Prince Valiant – serie

The 11th volume of Fantagraphics' award-winning Prince Valiant series concludes our hero's adventures in Cornwall and marks the first appearance of Arvak the Red Stallion. At the Council of Kings, Prince Valiant stands alone in the decision to avoid a ruinous war. Val returns to Aleta and the two are summoned to Camelot - where Queen Guinevere becomes jealous of Aleta's popularity. Meanwhile Val leads a bloody campaign to secure the Eastern marshes and learns the tragedy of war.

Readers might think that the birth of Prince Valiant's son Arn at the end of the previous volume would have slowed Val's adventuring, but they would be wrong. After the baby has been christened, Valiant and Gawain end up in pitched battle at the aptly-named Castle Illwynde. Then it's off to Scotland to battle the Picts, and then home yet again for Val to visit his growing boy. This volume also features an escape through the Alps, far many too red-headed girls and a tragic, life-changing event for the young squire Geoffrey.

The latest classic instalment of Foster's sumptuous epic continues through the 1950s. Our tenth volume finds our band of heroes making their way back to the kingdom of Thule via Constantinople and Eastern Russia. Soon they are attacked by a tribe of barbarians who kidnap Aleta for the great Dragada Khan who wants to make her one of his wives. After nearly being killed in battle, Valiant returns to his homeland only to find the threat of hunger hovers over Thule.

During a journey back to her Misty Isles kingdom, Aleta is hypnotised and abducted by a wizard. Val pursues them to the evil Hashida's cavernous domain, only to learn that Aleta can rescue herself. Aleta's younger sister Helene is gambled away by her husband to a Corsair mercenary, drawing Prince Valiant and his Singing Sword into a deadly duel. And in between battles, romance has its way with kings, wizards, and slaves. This edition includes a large gallery of Hal Foster's art for the 1930 U.S. Naval Academy yearbook, and an interview with Mad artist Angelo Torres.

Hal Foster's Prince Valiant continues as one of the all-time magnificent adventure comics ever conceived and Fantagraphics' reprinting is the loveliest treatment of the strip in the history of publishing. In vol. 16, Prince Valiant is sent on a mission to track down a missing, lovesick heir, but when his retrieval is too late, Val becomes a practiced mentor to the reluctant leader.

We begin this volume with Prince Valiant going on his most daring, and perhaps most dangerous, quest yet: winning back the heart of Queen Aleta. Of course, things don't go as planned as Aleta's rival suitor organises a deadly search party for the gallant Valiant. Back in Camelot, the troubled Zanedon reveals himself to be a runaway groom as the mischievous twins, Karen and Valeta, hide him in their stable. Prince Arn quenches a coup, Val ends a tyrant's reign with tough love, and domestic chaos runs amok when a poet with a wandering eye makes the Misty Isles his playground.

In the ninth volume of the collected illustrative Sunday comic pages, Arn tries his hand at being a warrior, Merlin is bewitched by Nimue and Tillicum and Boltar have a son named Hatha - the first interracial baby born' in comics. As with all the previous volumes in this highly acclaimed series, these pages are reproduced for the first time from Foster's personal set of colour engraver's proofs, the most impeccably produced Prince Valiant series ever produced.'

In Fantagraphics' latest volume of the award-winning series, Prince Valiant is sent to defend the borders against invading barbarians, but it is young Arn who takes centre stage as he travels to his homeland and loses his heart to Lydia, daughter of Haakon the Sea-Rover. Also includes the 1943 comic-strip adaptation by Hal Foster of Frank Werfel's popular novel The Song of Bernadette. Sam and Silo co-creator and Beetle Bailey gag-writer Jerry Dumas introduces this volume with a remembrance of his friendship with Prince Valiant artist John Cullen Murphy.

A scoundrel has ruled over the continent's troubadours for the past three years, introducing scum and villainy into their ranks. Arn and Court Jester sir Dinadan travel to France to set things right, while Prince Valiant accompanies the headstrong Gunther of Germany on his quest to recover stolen holy relics and claim a wife in Jerusalem. The mercenary army of a Persian warlord sweeps across the Middle East, forcing Queen Aleta to seek refuge in a hidden utopian city ruled by women. Val competes in tournaments in Marseille and Camelot and reunites with Sir Lancelotm but a tragic death impacts a member of Val's family. Plus: more dazzling commercial illustration work by Hal Foster.