Ask a Bookseller: ‘Mafalda: Book One’ by Quino

On The Thread’s Ask a Bookseller series, we talk to independent booksellers all over the country to find out what books they’re most excited about right now.Calvin isn’t the only six-year-old comic strip character with deep thoughts about how the world should work. Meet Mafalda, star of the classic comic strip created by Argentine artist Quino. Timothy Otte of Wild Rumpus Books in Minneapolis says the first book of collected Mafalda comics is now available in English, as translated by Frank Wynne. Here’s how Otte introduces Mafalda: “Mafalda is a six-year-old genius. Imagine Lucy from the Peanuts gang if she were written by a Latin American Bill Waterson. Mafalda is smart and obsessed with democracy. She hates soup, and she and her friends discuss politics day in and day out. She's wonderful. I think she's so funny.” The comic strip, written in Spanish, ran from 1964 to 1973 and was distributed around the world. Its illustration style is similar to Charles Schulz’s “Peanuts.” Otte says its comments and humor still feel relevant today. “It's such an open-hearted kind of politics. It has the kind of humor that is very much geared toward young readers, but that adults will also find a lot of really unique and wonderful jokes in as well."