Jane (comic strip)

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Jane was a comic strip created and drawn by Norman Pett exclusively for the British tabloid The Daily Mirror from 5 December 1932 to 10 October 1959.

Originally entitled Jane's Journal - Or The Diary Of A Bright Young Thing, the salacious strip featured the misadventures of the title ingenue, said to be modelled on Christabel Leighton-Porter. The hapless heroine had a habit of frequently (and most often inadvertently) losing her clothes. Her intimate confidant was a pet dachshund named Fritz.

Her full name was Jane Gay (at the time the term "gay" was used to describe someone as cheerful and fun-loving). It was a play on the name Lady Jane Grey.

The strip became enormously popular during the Second World War and was seen as morale-boosting, similar to Milton Caniff's comic strip, Male Call. Until 1943 Jane rarely stripped to more than her undergarments, but when an episode presented her as altogether nude, an American newspaper commented that as a result the British Army advanced five miles in North Africa!

[edit] Adaptations

The strip inspired an eponymous stage-play in the 1940s. A film followed in 1949, titled The Adventures Of Jane and directed by Edward G. Whiting. A second film was made in 1987, titled Jane and the Lost City and directed by Terry Marcel.

A television series was also made by the BBC between 1982 and 1984, starring Glynis Barber in the title role.