[Bluey and Curley]. GURNEY, Alex

Bluey and Curley. Kokoda Trail, Buna, Milne Bay, Etc. A 'News' Feature [cover title]

Adelaide, News Limited, [1943].

Large oblong octavo, 52 pages (including the covers) with an illustrated introduction, 47 pages of comic strips, and advertisements on three sides of the covers.

Colour-pictorial title-wrappers; tiny chips to the ends of the spine; text paper uniformly tanned; in excellent condition.

'That Bluey and Curley have ever heard of Ulysses is more than doubtful, yet their wanderings and adventures bear comparison with his. Piloted by their gifted creator, Alex Gurney, they have, since their impudent entry to The News three years ago, girdled half the globe with grins' (the introduction). Alexander George (Alex) Gurney (1902-1955) 'was already well established as a caricaturist, cartoonist, and comic strip artist ... [when, in] late 1939, following the outbreak of World War II, he created his most famous characters, Bluey and Curley, which first appeared in the "Picture-News" magazine.... It was transferred to "The Sun News-Pictorial" in 1940' and was widely syndicated. The Annuals were published from 1941 to 1960. After Gurney's death, 'the strip was drawn by Norman Howard Rice (1911-1956). Rice died as the result of a car accident on 31 December 1956 ... The strip was then drawn by Les Dixon from 1957 until 1975' (Wikipedia). The strip featured a pair of soldiers, red-headed Bluey, the Great War veteran who had re-enlisted in the Second AIF, and Curley (the hair again), the new recruit. 'As an accredited war correspondent, Gurney visited army camps throughout Australia to obtain authentic detail and gain a feel for military life; he contracted malaria in August 1944 while visiting New Guinea. The strip made "superb use of Australian idiom and slang", and had an "instinctive understanding and interpretation of the Australian male"' ('Australian Dictionary of Biography').

'Although Bluey and Curley were popular with Australians because they related to the slang, attitude, and the lack of respect towards authority exhibited by the main characters, the strip lost some of its appeal and readership when the pair returned to "civvy street"' (Wikipedia again - although a 37-year run is not bad by any reckoning).