Retro Comics FTW!

Reading can be hard and to instill that interest amongst young children can be a tedious task for most. Young minds need a lot of colour and fascinating angles to a story to keep them engrossed. But how lovely would it be if they didn’t read only because they were told so but did it out of their personal interest itself? Comic books have been able to do so for a majority of them. We all have our own memories of our favourite comics books as kids. We couldn’t keep them down no matter how often we told to until we were done reading it thoroughly. Sometimes, we read it over and over again, because we loved to. Subin Jameel, creator of the Retro Comics India Facebook community was one such child.

Eras and characters come alive in our minds in the form of these strips that makes stories interesting, colourful and sometimes very informative. Jameel still finds comics very close to his heart. People outgrow their love for certain things as they grow up but he never outgrew his love for comics. He says, “I had a massive comic book collection which I lost as we shifted homes and states. When I got into college, my goal was to collect every comic book that I had lost. Eventually I started collecting comic books I never had, comic books from all Indian publishers and it grew into a collection of over 5000 comic books.”

A comic book that is very dear to him and he remembers quite fondly is Tinkle 181 which he admits that he wouldn’t like very much right now as his tastes have evolved over time but nevertheless, it stays fresh in his mind. He prefers reading graphic comics now and contemporary ones. This enthusiast enjoys collecting comics too, especially Indian ones. He has got his hands on a few rare comics that aren’t easily available in the market and hopes to lay his hands on more such finds.