When Dark Horse Comics was granted the license to produce comics based on the characters and worlds of Edgar Rice Burroughs, it was fortunate enough to receive from Semic International, the previous license holder, a great deal of Tarzan material, including 24 riveting painted-color pages showing Tarzan's dealings with three anthropomorphized jungle beasts. That the unlettered images told a clear and utterly beautiful story by themselves was testimony to the sheer quality of the work; when the script was attached, we quickly realized that we were holding nothing less than a masterpiece in 24 pages. Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan: A Tale of Mugambi uses a story-within-a-story format to weave a cautionary tale about a jungle god with the lesson a tribal leader learns about living with power.

Igor Kordey, the artist of Tarzan: Mugambi, was recently tapped by Marvel Comics to illustrate a sequel to the critically acclaimed Marvels miniseries. In addition to Tarzan: Mugambi, Igor has partially completed the epic Tarzan and the Rivers of Blood, which was written by Neven Anticevic. I spoke with Igor from his home in Groznjan, Croatia. Peet Janes: Have you had other work published in the American market?

Igor Kordey: I had a 20-page story called "The Wall" in Heavy Metal in 1989, as well as another story, "The Autumn," in Heavy Metal in 1992. "The Wall" was black and white, but "The Autumn" was painted color. I also had some other Tarzan material published in a Malibu graphic novel.

PJ: What was the impetus behind creating a folk tale around Tarzan?

IK: It's a long story. While we were working on Tarzan and the Rivers of Blood, I had other ideas to develop Tarzan's character. While I waited for Neven Anticevic and Henning Kure to finish revisions to the script for that series, Henning suggested that we develop a parallel story. When I told Henning that I wasn't that good at writing, he asked me to find a writer. I am old friends with Darko Macan, and so I called him to write it. This was back in 1991-1992.

PJ: The story suggests that Mugambi is an important person in Tarzan's life. Will fans of the Tarzan comics get a chance to see Mugambi again?

IK: I actually prefer Mugambi. We all know who Tarzan is. Tarzan is an institution. Mugambi is like another side of Tarzan. He has a lot of knowledge and wisdom like Tarzan, but his feet are always on the ground. Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc. has very strict guidelines for what Tarzan would do or say, and telling a story of Mugambi is another, more flexible way to tell a story of Tarzan. Mugambi also plays a very important role in Tarzan and the Rivers of Blood.

PJ: American comics creators are sometimes treated like rock stars and sometimes scorned as classic cases of arrested development. What's the general attitude about your work in Croatia?

IK: People don't treat me like a painter or a sculptor, but I like it like that. In the 1970s, we formed a publishing group called New Frame, and we had comics in many magazines. When New Frame was very popular, people who had seen me on television would stop me on the street. They wanted to hang out around famous people. I moved away from Zagreb to get away from that, to get work done.

Twenty-five years ago, there were many people reading comics here, but due to the crisis, they are not as popular today. But now, kids want video games, not comics. Nowadays, most people here don't have much money for comics, but most of the readers that we do have are adults.