It’s not a cheerful comment, but when Oor Wullie says: “It’s a sair fecht,” it seems to strike a chord.
Literally, “sair fecht” means sore fight in the Scots language but translates idiomatically as: “It’s a hard life.”
Anyway, the standard size edition is nearly exhausted – there are about ten left of the edition of 200.
So, if you’ve been meaning to get one, now’s the time.
This panel is taken from The Sunday Post, Dundee, which has been carrying strips featuring Oor Wullie – and his sister strip The Broons – since 1936. I am the first and only screenprinter with permission to use the images of The Broons and Oor Wullie in my work.
Oor Wullie’s characteristics are spiky hair, dungarees and he often sits on an upturned bucket to sum up his situation for us.
The strip was drawn by the legendary draftsman Dudley D. Watkins, who continued to draw the characters until his death in 1969. They are still appearing every week in The Sunday Post.
I especially enjoy using Watkins’s panels in my screenprints as they were drawn so well – he took great pains to give each panel a well balanced composition. And with just a few lines he was able to give a huge range of expressions to his characters.
The Broons and Oor Wullie have become hugely popular across Scotland – and often seem to regarded as part of Scots’ extended families.
I love the stories for their invention and the language that the characters use – it’s full of Scottish turns of phrase which you don’t often see elsewhere.
The Broons and Oor Wullie are known to every Scot – wherever they may be. Many of my customers are Scots or the children or grandchildren of Scots who live outside Scotland.
This is selected, like many of my panels and images, from the 1960s and 1970s, and should make a great gift to anybody who is into retro, vintage, old school design. I tend to choose material from this era because it was the time I was growing up and my tastes and preferences were being formed. But also it’s a pre-digital age, and the drawings are all made by hand rather than computer aided. Obviously, as I’m a screenprinter, I’m biased in favour of the handmade, so this style is right up my street. I hope it is yours.
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