IN MEMORIAM OF CLAES REIMERTHI
I was stunned when I opened my Email on 25th July and saw the
message from my American friend who had a large netsite of the
Phantom in States. There was the message which said that the
famous Phantom writer Claes Reimerthi has passed away on
23th July.
I could not believe that it was true - Claes was just left his work
in Egmont and told me that now he was free to go on with his
planned projects of writing when so much of his time didn´t
passed to write Phantom scripts. He sounded relieved and loo-
ked forward with energy... So the news of his sudden death soun-
ded tragical and not fair.
But it was true as I very soon learned. The best scriptwriter of
Egmont was gone and no skillfull scripts was ever given from
him to me to illustrate. After 47 stories which I had done from
his scripts not even one will never been sent to me any more.
One of the sad matters with me and Claes was that we had met on-
ly one time. It happened during the Gotherburg Book Fair in
2004 when me and my wife Kaarina were invited there by Egmont.
The meeting, in spite that we were there some few days, happened
when Ulf Granberg invited all of us Fantomen-group visitors to a
dinner in Fair´s best restaurant and then there we were - Ulf,
Claes Reimerhi, Hans Lindahl, my wife and me sitting at the tab-
le and speaking whatever we spoke - I do not remember, except
that Claes told us about some projects which he had in his mind.
His behavior was modest and amiable and now when he is gone
I regret that we had never possibility to see each other again.
Rest in peace, Claes
Kari T. Leppänen - Phantom artist