spirit and who got punished for it which provided a tone even for those boys who were  - and I'm not condoning bullying - where people like them could see bad behaviour called out and and dealt with.

Simply not showing bullying does nothing to prevent it where showing it affirms the reality that as children we knew and know happens.

There is nothing at all wrong with including newer stories that reflect modern ideas, that have greater diversity in terms of gender and ethnic origins matching that of today's boys and girls liking many of the newer stories, it is simply that I cannot let pass how I feel about what has happened those set in the past as it marks it's 4,000 anniversary.

Comic talent

Comics were always a big thing with me buying loads and having them bought for me by my parents, my Nan and family friends as a boy but sometimes we forget that within the medium of our mirth there resides considerable talent.

Not everyone can draw so well as to get a job as a illustrator drawing the characters and creating from guidelines new stories every week for publication and this is an example of the kind of talent used from here in the Midlands about the man who draw Korky The Cat.

The Dandy Summer Special is back 2014 style

 It's Summer and so childhood rituals may return!

The Evergreen Beano with fun reading and activities has come but guess what is also here against all the odds?

The much missed dandy has a Summer Special this year which was very much in the balance late last year after the demise of the weekly edition in 2012.

68 full colour pages in glossy paper with a traditional binding with all our favourite characters.

A ritual of childhood can be resumed ready for summer trips and maybe even a proper kids  holiday where I can just be age dysphoric me letting the whole of me out.

Comic celebrations

For most of this blog I've looked more at more the presentational side of being a feminine boy but being him involves connections to other things that connect to people and comics was one where many of mine were fairly regular comics that most boys read.

For a good number of us, our sense of being young is in part at least connected with our actual childhoods and the routines we had back then and for me at least it was the arrival of comics which in the case of this British one came out on a Thursday.

That's right, the Beano which first came out in 1938 apparently although during World War II, it was reduced to fortnightly to save paper which was in short supply.

This is special kind of a magazine with a softbook binding issued July 24th featuring a background capsule on all the main cartoon strips the comic run and the first strips of each that for me included such favourites as Minnie The Minx, Lord Snooty, Biffo the Bear, Dennis with Gnasher and the school series the Bash Street Kids that was close in some ways to my first school with its' Victorian building. Dennis has only been regularly on the front page from September 1974 taking over from Biffo.

Included in it is four glassy art prints which just adds to the enjoyment of this special issue although I often get the new regular copies and there is a celebratory featured  special issue of the regular comic that I hate to say really doesn't work as part of the appeal is the constant old style art and traditional storylines carefully made just slightly in tune with our times for younger audiences. 

That childhood runs on how I live now.

Christmas 2009

So it happens to be Christmas, for this little my favourite time of year outside of summer hols so what do we have?

Well, I'm LSG which I'm sure you may of noticed if you read this blog which basically means it's a similar christmas to when I was officially a child but being neither a girl or boy exclusively by gender so first off I have the Beano annual just like I had back then.

While it's changed a little to take in what boys and girls now are looking for and what given Dennis the Menace has a tv series tv can accept, it's still recognizable and a barrel of fun with quizzes and activities apart from the cartoons.

The Dandy seemed for a period unsure of where it really was but of late has gone back to a more traditional take on itself and the annual takes in old favourites like Desperate Dan and Korky the cat and adds newer things such as Bananaman.

I went out for lunch with my mummy and daddy so we could just spend time together and not in the kitchen.

I had some money to put toward some cds and dvds  and new pair of gloves.

Summer Comics

It's summer so it's summer special time again but with a twist as the Dandy's goes with it's controversial maker as Dandy Xtreme for this one and I for one don't care for how Desperate Dan has been drawn, looking mean.

A bit of a let down.

A few years ago The Beano stopped doing the Summer Specials I loved as a kid for the celebrity centric Monthly colour BeanoMAX editions that do little for me.

You might as well just make a point of having the regular weekly editions  with you when you're on your hols 

That might of been from 1966 rather than 1976 but it so much more colourful and appealing to a child under fourteen (or like one like me who still mentally is under that age) compared to that DandyEXTREME.

That might be a 1967 Beano edition and by 1976 Dennis would be on the front cover but that cover sets the scene as it was the edition that you had all summer hols and with you on your family holiday at the seaside.

Isn't all of this so much more age appropriate for children's publications?

The Beano in the past

When I was younger I grew up reading comics which are usually combinations of short stories written for children in a series of frames with the drawing, speech bubbles for the characters and a little bit of plain text to set the scene of the frame.

The stories are usually centred on universal aspects of childhood, such as parents, authority figures, school, war or adventure stories with heroes and having fun with other kids.
Some comics are written to appeal mostly to one gender but most I read were for both such as the Dandy and the Beano pictured.

In many ways the Beano had it all as far as I was concerned with the adventures of Dennis the Menace,  the lovable roguish boy fighting dad, every authority figure there was, Walter (the goody-goody boy) with every trick in the book. 

That said in earlier editions he'd get his comeuppance once in a while when Granny would arrive on the scene and spank him with the 'Demon whacker', a notoriously hard leather slipper!

Dennis of course had Gnasher, his pet dog although there was nothing soppy about him and Gnipper the pup

There was Rodger the Dodger who always tried to get out of things at home or at school but I preferred Winker Watson in the Dandy for that kind of story.

My other favourite as The Bash Street Kids set in a old run down inner city primary school with loads of wacky characters engaged in a constant battle with 'Teach' who carried a cane with him who himself was under pressure from the Headmaster. 

In older episodes he'd cane the kids from time to time for their misdemeanours in class or on trips which didn't phaze us as boys cos we often got Six of the Best across our shorts too so it it was normal.

For girls there was Minnie The Minx. She was a bit like Dennis but with a Tam and obviously a skirt on compared to Dennis's flannel shorts but more cunning with a tomboy aspect to her personality always scheming to get her own way . She'd have me in stitches every week!!!

I still love reading them and buy the annuals.

Christmas 2008

 

One ritual that goes right back to childhood is the process of taking what you done and drawing them together from end of terms to concluding one form and moving up into the other.

As we go out of the year, two reminders of why this blog is different from Christmas following that box set review.

Although Dandy Xtreme isn't my thing, preferring the 'classic' Dandy, this years annual is more like was when I was younger.

The Beano is pretty much bar a bit of toning down of the Menacing of Dennis as it was in the 70's and like the regular weekly comic today.

They were up in my Christmas pile because the year for me is as an adult but child so things are more child-like and Christmas is like it was in 1974 even if the tv is bigger and has different programs on.

Those programs would be similar to what I watch and as with Blue Peter, actually like the Beano, a little different but basically the same as it was back when John, Lesley and Peter were on.

Thus we look at books most of which go back to that time, look at things from the past that stick in my mind such as school and scouts and anime.

In with this years Christmas presents is this 4 cd long cd box set.

Entitled "Love Train: The Sound of Philadelphia" it is a comprehensive set of hits and notable cuts of PhillySoul that for once isn't tied to a specific record label so does a better than average job of surveying the scene so we get acts like the (Detroit) Spinners and the Stylistics in with the mainstays of Philadelphia Records whose selection doesn't cut off 1976 unlike the 1997 3 cd set but goes to it's last glory days in 1983 with Patti LaBelle's If Only You Knew.
it includes a comprehensive booklet with interviews connected with the music one of which does tackle the UK's fascination of the music of Black America.

My presents this compact disc of Cello Music by the French composer Camille Saint-Saens who wrote rather more music than is given credit for.

Most people know his Organ Symphony which I bought in the mid 80's a cd of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra conducted by Daniel Barenboim recording from 1976 which I loved on record and of his Samson et Delila.

He wrote a number of pieces for the Cello such as a concerto for cello and this disc adds some marvellous performances recorded ten years ago by the master Cellist Mischa Maisky with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra extremely well recorded to my collection of French music. 

Sometimes I go into what really made me the sissy gurl I am and why this LSG thing is the present rooted in the past.

Going forward, I see more of the same that might take a new like in as it did back then but the one thing that can't be ignored is I remain a a little sissy gurl, forever.

Comics in the classroom

Timed for Christmas but under wraps is this compilation in the 70th Years  "Classic" series of classic cartoon strips from the Beano and Dandy based around the school adventures of such strips as Dennis The Menace, Bash Street Kids and of course Winker Watson who I loved in the dandy growing up.

Comics were a staple of my life back then as a schoolboy, something we shared and talked about and as a LSG remain apart of this life I am living.

Xmas 2007

It wouldn't be a Christmas for me without my annuals so here's this years set for endless fun for me reading and doing the competitions in while the groan ups talk about stuff that really doesn't interest me.

And here's the other, The Dandy's that my Gran used to buy me copies of the regular comic of as a kid.

Desperate Dan is sat by his fire on the range singing folk songs with his horse.

Jacqueline Wilson is more my kind of authoress writing more for girls that works very well for little sissy gurls like me so this is so so up my alley.

I go out for Christmas lunch with mummy and daddy and siblings after meeting up locally so mummy gets a day off from cooking.

Christmas 2006

Happy Boxing day people.

As is normal for someone like me I still get children's presents and Mummy bought me this years Beano annual.

There's an old fashioned saying that goes "You can't have the one without the other"

So naturally that other staple annual of the comic I had as a child also was in with the presents which included socks, underwear and money for music, sweets and books.

Now doesn't that sound just like Xmas 1974 all over again?