"Little Nemo in Slumberland" dated January 15, 1911:
Transcript of Tweets by @LittleNemo1905 (MARCH 14, 2021):
First, I gotta say that the way McCay connects Boston and Montreal (through an abundance of snow) is quite well done. - 1/24
It's a fun little nod to the shared experience of both Americans and Canadians in these locations… just insane winters. - 2/24
Personally, I love winter and could not agree more with the owls comment about how winter "beautifies" the city. This Canuck is definitely a fan of the snow. - 3/24
Today we receive another second panel postcard written by our very own Nemo mailed to the children of Boston! - 4/24
It is quite complementary, much like the one left in New York, and would certainly be a fun little message to all of McCay's readers in Boston! - 5/24
Panel 6 is interesting because it demonstrates some visual-narrative continuity from the last strip. - 6/24
Recall that the Captain yelled at Impie to keep out of the Pilot House last strip? Well, today, he stays out. - 7/24
This is disappointing to me. Poor Impie continues to be treated poorly and now we're seeing the repercussions of it play out in real time… - 8/24
It continues to seem likely that McCay kept Impie around for little more than the occasional depictions of mistreatment as gag… - 9/24
I mean, he has maintained a position within the periphery for quite some time now and is rarely an active agent within the strip… so why else? - 10/24
This is disappointing, but sadly (as we've discussed many times before) reflective of early 20th century attitudes. - 11/24
Back to the strip, Nemo is the only one who doesn’t want to land the airship… which does, in fact, turn out to be the right decision because in the next panel it is buried in snow. - 12/24
Again, I want to comment on the really severe expectations for closure between panel 6 and 7. - 13/24
A significant amount of time must have passed from panel 6 to 7. Presumably, they are still up in the air when they're discussing landing and then in the next panel they're buried. - 14/24
It's a really jarring transition, in my opinion. - 15/24
It's only exacerbated by the dialogue occurring in the panel, as well. It seems as if we've missed an entire exchange between Flip and the young boy before getting to where the dialogue starts here. - 16/24
I imagine Flip calling out and asking how far from Montreal they are, then the boy replying with something about Mount Royal. Cue panel 7 dialogue. - 17/24
Of course, the Mount Royal comment is a bit of an etymological joke. While there are a few contradictory hypotheses regarding how the city got its name, the most common is that it was a variant of "Mount Royal": - 18/24
Finally, I'm wondering about how (or if at all) Canadian children could read #LittleNemo's exploits? Does anyone know? - 19/24
Canemaker doesn't seem to mention and I haven't (yet) been able to find any recorded evidence of whether it was concurrently (or otherwise) ever published in Canada through syndication. - 20/24
This is something I'm interested in finding out about… were the children of Canada as able to follow along with Nemo's exploits in their cities like the American children were? - 21/24
Or were these visits to Canada more about sharing the sights of McCay's (potential) homeland with young American's who may not have visited the Great White North? - 22/24
Either way, welcome to Canada Nemo! - 23/24
This is my reading of "Little Nemo in Slumberland" #275. What's yours? - 24/24
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