Prince Valiant Volume 16: 1967-1968

Prince Valiant Volume 16: 1967-1968
Published by Fantagraphics Books, Inc .,Seattle.
Publication date of reprint book: 2017
Author and artist: Hal Foster
Cost: $ 34.99
ISBN: 978-1-38396-064-5
Reviewed by: Allen Klingelhoets

Quote from back cover:

In Prince Valiant’s 16th volume, Hal Foster’s evocative art brings to life the halcyon wonders of Camelot’s autumn hunt, during which Aleta loses her skirt to a charging stag and a drugged Arn becomes a crazed berserker. Enslaved by the Governor of Balda Han, Val engineers a revolt. Queen Aleta returns to the Misty Isles to learn that the merchants and nobles control the wealth, yet the workers are overtaxed and underpaid. The marriage of Val and Aleta is finally honored by a wedding feast, but the abduction of Aleta and the twins leads to the confrontation between Val and “The Vulture.”

End quote.

This book reprints of Sunday morning newspaper strips from 1967-1968. I got hard cover book through inter library loan service. The book tells amazing stories during King Arthur’s Round Table days. Prince Valiant has grown into adult with children from his wife Aleta. The book now is up to page 1664 for consecutive weeks drawn by Hal Foster. Volume 16 had many fun moments like when Prince Valiant learned how to fish salmon with fly fishing pole. Val had many problems learning how to fish with tackle used for fishing. I liked how characters from older stories told in previous years also made appearances in 1967-1968 strips. I liked way shown art of all places Val or his son Arn journeyed to. I never really found it problem reading stories without word balloons. I thought captions on bottom of each panel worked fine for Prince Valiant fantasy stories. Hal Foster always kept stories moving quickly forward. It does help to read stories in sequential week order. The publisher worked very hard to put volumes together at reasonable price. I saw on inside front cover page a special thank you to SPECIAL COLLECTION RESEARCH CENTER of the SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY for providing scans for the vast majority of the Prince Valiant strips, reproduced from original syndicate proof sheets, in this volume.

Volume 16 also has an inspiring article about appreciation of the art and story of Hal Foster by Greg Hildebrandt. The article is called “ Hal Foster: The Art of Seeing, Analyzing and Executing Reality with Pen and Ink.”

Volume 16 also has some very interesting bonus features after last panel strip for 1968. One was a full page picture of Commemorative plaque given to Hal Foster at the 1967 Hermes Ball.

There was also an article wrote by Brian M. Kane called Hal Foster in the big easy: Prince Valiant’s adventures with the Krewe of Hermes.

There were also other wonderful treats like seeing an actual hand signed letter from Hal Foster. Plus other Prince Valiant and Hal Foster related photos and memorabilia.


Allen Klingelhoets