Bettina of Nicht-alle-Tage-Buch describes a comic for young people to appear in January, from the EU parliament, on the topic of water pollution (with picture of a strip). It can be ordered free of charge here. That’s in German. The brochure is 40 pages long and called Trübe Wasser (in English Troubled Waters).
Here is a BBC News article on the subject (January 2003). So this is old news in English. MEP Roger Helmer quotes himself:
bq. Commenting on the launch, East Midlands Euro-MP Roger Helmer said:
“It seems that the European Parliament has found its natural level with the publication of this comic book, stuffed full of self-congratulatory claptrap and Euro-propaganda. Civil servants in the parliament have clearly failed in their duty of political neutrality. I will be demanding to know who authorised this initiative, and how much of our tax-payers’ money has been squandered on it”.
Of course, Belgium has a great history of comic art: Suske en Wiske, Tintin, and apparently even the Smurfs.
LATER NOTE: I misread that: the comic is said to be already available in 11 languages and Bettina has already received her copy.
Maybe I wasn’t quite clear in my entry. The German version, too, has been there for some time (I only got my copy a few days ago).
No, my fault, I misread.
Is it worth having? I suppose you can always give it to a young person for Christmas…cheap present.
Exactly. My cartoon-mad son quite likes it. I enjoyed the pictures of familiar places in Brussels. There are also some (illustrated) explanations about EU terms. If you like comics at all, I should think it’s worth having.