ABSTRACT
Comics, manga and graphic novels are closely related types of graphic narrative whose lineage can be traced to prehistoric graffiti, medieval tapestries and eighteenth- and nineteenth-century prints and protocomics, but whose present form “is closely related to the emergence of mass-media, due to new means of mass reproduction and an increasing readership of the printed media”. The development of many continental European comics industries and cultures in the early 1930s can be seen largely as the result of translation practices. The new brand of comic magazines issued by a handful of Italian, French and Spanish publishers and literary agents prominently featured translated American stories. Interest in comics translation reflects a widening of the scope of translation studies as well as a general increase in the interest in comics as a field of academic enquiry. Four main areas of interest can be discerned in research on comics translation, although with considerable overlaps.
