Dutch comics

Since the Netherlands shares the same language with Flanders, many Belgian comics and Franco-Belgian comics have also been published there, the latter in translation. But while French language publications are habitually translated into Dutch/Flemish, the opposite is not true: Dutch/Flemish publications are less commonly translated into French, possibly due to the different cultures in Flanders/Netherlands and Wallonia/France. Likewise and though available, Flemish comic books are not doing that well in the Netherlands and vice versa, save for some notable exceptions, especially the Willy Vandersteen creation Suske en Wiske (Spike and Suzy) which is as popular in the Netherlands as it is in native Flanders. Concurrently, the cultural idiosyncrasies contained within Dutch/Flemish comics also mean that these comics have seen far fewer translations into other languages – excepting French to some extent, due to the bi-lingual nature of Belgium – than their French-language counterparts have.

History

Earliest examples

Dutch comics, like many European comics, have their prototypical forerunners in the form of medieval manuscripts, which often used sequential pictures accompanied by text, or sometimes even used speech balloons for captions. The "mannekesprenten" ("little men drawings") are also an early forerunner, usually depicting the lives of Christian saints or fables. In the 19th century several Dutch political cartoonists made use of sequential pictures, caricatures and humoristic situations that can be seen as the predecessors of comics. In 1858 the Swiss comic strip Monsieur Cryptogame by Rodolphe Töpffer was translated in Dutch by J.J.A. Gouverneur as Meester Prikkebeen (Mister Prick-a-leg) and was a huge success in the Netherlands. It was published in the text comics format, with written text published underneath the pictures. This type of comics would remain the dominant form in the Netherlands until the mid-1960s, because Dutch moral guardians felt that these comics at least motivated children to actually read written sentences instead of merely looking at the pictures. While translations of comic strips remained popular no actual Dutch comics artists emerged until the late 19th century. One of the earliest artists to be considered a comic artist was Jan Linse. He drew several humoristic scenes in sequential form and wrote the text beneath the pictures. Another pioneer was Daniël Hoeksema, who drew a spin-off series inspired by Monsieur Cryptogame called De Neef van Prikkebeen (1909) (Prikkebeen's Cousin). However, most Dutch comics during the 1880s, 1890s, 1900s and 1910s were satirical illustrations and cartoons about Dutch politics and society or moralistic stories for the youth.

Interbellum: The true beginnings of Dutch comics

The first proper Dutch comic strips were published after World War I. Many Dutch newspapers and magazines now imported translations of popular American, British and French comics, such as The Katzenjammer Kids (translated as Jongens van Stavast ), Rupert Bear (translated as Bruintje Beer), Perry and the Rinkydinks (translated as Sjors), Mickey Mouse (translated as Mikkie Muis ) and Billy Bimbo and Peter Porker (translated as Jopie Slim and Dikkie Bigmans) which were all immediate successes. As a result, Dutch newspapers started hiring Dutch artists to create comic strips of their own. Among the most notable were Yoebje en Achmed ("Yoebje and Achmed") (1919) and Tripje en Liezebertha (1923) by Henk Backer, Bulletje en Boonestaak ("Bulletje and Boonestaak", 1922-1937) by Dutch writer A. M. de Jong and artist George van Raemdonck – actually of Flemish descent and an ex-pat refugee from war-torn Belgium, considered to be the first Flemish comic artist though he created his comic in the Netherlands – and Snuffelgraag en Knagelijntje by Gerrit Th. Rotman and Arie Pleysier. Of all these comics Bulletje en Boonestaak had the most success in translations, becoming the first Dutch comic to see translations into German (1924) and French (1926). At the same time it also caused outrage among moral guardians because of anti-authoritarian behaviour, frequent nudity, violence and gross-out humor, such as vomiting. Backer's Tripje and Liezebertha was popular enough to inspire a lot of merchandising.

The early example of a Dutch comics magazine was Kleuterblaadje (Toddler Magazine) published in 1915 and had a weekly comic strip, often translations and even plagiarism from foreign language magazines. Many children's magazines began to devote one or more of their page to comics, but the first actual full-fledged Dutch comics magazine was published in 1922: Het Dubbeltje. It only lasted two-and-a-half years, but other more successful ones followed in its wake, such as Doe Mee (1936-1942) (1946-1949), Olijk en Vrolijk (1937-1941)

The 1930s saw P. Koenen's "De Lotgevallen van Pijpje Drop" ("The Adventures of Pijpje Drop" (1930), "Flipje" (1935) by Harmsen van der Beek and Gijsje Goochem by Jac Grosman. In 1932 Frans Piët also created a newspaper comic strip called Wo-Wang en Simmy, which was a predecessor to his more successful series Sjors en Sjimmie (1938). Piët based his character Sjors directly on Perry from Martin Branner's Perry and the Rinkydinks. Sjors also inspired a comics magazine of his own in 1936. Another influential Dutch comics artist who made his debut in 1934 was Marten Toonder. He created a comic strip called "Thijs IJs", which was a substitute for Rupert Bear after the newspaper lost the publication rights. By far the most popular Dutch comic strip of this era was Flippie Flink (1933) by Louis Raemaekers and Clinge Doorenbos. A stage adaptation was produced, with the actor playing the part of Flippie greeting hundreds of children in the streets.

World War II

The German occupation in 1940 prevented further Anglo-American imports and led initially to a greater production of native material. Nazi censorship and paper shortage worked to the detriment of the comics field. At the same time the embargo against American and British comic strips also meant that Dutch comics artists received more chances to publish their own material, even if it meant becoming a member of the Kulturkammer, the Nazi cultural watchdog. The most notable Dutch comic strips to debut during the Nazi occupation were Alfred Mazure's Dick Bos (1942) and Marten Toonder's influential Tom Poes (Tom Puss) (1941-1986 as newspaper comic). Willy Smit and Herman Looman's Tijs Wijs de Torenwachter (1940-1942) and Wim Meuldijk's Sneeuwvlok de Eskimo (1942-1944) were popular enough at the time to be adapted into stage plays, but are completely forgotten today.

After 1945: The two great Dutch comic classics come into being

After the liberation the publication of comics boomed, with many successful series being published in newspapers, such as Pieter Kuhn's Kapitein Rob (1946-1966), Hans G. Kresse's Eric de Noorman (1946-1964), Phiny Dick's Olle Kapoen (1946-1954, Dick was Toonder's spouse), Marten Toonder's Kappie (1945-1972), Panda (1946-1991) and Koning Hollewijn (1954-1971), Godfried Bomans and Carol Voges's De Avonturen van Pa Pinkelman (1946-1952), Jean Dulieu's Paulus de Boskabouter (Paulus the woodgnome, which spawned a long-running 1955-64 radio show as well as two popular 1968-69 and 1974-75 puppetshows made for television), Henk Sprenger's Kick Wilstra (1949- ... ), Bob van den Born's Professor Pi (1955-1965), Willy Lohmann's Kraaienhove (1962-1972), Peter van Straaten's Vader & Zoon (1968-1987). The most successful and productive Dutch comics studio were the Toonder Studio's, renamed as such by Marten Toonder in 1945, who both made comics as well as animated cartoons, already during the war years. They also launched the short-lived comics magazine Tom Poes Weekblad (Tom Puss Weekly, 1947-1951).

The Toonder Studio's was not created by its namesake, but actually had its origins in the Diana Edition agency, established by the Jewish-Austrian refugee Fritz Gottesmann in the 1930s and where Toonder started to work in 1939. Gottesmann had to go into hiding during the war and left the company into the care of his by then partner Toonder from 1941 onward, but was later captured and died in the Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp, de facto bequeathing the company to Toonder, who successfully made the company into what it became, starting in the war years and in the process renaming the company after himself. The Toonder Studio's turned out to be a fruitful breeding ground for post-war Dutch comic talents, born before or during the war, as the majority of them started out their careers at the company in one way or another, which included such names as Fred Julsing, Lo Hartog van Banda, Thé Tjong-Khing, Dick Matena and Piet Wijn. Even Dutch great Hans. G. Kresse, while not formally working for the Studio's, started out his career during the war in close cooperation with the company.

Throughout the 1940s and 1950s educators in a conservative society the Netherlands still was at the time, highly discouraged young people reading comics, because they felt it was a bad influence on them. Many magazines and newspapers went across their censorship and moral objections by publishing their series in a text comics format. This allowed children to at least read some sentences and could guide them to "real literature". Yet, it was partly for these reasons that the Dutch text comic enjoyed its golden age in the era 1945–1960, with Tom Poes, Eric de Noorman and Kapitein Rob as its standard bearers.

Of these latter three, it were Tom Poes, Eric de Noorman and their two creators in particular who went on to conquer a special place in Dutch popular awareness, in the process becoming the two personifications of the classic Dutch comics, eclipsing all the others, which are increasingly becoming dim memories only. Though obviously fondly remembered by the older Dutch generations, their renown have become such that even the younger native generations, even though the vast majority of them has never read a single title of these two creations, still recognize the names Tom Poes en Oliver B. Bommel and Eric de Noorman. The memory and cultural heritage of its two creators, Toonder and Kresse respectively, is actively kept alive by its two respective private foundations "Toonder Compagnie BV" (actually started in 2000 as the "Stichting Het Toonder Auteursrecht" by Toonder himself, as he was keenly aware of the impact his creations had made in Dutch cultural awareness), and the "Stichting Hans G. Kresse", until 2009 the only such organizations specifically dedicated to the work of individual Dutch comic artists, after which they were joined by "Stichting Jan Kruis Museum". Predominately run by (family) heirs and sympathetic professionals, the two foundations in their goal of maintaining the cultural legacy of both artists – aside from safeguarding and maintaining their original art collections – organize exhibitions on a regular basis at the various cultural institutions, publish bibliographical book publications of for example biographies and rare, unknown and previously unpublished works, as well as providing information and illustrations to media interested in reporting on the two comic artists and their work. The Kresse foundation though, appears to have dialed down its activities around 2018 when its official "Eric de Noorman" website went dark. Exemplary of the continued presence in Dutch popular awareness of Tom Poes en Oliver B. Bommel was Dutch collector Pim Oosterheert, who possesses one of the largest private collections of Toonder materials. Oosterheert decided to turn his home in Zoeterwoude into a bonafide museum, Museum de Bommelzolder, whose opening in 1998 was presided over by Toonder's son in the presence of Dutch comic scene alumni and local dignitaries, and enjoys the full backing of the Toonder Compagnie. A well visited museum, enlarged and as of 2017 still in existence, Oosterheert expanded his activities with the publication of a semi-regular newsletter and reference books, as well as traveling lectures. For the main bodies of work of both artists, their two respective foundations closely cooperate with Hans Matla, a figure of note in the Dutch comic scene from the mid-1970s onward, whose publishing house Uitgeverij Panda (named after one of Toonder's creations, even though the company logo features the eponymous animal) releases bibliographical/bibliophilic limited "integrale" editions of these works, helping to keep the memory alive.

While Pieter Kuhn's Kapitein Rob was every bit as renowned as its two counterparts by Toonder and Kresse were at the time, he eventually failed to become the third "Dutch great" and both he and his creation are as of 2020 all but forgotten, only fondly remembered by the oldest still living generations. Recently though, comics publisher Uitgeverij Personalia became a latter-day Dutch publisher to tap into this nostalgia, by reprinting the complete Kapitein Rob series, starting in 2021.

1946: Advent of the Franco-Belgian comic

Tom Poes Weekblad, featuring the for the Netherlands traditional text comics, had to compete right from the start with Belgian weekly competitors Kuifje and Robbedoes (Dutch magazine) from publishers Le Lombard and Dupuis respectively, which became available in the country around the turn of 1946/1947. The magazines, unaltered Dutch-language versions of their French counterparts Tintin (1946-1993, applying for both language editions) and Spirou (1938-, the Dutch version folded in 2005) respectively, acquainted Dutch readership with the phenomenon, not much later known as the Franco-Belgian bande dessinée, in the process (re-)introducing them to the speech balloon comic. As a format, these comics gradually, but steadily, gained increasing popularity, especially under readers born around, and after the war, becoming an influence of note on a new generation of Dutch comic creators, from the 1960s onward. Both Robbedoes and Kuifje far outlived all their other native contemporaries introduced in the 1945-1950 era, including Tom Poes Weekblad, all of which nowadays only known unto comic historians. It were not only the new generations who were influenced by the Franco-Belgian comic, even a veteran mainstay like Hans G. Kresse, who had achieved fame in the text comic format, created his latter-day comics series in the Franco-Belgian format, and which included Vidocq (1965-1970; 1986-1988), Erwin, de zoon van Eric de Noorman (1969-1973) and most notably his acclaimed Indianenreeks (Indian Books, 1972–2001, the last volume published posthumously), which, contrary to most of his other work, has seen multiple – as in more than one or two – translations in other languages, including English as British publisher Methuen Publishing has published the first two volumes in 1975 for the UK market. Another example was Piet Wijn who started out his career in 1947 creating text comics for the Toonder Studios – among others the aforementioned Koning Hollewijn comic – , but who achieved international renown for his Douwe Dabbert (1971-2001), created in the Franco-Belgian tradition for the Dutch Disney Studios.

It was through Kuifje, where the series ran from 1948 to 1959, that Dutch readership was introduced to Suske en Wiske and where the series started its journey to become one of Holland's most all-time popular comic series.

1948: Crisis

Late 1948 turned out to be a seminal moment in time for the Dutch comic world when Dutch Minister of Education Theo Rutten had his official letter, dated 19 October 1948, published in the October 25, 1948 issue of the newspaper Het Parool, directly addressing educational institutions and local government bodies, advocating the prohibition of comics, or rather the below mentioned "beeldromans". He stated, "These booklets, which contain a series of illustrations with accompanying text, are generally sensational in character, without any other value. It is not possible to proceed in a legal manner against printers, publishers or distributors of these novels, nor can anything be achieved by not making paper available to them, since this for those publications necessary paper, is available on the free market," further implying that it became the civil duty of parents, teachers and civil servants, including policemen, to confiscate and destroy comic books wherever they found them, or as he had put it, "If you would like to point out, unnecessarily perhaps, to your school personnel that it is desirable to ensure that the students do not bring the graphic novels into school or distribute them to their comrades.(...) Where the circumstances make this desirable, the students are to be pointed out the very superficial nature of this literature, and the numerous books that are more worthy of their attention." Less than a month later, a 16-year-old girl was murdered in a bizarre manner on November 19 in the small town of Enkhuizen by her 15-year old boyfriend, who had tied her down to railroad tracks where she was killed by a passing train. An initially mystified police subsequently uncovered that both had been ravenous readers of comic books of the kind that were in concordance with Rutten's definition in his letter. Taken as validation, a moral outcry ensued, causing not only "beeldromans", but all comic books being en masse confiscated and destroyed around the country by parents and educators, with all comic publications being suspended and public libraries removing and destroying any comic books they might have had in their collections. On the occasion, and in an effort to outdo other contemporary media statements of indignation, libraries went even as far as coining comic books in a public statement, "an atrocious sickness of the times, ready for suicide of the soul in its despondency". It nearly destroyed the comic phenomenon in the Netherlands, which had only just begun recovering from the war years. The only exceptions were made for a small number of "healthy" comic productions from the Toonder Studio's, which included the by then considered literary comic strip Tom Poes. Reactions to the incident were not state-sanctioned initiatives, but rather spontaneous, popular responses.

Despite the upheaval the incident has caused in the Netherlands, Dutch authorities have refrained from ever passing laws or instituting agencies of the restrictive kind France, Germany and Canada – which had purely by chance experienced a near-similar comics related incident at almost the exact same time with a likewise lethal outcome – established, even though the former two countries had not experienced comic related incidents of the magnitude the Netherlands and Canada had. This was partly due to the fact that the moral panic surrounding the incident subsided rather quickly, as evidenced by the fact that the newspaper De Telegraaf resumed comic publication only weeks after the incident – even though that newspaper had had a leading hand in the uprising against the medium at the time – , and partly due to the fact, as Rutten himself had already implied, that the Dutch constitution simply did not allow for them, contrary to the ones of France and Germany which had allowances embedded for youth publications (see: Seduction of the Innocent), whereas Canada simply amended its Criminal Code, something Dutch authorities did not even consider. Not only that, but the phenomenon was not entirely without its own supporters, albeit from a freedom of expression point of view, as Dutch literary giant Godfried Bomans had worded at the time in his column of Elsevier, "The reading is healthy. The format in which she has been subordinated is merely flawed. This is an aesthetic flaw, not a moral one. By confusing these, we ignore the essence of the art of the novel." Still, while the Dutch comic world never went as far as their US and German counterparts did, i.e. establishing self-censuring institutions, they henceforth chose to err on the side of caution for the time being, until the advent of the comics magazine Pep in the 1960s.

1954: Tom Poes becomes Dutch literature

While being considered "healthy" and thus exempted from the purge resulting from the 1948 incident, Marten Toonder was not that confident that his Tom Poes (or any other from his studios for that matter) was out of the woods yet, and as a result he too, like Bomans, took a stand against the hysteria engulfing the country at the time, expressing his concerns in the 1949 Tom Poes story "Horror, de ademloze" through the words of Tom Poes' faithful friend, sidekick, companion, and all around gentleman Oliver B. Bommel (Oliver B. Bumble). In hindsight however, Toonder needed not to have worried personally. Tom Poes actually started out as a children's comic with the first six stories being written by Toonder's wife Phiny Dick; and indeed Toonder based his characters Tom Poes en Oliver B. Bommel – who made his first appearance in the third story – on the characters his wife had created for a children's book trilogy she had written and illustrated in the period 1939-1941: the (female) kitten "Miezelijntje", she herself considered the younger sister of Tom Poes, and the boy bear "Wol de Beer". Yet, from the moment Toonder made Tom Poes truly his own, his eloquent mastery of the Dutch language was quite early on recognized by critics as bonafide Dutch literature, only emphasized by the fact that several recurrent utterances by Oliver Bommel (who was such a popular figure, that he actually took over the series, retitled "Heer Bommel" – "Gentleman Bommel" – as the main protagonist in the later speech balloon versions) have percolated over the years into colloquial Dutch, such as "Als U begrijpt wat ik bedoel" ("If you know what I mean") and "Als U mij wilt verschonen" ("If you will excuse me"), and which was very much met with the approval of the conservative educators mentioned above, and the primary reason why his studio productions became exempt from the 1948/49 purge.

Toonder's growing renown as a literary author was formalized when he was invited to become a fellow of the prestigious "Maatschappij der Nederlandse Letterkunde" literary society in 1954, ironically the same year Fredric Wertham published his comic condemning Seduction of the Innocent treatise in the United States. As of 2020, the Toonder creations are the only Dutch comic creations formally recognized as Dutch cultural heritage albeit, and this can not be stressed enough, for its texts only, and not its art. Exemplary of this, is that Toonder's current literary publisher De Bezige Bij, Holland's most important purely literary publisher and for decades now Toonder's literary publisher, exclusively reprints Toonder's text comics only, dismissing all his latter-day balloon comics for (non-comic) Revue and Donald Duck magazines, including Tom Poes, as being outside, what they consider, Toonder canon. This stance is mirrored, and thus formalized, on the official website of the Literatuurmuseum (Holland's official, state-owned literature museum, located in The Hague), where only his text comics are given attention. Conceived as replacement for the by the Germans prohibited Micky Mouse Disney comic, its "quasi-protected" literature status has been an important contributing factor for Tom Poes en Oliver B. Bommel to become the longest running news paper text comic in Dutch comic history, well until after the text comic format had gone out of favor by the mid to late-1960s (when different Heer Bommel text balloon stories started to run concurrently in magazines). Published exclusively in the newspaper De Telegraaf, it ran almost uninterrupted – save for two short suspensions in the final six months of the war due to increased Nazi meddling with the newspaper, and a second, far shorter one in 1948 as explained above – from March 1941 until 1986. Remarkably, considering the fact that Godfried Bomans was already established as a figure of note in Dutch literature, his De Avonturen van Pa Pinkelman (all but forgotten nowadays) has not been accorded the same status.

The elevation of Tom Poes into "official" literature has also sparked a decades long tug-of-war between the Dutch literary world and the Dutch comics world over "spiritual ownership" of Toonder's creations, which only seemed to have died down after the adoption of the English expression "graphic novel" in the Netherlands in the late-1980s as well, being deemed acceptable to both sides of the discourse. Graphic novel translates into Dutch as "Beeldroman", and the Dutch expression was originally in use during the 1940s for a typical Dutch comic format, which was precisely the format targeted by, and not surviving, the purge of 1948 (see below), though the Dutch expression itself was resurrected as translation for graphic novel by the literary world, whereas the Dutch comics world prefers the use of the English expression. Exemplary of the tug-of-war between the two worlds as far as the Toonder comics were concerned, is, while De Bezige Bij only publishes his work according to their definition of Toonder canon, that Hans Matla's publishing house Panda Uitgeverij has proceeded with several bibliographical/bibliophilic "integrale" publications of the entirety of Toonder's main body of work, including his latter-day speech balloon creations, and thus approaching the subject matter from a comics art point of view.

Yet, the literary status of Tom Poes also came at a cost; Toonder making the fullest use of the intricacies of the Dutch language – in the process actually inventing some new Dutch language – also meant that the appeal of his creations remained mostly limited to Dutch-Europe, as translation in foreign languages was bedevilishly difficult to achieve without having much of its nuances and subtleties, having become the corner stones for Tom Poes in the first place, being lost in translation. This was especially pertinent for the Romance languages, including French, where very few Toonder creations are known to exist in translation, contrary to the Germanic languages – including English as Toonder, having acquired the language skills during his world travels before the war, had actually created some original Tom Puss stories in English for the British market – , particularly the Scandinavian ones due to their grammatical similarities. Of the two Dutch greats, Hans G. Kresse therefore became the more translated one, but who is otherwise shunned by the Dutch cultural authorities.

The 1950s and 1960s: Recovery

In the wake of the 1948 upheaval, the Dutch comic world initially relied predominantly on "healthy" imports, apart from their own Toonder Studios productions and the already established Robbedoes and Kuifje magazines which resumed distribution after the short-lived suspension, with 1952 marking the introduction of the most popular Dutch comics magazine, when Donald Duck published its first Dutch-language issue. It, in initial conjunction with the Toonder Studio's, quickly became a national institution and published, apart from Disney comics, also comic series from former Toonder Studio's artists like Thom Roep and Piet Wijn's earlier mentioned Douwe Dabbert (1971-2001) and Van Nul tot Nu (1982) by Thom Roep and Co Loerakker. Douwe Dabbert went on to become one of the great success stories of Dutch comics.

In the wake of Donald Duck, other comics from American origin, which were immensely popular in the country in the interbellum era (as indeed they were in the rest of Europe) made their reappearance in the country as well, when National Periodical Publications (the later DC Comics) opened a local branch in 1956 in the town of Huizen, Classics Lektuur, made responsible for the Dutch translations and distribution of their comic productions. With what was originally named Classics Nederland (later rechristened Williams Nederland before its final name), the Netherlands had actually received its first specialized comic book publisher, though care was taken with the sensibilities still present in the country as the company initially started out with the publication of predominantly "safe" series, the most conspicuous one having been the translated version of Classics Illustrated, and after which the Dutch subsidiary was named to begin with. Regaining the popularity they had before the war (contrary to France and Belgium, where American comics failed to make a comeback, the Disney productions excepted), particularly in mid-1960s to early 1970s era after attitudes towards the medium had relaxed when comic series of a less edifying nature were added to the array, American style comics went out of vogue in translation by the end of the 1970s, being increasingly supplanted in popularity by the Franco-Belgian style comics, both native and in translation from their originating countries, which also resulted in the demise of the company itself.

Still, exemplary of the cautious course the Dutch comic scene embarked upon after the 1948 incident was the advent of the magazines Taptoe (1953-2016) and Okki (1953-) in the early 1950s – both reinventions of older, pre-war Catholic school magazines and later followed by Jippo (1974-1984) – , all of them of an educational nature and grounded in the Catholic faith, aimed at the pre-adolescent primary school youth, and widely disseminated in schools around the nation in the era, especially the Catholic south of the country. Like their French counterparts of the era, the Fleurus presse publications such as Cœurs Vaillants and the like, the magazines featured plenty of comics, albeit of an edifying nature in the text comics format initially, but unlike the Fleurus publications, they did provide a stepping stone for native comic talents to start out their respective careers in the speech balloon format like Willy Lohmann, Piet Wijn, Jan Steeman, Jan Kruis, Fred Julsing, Gerrit de Jager, Joost Swarte and Patty Klein (one of the very few female comic artists who started out in the era as such after her apprenticeship at the Toonder Studio's), eventually supplanting the increasingly obsolete text format comics created by artists now forgotten. All these artist had to start out in such publications as the only original Dutch-language comic magazine publications either went out of business very quickly, as was the case with the native magazines, or were not willing to provide any space for these budding Dutch talents at the time, as was the case with the two Flemish magazines, who were very protective of their own native Belgian artists, then and later on. Dick Matena, Paul Teng and Peter de Smet are the only Dutch comic artists known to have been directly contracted by Kuifje publisher Le Lombard for direct album publications without prior magazine publication (excepting some of De Smet's Viva Zapapa short gags, which were pre-published in the magazine), whereas Gerrit Stapel, Toon van Driel, Gerrit de Jager, Geerard Lever, Henk Kuijpers and, again, Peter de Smet are the only Dutch comic artists known to have been contracted by Dupuis to contribute to their Robbedoes magazine for a short period of time in the 1980s only, most of whom not seeing their creations issued as albums by the publisher afterwards. As of 2017, Okki is still in existence, contrary to most of their successors who followed suit in their wake, but its role in the Dutch comic scene has been all but played out.

Yet, hard on the heels of these edifying publications, came the first purely Dutch initiated comic magazines aimed at an adolescent readership without the edifying nature of the Catholic magazines, which included Sjors van de Rebellenclub (1950-1976, featuring predominantly comics from British origin initially, though from the start Dutch creations were included such as those from Bert Bus and in particular those of the titular hero by Frans Piët after whom the magazine was named, at a later point in time added upon with creations by artists who had started out for the Catholic magazines, Jan Steenman, Jan Kruis and Patty Klein in particular), Fix & Foxi (1959-1966; while largely a translated variant of the German source publication – itself the German answer to Donald Duck – it afforded Dutch readers one of the first opportunities to become acquainted with post-war comics of predominantly French origins as the magazine already contained comics from early volumes of French Pilote magazine) and Pep (1962-1975, cooperating in the early years with Disney, Toonder Studios, and Le Lombard – the parent publisher of Kuifje magazine – , especially featuring creations from Hans G. Kresse who had worked for both the former two). One of the most popular series that became published in Sjors was the British comic series The Trigan Empire, whose artist, Don Lawrence (creating his series directly in colors in the Frank Hampson tradition, something hitherto not seen before in the Dutch comic world), was yet to play a role of note in the Dutch comic world. Also mentionable was Arend weekly magazine (1955-1956, where Hampson's Dan Dare creation had seen partial publication as Daan Durf), a translated variant of the contemporary British comic magazine Eagle. But it was Tina magazine (1967-), likewise initially a translated version of British magazine Princess Tina, but unlike the source publication, from the start executed in color, that has become the most notable one of the British inspired magazines as a girls' magazine which published a lot of comics, predominantly from British origin (albeit it mostly drawn by anonymous Spanish Fleetway studios artists), just like Sjors magazine had at first. And like Sjors, Tina would provide a platform for Dutch talents like Kruis, Steeman and Klein to flourish, unsurprisingly perhaps as both magazines were at the time published by Dutch publishing house Uitgeverij en Drukkerij De Spaarnestad, contrary to Pep magazine which was published by its big competitor of the time, De Geïllustreerde Pers.

Pep magazine

However, it was Pep in particular that turned out to be an emancipating force for the Dutch comic world, freeing it from the shackles of 1948 while coaching on the winds of the social and cultural changes that not only swept the Netherlands, but the entire western world in the 1960s. From the mid-1960s onward the magazine reinvented itself when it quite radically distanced itself from its Disney and Le Lombard roots, as comics from these publishing houses already appeared in the competing Donald Duck and Kuifje, whereas the comics from the French magazine Pilote (est. 1959, and itself susceptible to the cultural changes taking place, especially from the May 1968 events in France onwards), with which Pep now aligned itself with and henceforth increasingly featuring productions from that magazine, had not yet seen a wide dissemination in the Netherlands – and Flanders for that matter. It was Pep which introduced Dutch readership to great Franco-Belgian comic classics from the Dargaud stable like Roodbaard (Charlier and Hubinon), Blueberry (Charlier en Giraud; The previous introduction in 1965 of these two having failed in Fix & Foxi, as that magazine targeted an entirely different age readership, thus remaining unnoticed), and most conspicuously Asterix (Goscinny and Uderzo), which ran in the magazine from its very inception to become one of the all-time most popular comic series in the Netherlands, as indeed it became in the rest of Europe. Other Pilote comics introduced to Dutch readership concerned Olivier Blunder (Greg) en Ravian (Christin en Mézières), as well as the poetic comic Philémon from Fred and the satirical comics from Marcel Gotlib at a later point in time. It was through Pep, together with its Kuifje and Robbedoes contemporaries, that Franco-Belgian comics and their native derivatives started to occupy their preeminent place in the Dutch comic scene in earnest.

It was Pep magazine (and its successor Eppo) that saw such first-time original publications of Dutch comic world mainstays, like Martin Lodewijk's Agent 327 (1967-1985; 2000- ... ), Dick Matena and Lo Hartog van Banda's De Argonautjes (1970-1980), Gideon Brugman's Ambrosius (1970-1974), Fred Julsink's Wellington Wish (1971-1973), Peter de Smet's De Generaal (1971-2003), Jan Steeman and Andries Brandt's Roel Dijkstra (1977-1995), Henk Kuijpers's Franka (1974-...), originally as Het Misdaadmuseum) and Hanco Kolk and Peter de Wit's Gilles de Geus (1985-2003).

It was not only the young generation of Dutch comic artists who found a fruitful platform for their creations in the magazine, Pep also provided the veteran Hans G. Kresse with a venue for what can be considered his second comics career. Attached to the magazine from the very start, Kresse not only provided illustrations for the magazine's editorials and short prose stories as well as magazine covers on behalf of the other magazine artists in the early years, but also started to create his early magazine comic series in the increasingly popular speech balloon format (thereby abandoning the text comic format in which he had achieved fame) of which Zorro (1964-1967) was the best known at that time. Together with the Asterix artists, Kresse was one of the very few magazine artists who survived the radical formula change Pep implemented a few years into its existence, and major series he created for the magazine afterwards were the aforementioned Vidocq and Erwin, de zoon van Eric de Noorman (spinoff series of Eric de Noorman, centered around his son Erwin). During his tenure at the magazine, Kresse started to take a keen interest in the plight of the Native-Americans and started to express this in a series of one-shot comic stories, increasingly featuring his indignation over the historical treatment of Native-Americans by the Europeans, which included Matho Tonga, De wraak van Minimic (both 1970), Mangas Coloradas: Woestijn van wraak (1971–72) and Wetamo: De heks van Pocasset (1972–73). In the process, Kresse actually became one of the first comic artists anywhere who started to paint a more even-keeled, realistic and human picture of the Native-American, who was hitherto commonly depicted in comics as either an uncivilized bloodthirsty barbarian or as the equally unrealistic "noble savage". In this, Kresse became the forerunner of such artists as the Swiss Derib (Buddy Longway, Celui-qui-est-né-deux-fois), the Frenchmen Michel Blanc-Dumont and Laurence Harlé (Jonathan Cartland) and the Dutchman Paul Teng (Delgadito), who later on explored the social intricacies of the Native-American world in greater detail in their creations. The increasing, more adult social engagement Kresse exhibited in these works, was something new in Dutch youth comic magazines and were precursors to his acclaimed Indianen reeks, one of the first mainstream Dutch comic creations which (together with his last two one-shots, Wetamo in particular) were later recognized as early Dutch precursors of what was later coined "graphic novels", as in works featuring more mature and adult themes. Kresse remained attached to Pep and its successors for the remainder of his life, one of his last creations having been a new latter-day speech balloon format addition to his most famous series Eric de Noorman he had abandoned in 1964, De vrouw in het blauw (1985), which was followed by De geschiedenis van Bor Khan (1988–89) – actually a partially redrawn speech balloon adaption of the original version he had already created back in 1952/1953 in the text comic format, and which became the last recreation he completed before his death in 1992.

Despite its relatively short lifespan in comparison to its Flemish counterparts, but like its main inspiration Pilote has had on its, Pep magazine has left an indelible impression on an entire generation of young Dutch comic readers and future comic artists, but considerably less so on their Flemish contemporaries, they having traditionally been more oriented on their own Robbedoes and Kuifje magazines. A possible partial explanation of this is that several Dutch artists either worked in humorous and satirical references to Dutch current affairs in their creations (de Smet), had their creations take place in typical Dutch settings or circumstances (Kuijpers), or both (Lodewijk), which were lost on foreigners not familiar with these, therefore diminishing their appeal initially. Nonetheless, after the European Single Market came into being in 1993, the mobility of its citizens among the European Union member states has vastly increased, with the younger generations in particular becoming more intimately acquainted with local cultures, and which has played a part in the delayed introduction and acceptance of some of the typically Dutch comic creations in other language areas as well. This held especially true for Piet Wijn's Douwe Dabbert and Henk Kuijper's Franka – both of them far less beholden to Dutch current affairs than the others – , which have seen translations in more European languages afterwards.

Post-Pep-era comics artists, very popular in the Netherlands themselves, but who found the appeal of their bodies of work predominantly limited to the native market for the same reasons, included such artists as Gerrit de Jager (De familie Doorzon), Theo van den Boogaard (Sjef van Oekel), Eric Schreurs (Joop Klepzeiker), and Marnix Rueb (Haagse Harry), as remains the case with Martin Lodewijk (even though German translations of his Agent 327 have been attempted) and Peter de Smet. Incidentally and concurrently, the same holds conversely true for Dutch-Belgium, whose comic artists, like Marc Sleen or Jef Nys for example, find the appeal of their work mostly limited to native Flanders.

The 1970s and 1980s: Heyday

In the field of adult comics magazines Tante Leny presenteert! (1970-1978), Modern Papier (1971-1972) and De Vrije Balloen (1975-1983) were the most notable. From the 1960s on more American comics were imported, with the Dutch edition of the American Mad Magazine also had a lot of success and ran from 1964 until 1996, with a brief resurrection in 2011–2012. Sjors and Pep themselves later merged into Eppo (1975-1985), subsequently renamed as Eppo Wordt Vervolgd (1985-1988), Sjors en Sjimmie Maandblad (1988-1994), SjoSjii (1994-1998), Striparazzi (1998-1999) and again as Eppo in 2009. In the early 1980s the punk comic Red Rat was launched which soon became a cult classic of the Dutch squatters movement.

It's notable that the Netherlands were one of the few European countries to still publish text comics well into the 1960s, when the attitude towards comics began to change. In 1967 a center for comics fans, Het Stripschap, was founded, with their own specialized subject magazine Stripschrift. In 1968 the third-oldest comics store in the world, Lambiek was founded, with the country receiving its own comics museum in Groningen, "Het Nederlands Stripmuseum", in 2004.