Squeans, Plewds and Briffits
In a March 24, 1946 article for This Week magazine (which was included as a Sunday supplement in many newspapers), Charles Rice coined names for various symbols that appeared in comic strips. For example, he said that 'briffits' were the dust clouds left behind when a character is running, and 'plewds' were the drops of sweat emanating from the character.
Cartoonist Mort Walker (of Beetle Bailey fame) later expanded Rice's brief list into an entire Lexicon of Comicana (1980).
According to wikipedia, these terms now "sometimes appear in dictionaries, and serve as convenient terminology occasionally used by cartoonists and critics."
More info: Wikipedia; The Lexicon of Comicana (Internet Archive)
Cartoonist Mort Walker (of Beetle Bailey fame) later expanded Rice's brief list into an entire Lexicon of Comicana (1980).
According to wikipedia, these terms now "sometimes appear in dictionaries, and serve as convenient terminology occasionally used by cartoonists and critics."
More info: Wikipedia; The Lexicon of Comicana (Internet Archive)
Indianapolis Star - Mar 24, 1946
Comments
From the example a briffit looks more like a fart than running.
Posted by F.U.D. in Stockholm on 12/10/24 at 02:26 PM
Warning: TVTropes link!
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BriffitsAndSqueans
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BriffitsAndSqueans
Posted by Richard Bos on 12/14/24 at 12:43 PM
Category: Languages | Comics | 1940s