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Bestseller canon

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Bestseller canon

"Visual storytelling" canon series: the popularity factor

Tranquilinho
Jan 7, 2023
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High-brow critics wisdom is to disregard popular works - what do ordinary people know about Art? I agree that quality has nothing to do with sales, but, at the same time, extremely popular works must have some quality to reach that level of popularity…

Best-selling illustrated books

In this list, I include some “text-only” books for comparison. According to Wikipedia, the most popular illustrated books are…

  • “The little prince”. Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1943). ~200 million copies.

  • “Harry Potter and the Philosopher Stone”, J.K. Rowling (1997). ~120 million

  • “The da Vinci Code”, Dan Brown (2003). ~80 million

  • “The tale of Peter Rabbit”, Beatrix Potter (1902). ~45 million

  • “The very hungry caterpillar”, Eric Carle (1969). ~43 million

  • “The adventures of Pinocchio”, Carlo Collodi (1881). ~35 million

  • “James and the giant peach”, Roald Dahl (1961). ~20 million

  • “Where the wild things are”, Maurice Sendak (1963). ~20 million.

  • “Charlie and the chocolate factory”, Roald Dahl (1964). ~20 million.

  • “The Poky Little Puppy”, Janette Sebring Lowrey (1942). ~15 million

  • “The Gruffalo”, Julia Donaldson (1999). ~11 million

  • “The Cat in the Hat”, Dr. Seuss (1957). ~11 million

Then, best-selling series of illustrated books:

  • “Diary of a Wimpy Kid”, Jeff Kinney (2007-present). ~275 million.

  • “Berenstain Bears”, Stan and Jan Berenstain (1962-present). ~260 million.

  • “Peter Rabbit”, Beatrix Potter (1902-1930). ~150 million.

  • “The Chronicles of Narnia”, C. S. Lewis (1950-1956). ~120 million.

  • “Miffy”, Dick Bruna (1955-present). ~85 million

  • “Anpanman”, Takashi Yanase (1973-2013). ~80 million

  • “Captain Underpants”, Dav Pilkey (1997-2015). ~80 million

  • “Winnie-the-Pooh”, A. A. Milne (1926-1928). ~70 million

  • “Where's Wally?”, Martin Handford (1987-present). ~50 million.

  • “Paddington Bear”, Michael Bond (1958-present). ~35 million.

  • “Le petit Nicolas”, Sempé + René Goscinny (1956-1965 ) ~15million

Best-selling comics

In Wikipedia there is a listing of comic series, from which I selected theses titles:

  • “One Piece”, Eiichiro Oda ~515 million copies

  • “Asterix” René Goscinny + Albert Uderzo ~385 million

  • “Dragon Ball”, Akira Toriyama ~350 million

  • “Peanuts”, Charles M. Schulz ~300 million

  • “The Adventures of Tintin”, Hergé ~250 million

  • “Black Jack”, Osamu Tezuka ~175 million

  • “Mortadelo y Filemón”, Ibáñez ~100 million

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