Raoul Cauvin

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Raoul Cauvin (born September 26, 1938) is a Belgian comics author.

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[edit] Biography

Raoul Cauvin was born in Antoing, Belgium in 1938.[1] He studied lithography at the Institut Saint-Luc in Tournai, but when he left school there were no longer any lithographers needed.[2] He started working at Dupuis in 1960 as a cameraman for the small animation studio the publishing house had started, working on early Smurfs cartoons and other short movies produced then. After a few years, he started writing comics for others, and has since become one of the most prolific Franco-Belgian comics authors, almost always staying true to Dupuis. Some of his earliest works are for other relatively new artists like Claire Bretécher, Gennaux and Eddy Ryssack. He starts his first long running series in 1968 with Les Tuniques Bleues with drawings by Salvérius, as a replacement for Lucky Luke, the successful Western comic of Spirou magazine which after 31 albums moves to rivaling Pilote. The series is not immediately successful but slowly gathers a huge following. Since then, more than 15 million albums have been sold.[1] He adds other another major success in 1972 with Sammy. He continues working for the animation studio as well, writing the scripts for the Musti, Tip and Tap and The Pili's cartoons by Ray Goossens.

He lives in Nivelles since 1991.[2] In November 1999, he had published already 237 albums,[3], selling over 45 million albums in total.[4]

[edit] Themes, critics and successes

His work is almost always humoristic, but he produces both long (i.e. 44 pages) stories and short gags (between half a page and 6 pages). He started mainly with historic series: Les Tuniques Bleues uses the American Civil War as background, while Sammy plays in the time of Al Capone and Eliot Ness, and Les Mousquetaires describes the adventures of three musketeers. But with Agent 212, featuring a rather stupid cop, he starts to make his stories more contemporary, and in the 1980s he breaches more and more taboo subjects and introduces more critical views, with themes like nursing and hospitals in Les Femmes en Blanc, paparazzi in Les Paparazzi or gravediggers in Pierre Tombal. But he also makes fun of his own life and that of an artist in Pauvre Lampil, a caricatural autobiography, and starts series about a love angel in Cupido or the hard life of a vulture falling in love with an owl in Les Voraces.[1]

He makes his scripts in the form of a rudimentary comic, suggesting a page lay-out,[5] and he has also made a few comics completely on his own, but with limited success. His works are often seen as more artisanal than artistic by the critics[6], while others consider him an uncontested master of the humoristic comic.[7]

Whatever the critics think of him though, he continues to be very successful with the public and sought after by artists, currently writing 11 different series. In 2006 alone, he had six series in the list of best selling new comics of the ABCD, with Cedric securing the fourth spot with 288,900 albums and Les Tuniques Bleues at ten with 184,800 copies. His other most succeesfull comics were Les Femmes en Blanc (78,000 copies), Agent 212 (66,000 copies), Les Psy (51,500 copîes) and Pierre Tombal (45,700 copies).[8]

[edit] Selected bibliography

All stories originally appeared in Spirou and published in album by Dupuis unless otherwise stated.

  • Agent 212 (artist: Daniel Kox; 25 albums, since 1975)
  • Boulouloum et Guiliguili (artist: Mazel; 10 albums, between 1975 and 1988)
  • Cédric (artist: Laudec; 20 albums, since 1989)
  • CRS=Détresse (artist: Achdé; 12 albums published by Dargaud, since 1993)
  • Cupidon (artist Malik; 18 albums, since 1988)
  • Les Femmes en blanc (artist: Philippe Bercovici; 28 albums, since 1986)
  • Godaille et Godasse (artist: Sandron; 5 albums, between 1982 and 1988)
  • Les Grandes amours contrariées (artist: Philippe Bercovici; 1 album in 1982)
  • Les Mousquetaires (artist: Mazel; 8 albums, between 1972 and 1998)
  • Natacha (artist: François Walthéry; Album #13 in 1988)
  • Les Naufragés (artist: Claire Brétécher; 1 album, in 1968)
  • Les Paparazzi (artist: Mazel; 10 albums, since 1996)
  • Pauvre Lampil (artist: Lambil; 7 albums, between 1973 and 1995)
  • Pierre Tombal (artist: Marc Hardy; 23 albums, since 1983)
  • Du côté de chez Poje (artist: Carpentier); 17 albums, since 1986)
  • Les Psy (artist: Bédu; 13 albums, since 1992)
  • Sammy (artist: Berck, since 1995 Jean-Pol; 39 albums, since 1970)
  • Spirou et Fantasio (artist: Nic Broca; Albums #30, #31 and #32, between 1983 and 1984)
  • Taxi Girl (artist: Laudec, 2 albums, between 1994 and 1996)
  • Les Tuniques Bleues (artist: Salvérius, after his death Lambil; 50 albums, since 1968)
  • Le Vieux Bleu (artist: François Walthéry, 1 album, in 1980)
  • Les Voraces (artist: Glem; 5 albums, between 1986 and 1994)

[edit] Awards

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ a b c De Weyer, Geert (2005). "Raoul Cauvin". In België gestript, pp. 176-177. Tielt: Lannoo.
  2. ^ a b Interview on fan site (French) Last accessed September 29th, 2006
  3. ^ Interview from November 1999. (French) Last accessed June 28th, 2006
  4. ^ ActuaBD Comics news (French) Last accessed September 29th, 2006
  5. ^ Image of a Cauvin scenario for Les Femmes en Blanc. Last accessed September 29th 2006
  6. ^ Critic of a recent album by Cauvin. (French) Last accessed June 28th, 2006
  7. ^ Biography at Bedethèque (French) Last accessed September 29th, 2006
  8. ^ Ratier, Gilles. ACBD bilan 2006: Best selling albums of the year in French. ACBD.fr. Retrieved on 2007-02-08.
  9. ^ Berck website (French) Last accessed September 29th, 2006
  10. ^ Angoulême Awards 1976 (French) Last accessed September 29th, 2006
  11. ^ Angoulême Awards 2001 (French) Last accessed September 29th, 2006
  12. ^ Site of the Albert Uderzo Awards. Last accessed June 28th, 2006

[edit] Further reading

De Saeger, Kris (1995), "Dossier Cauvin". Arboris. ISBN 90-343-2435-4

[edit] External links

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