6

1975

Refs: 1 2

Japanese Title	Translation	Other Titles
furandaasu no inu	A Dog of Flanders

Original Work

A Dog of Flanders & Other Stories (1872)

Author

Marie Louisa De La Ramée (a.k.a. Ouida), 1839-1908 {English}

Editions

Only one in-print edition: Dover Thrift, paperback, $1. The Dover edition is the only English translation in print, but there are many other OOP editions. I own one entitled A Dog of Flanders together with the Nürnberg Stove and other stories, published by Grosset And Dunlap. The Flanders story itself doesn't appear to have been in print in recent times until the recent Dover edition.

Story Setting

A small village near Antwerp, Netherlands

Story Beginning Date

1870: Nello meets Patrasche

Number of Episodes

52

Production Studio and Broadcasting Network

Nippon Animation (Fuji TV)

Air Dates

January 5 1975 - December 28 1975

Staff

WMT Series Executive Producer: Motohashi Kôichi Director: Kuroda Yoshio Character Designer: Mori Yasuji Music: Watanabe Takeo Layout: Sakai Shun'ichi Script Writers: Nakanishi Ryûichi, Kase Takayuki, Itô Kôji, Yukimuro Shun'ichi, Satô Michio, Andô Toyohiro, Takayama Yukiko, Matsushima Akira Storyboards: Okuta Seiji, Tomino Yoshiyuki, Kuroda Yoshio, Yamazaki Shun'ichi, Onotani Minoru Animation Directors: Okada Toshiyasu, Hane Akiyoshi Art Director: Itô Kazue

Voice Actors

Nello: Kita Michie Alois: Katsura Reiko George: Komamura Kuriko Paul: Sugaya Masako Elina: Nakanishi Taeko Hans: Muramatsu Yasuo Andre: Shirakawa Sumiko Nurrett: Endô Haru Jehan: Oyokawa Hiroo Michel: Amenomori Masashi Hendrick Ray: Kayumi Iemasa Noel: Nagai Ichirô Cozets: Ôki Tamio Narrator: Takefuji Reiko

Theme songs

Opening: yoake no michi | "The Dawn Road" Ending: doko made mo arukô ne | "Let's Walk to the Ends of the Earth" Vocalist: Ôsugi Kumiko (Op. w/ the Antwerp Childrens Chorus) Lyrics: Kishida Eriko Music: Watanabe Takeo Arrangement: Matsuyama (?)Masushi

Related Images

From the anime: Nello and Grandfather

Related Web Pages

A Dog of Flanders and Other Stories, 1872, London, illustrated (Victorian Women Writers Project) Puss 'n Boots's page.

題名 Shift_JIS Title:

フランダースの犬

Shôjo & General entry

A Dog of Flanders is a short story set in the Netherlands about a destitute boy named Nello and his only companion, his dog Patrasche. The boy does many jobs to make ends meet while also helping his grandfather, with whom he was left after his mother died, but he undergoes many hardships. The tragic finalé of this story made the last episode of this anime version one of the (perhaps the) highest rated single WMT episodes. This novel is also important in that it is one of the first "child and his dog" stories, a genre which flourished in the mid-nineteenth century, ultimately producing the late great emissary of the genre in this century, Lassie.

This paragraph from early in the novella describing Patrasche can serve to illustrate the fervently romantic style of the storytelling and one of the themes of the story:

A dog of Flanders   yellow of hide, large of head and limb, with wolf-like ears that stood erect, and legs bowed and feet widened in the muscular development wrought in his breed by many generations of hard service. Patrasche came of a race which had toiled hard and cruelly from sire to son in Flanders many a century   slaves of slaves, dogs of the people, beasts of the shafts and the harness, creatures that lived straining their sinews in the gall of the cart, and died breaking their hearts on the flints of the streets.

When De La Ramée was a child, she was unable to pronounce her own name correctly, instead producing a sound close to "ouida"; hence the pen-name.

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