World Enough and Time

I have been, in my fannish fashion, trying to make my own list of the Ten Best Comics of 2012. (Still working on it.) In doing so, I was looking at other people's list of the Ten Best Comics of 2012, which I found interesting. One comic turning up constantly was Hawkeye by Fraction and Aja, and I agree: it's brilliant, and stands out above all the others.

Another comic which got a lot of notice was Saga by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples. I'd looked at it on the stands, attracted by the art.



I probably would have bought it on spec if it hadn't been written by Brian K. Vaughan. Yes, I know, everyone in the world of comics loves his work, especially the award-winning Y, the Last Man, but I hadn't been much impressed with that or anything else I'd read by him. His Runaways was good, but still didn't really pull me in. Which is okay: chacun à son gout.

But so many sites mentioned Saga that when I was in the Silver Snail today, I looked at issue #7. I read page two. I did a double-take.

The characters were talking Esperanto.

I love it. How many comics do you read where they speak Esperanto? Of course I had to buy it.

Enjoyed it, too. There isn't a lot of Esperanto, and you don't need to be able to read any of it - the story is carried in the narrative captions in English. It's clear Vaughan didn't take the time to figure out Esperanto grammar - the easiest grammar ever, you can learn it in an hour. I can understand that he wouldn't want to spend an few hour on it, but when the boy said to his dog in Esperanto, "To be correct posterior, Rumfer" I had to double-translate it in my mind: "I'll be back, Rumfer." Is there significance to the name "Rumfer"? Something to do with Vaughan's Buffy work?

Later on, he uses as infinitive when he should have used the imperative, but that's okay too - it was a magical spell and one can argue that magical spells are immune to grammar, and don't need to make sense.

On the other hand, his first three word balloons in Esperanto are spot-on, and I'm tickled he used it at all. I imagine previous issues don't have it, as this was a flashback.

I liked the story enough to want to go back and get the precious issues, too. The art really is lovely, and the characters intriguing.

And, hey. Esperanto. If the characters come from an Esperanto-speaking planet, they've got my attention.