EXTRACTS: British War Comics Illustrators Special © 2018 The Book Palace (144 PAGES in Full edition)

4 All Images © IPC Media Anyway to cut to the chase, U.K. comic publishers, canny folk that they are, were evidently cognisant of the need to provide some form of therapy for those thus afflicted, and this they did with considerable brio. In September 1958 Amalgamated Press (later Fleetway) launched the first two issues of a new series of pocket-sized comics under the banner of War Picture Library, and created a comics revolution in the process. The success of these comics was phenomenal, and they continued in one form or another for much of the next thirty years, and, even now their one time rival, Commando comics, are still being published. The genesis of these war comics came on the back of the re-orientation of one of Amalgamated Press’s earlier pocket library series. Thriller Picture Library had first hit the news-stands back in 1951, when under its earlier banner of Thriller Comics Library, it had presented comic-strip adaptations of children’s classics such as ‘Tom Brown’s School Days’, ‘Jane Eyre’, and ‘The Three Musketeers’, much in the manner of the US comics series Classics Illustrated . The series was initially edited by Edward Holmes, but it was the legendary Leonard Matthews, whose drive, vision, and sheer enterprise had revolutionised post-war children’s comics, who turned the series into one of the most successful comics of its day. However, by 1959 the appetite for much of the title’s mainstay themes— swashbuckling adventurers, and the Wild West —had paled, and new subject matter of an altogether grittier fare was beginning to gain traction. New characters such as Dogfight Dixon , Spy 13 , and Battler Britton were appearing on a regular basis, and their adventures were being drawn by a new influx of artists. Names such as Renzo Calegari, Gino D’Antonio, and Giorgio De Gaspari, indicated that editors were looking farther afield for art talent. Spain and Italy provide some excellent artists to fulfil this requirement, especially the Dami Studio which provided many of the artists who were subsequently to work on the war-themed pocket libraries. ABOVE TOP: Renzo Calegari's depiction of the horrors of war from 'Red Devils Don't Die', War Picture Library No. 251. ABOVE & FACING PAGE: Cover for War Picture Library No. 36. Giorgio De Gaspari was the pre- eminent cover artist for WPL 's early years.