28 March, 2024
"Dickie and Birdbath Watch the Woggle" p.1 of episode, excerpt, from 'Knockout' (originally Spirou & Fantasio #12 'Le nid des Marsupilami'; ill. Franquin; Copyright (c) 1957, 1960? by Dupuis, Fleetway Publications and the artist; image from facebook.com, by Steve Bennett)

It’s Official: Dickie and Birdbath Watch the Woggle

"Dickie and Birdbath Watch the Woggle" p.1 of episode, excerpt, from 'Knockout' (originally Spirou & Fantasio #12 'Le nid des Marsupilami'; ill. Franquin; Copyright (c) 1957, 1960? by Dupuis, Fleetway Publications and the artist; image from facebook.com, by Steve Bennett)

Sent to the Spirou Reporter Facebook page by Steve Bennett, a fantastic find: possibly the first English version of Spirou & Fantasio! Turns out that the adventure Le nid des Marsupilamis (Spirou & Fantasio #12 “The Nest of the Marsupilamis”) was printed in the weekly British boys’ magazine Knockout, which featured comics and illustrated stories. The adventure ran in 1960 under the odd title “Dickie and Birdbath Watch the Woggle” in black and white and at two pages per week. “Dickie” is Spirou, “Birdbath”(!) Fantasio, and the “Woggle” the Marsupilami. Seccotine seems to go by the name “Cousin Constance”, and the female Marsupilami is the “Wiggle”.

"Dickie and Birdbath Watch the Woggle" p.1 of episode, from 'Knockout&#039, 2. July 1960 (originally Spirou & Fantasio #12 'Le nid des Marsupilami'; ill. Franquin; Copyright (c) 1957, 1960 by Dupuis, Fleetway Publications and the artist; image from facebook.com, by Steve Bennett)

"Dickie and Birdbath Watch the Woggle" p.2 of episode, from 'Knockout&#039, 2. July 1960 (originally Spirou & Fantasio #12 'Le nid des Marsupilami'; ill. Franquin; Copyright (c) 1957, 1960? by Dupuis, Fleetway Publications and the artist; image from facebook.com, by Steve Bennett)

This installment is from the 2. July, 1960 issue.

Spirou Reporter

I grew up reading Spirou in Scandinavian translations. Now I'm learning French and trying to decode the originals.

View all posts by Spirou Reporter →

28 thoughts on “It’s Official: Dickie and Birdbath Watch the Woggle

  1. That is an amazing find. Fleetway Publications, who published “Knockout”, also published the first Benoît Brisefer story by Peyo in “Giggle” in the late 1960s. I wonder if they published any other Franco-Belgian strips?

    1. As “Tammy Tuff”, so they’d have had some discussion with Dupuis.

      Fleetway also translated “Tanguy et Laverdure” as “The Flying Furies” (Jim Power and Terry Madden) in Lion, but that was a Dargaud comic series…

      1. Despite translating the female Marsupilami as “Wiggle”, they decided not to translate her “Houbi” sounds, so now there’s no correspondence between the sounds of her and the male…

          1. According to Wikipedia, Giggle published “Lucky Luke” under the name of “Buck Bingo”.

Leave a Reply to Håkan Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *