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Big Nate is an American comic strip written and illustrated by Lincoln Peirce and distributed by NEA since January 7, 1991. The strip revolves around an eleven-year-old named Nate Wright, a radical rebel in the sixth grade, his school friends, teachers, and his enemies. It has eight spin-off novels, which were published from 2010 to 2016, as well as an animated adaptation by Nickelodeon that was released on Nickelodeon on Febuary 17, 2022.

Synopsis

Big Nate follows the adventures and misadventures of Nate Wright, a rebellious yet spirited male sixth-grader, along with his fellow classmates and teachers. He is portrayed as a boy with very little interest in studies or conforming to standards, which has led him into several conflicts with his social studies teacher Mrs. Godfrey, whom he considers to be his nemesis. Strips also focus on Nate's home life and friendships with his best friends Francis and Teddy. Answering questions from fans in the Washington Post, Peirce revealed the following about the creation of the strip:

"Big Nate started out as more of a 'domestic humor' strip than it is now. It was my intention to feature a lot of stories about Nate's single dad, and all the comic possibilities inherent in that. But before too long, I realized that the part of the strip that I enjoyed most was the school humor. I'd been a teacher myself, and schools can be very funny places."
―Lincoln Peirce

Awards and nominations

Year Novel Award Result References
2011 - 2012 Big Nate: In A Class By Himself Great Stone Face Book Award - Grades 4-6 Won [1][2]
2012 Big Nate: Strikes Again Colorado Children's Book Award - Junior Novel Nominated [3]
2012 Big Nate: In A Class By Himself Kentucky Bluegrass Award - Grades 3-5 Won [4]
2013 Big Nate: Goes For Broke Buckeye Children's Book Award - Grades 3-5 Nominated [5]
2013 Big Nate: In A Class By Himself Garden State Children's Book Award - Children's Fiction Won [6]
2013 Big Nate: In A Class By Himself Golden Archer Award - Intermediate Nominated [7]
2013 Big Nate: In A Class By Himself Young Reader's Choice Award - Junior/Grades 4-6 Nominated [8]
2015 Big Nate: Flips Out Golden Archer Award Nominated [9]
2017 Big Nate Series Milner Award Won [10][11]

History

Around late 1990 to early 1991, Big Nate was being set to debut in more than 135 different newspapers around the United States. The United Feature Syndicate (UFS) was the comic strip newspaper syndication service that was going to distribute all of the Big Nate comics to newspapers, and most of the people there were very excited about this new comic strip, believing that it could be an instant sensation, maybe even the next great comic strip.

But, sadly, tragedy struck. The UFS' star sales representative, who was responsible for more than half of these newspapers agreeing to show Big Nate, died very suddenly, of a heart attack. With him gone so soon, and nobody able to do the job as well as he did, about half of the newspapers who had beforehand agreed to show Big Nate in their daily issues, dropped the strip entirely, as they needed the sales representative to confirm the strip and to make sure that everything was going smoothly. With this blow, the strip's future as a great comic had been torn to pieces, and although the release of the strip went ok, it was not as well as to what most people at the UFS and Lincoln himself, hoped it would go. Not even close. And for the next 18 years, the strip was under the danger of failing, which was stressful for Lincoln Peirce, as he had his wife and children to feed.

But then it all changed when Jeff Kinney, author of Diary of a Wimpy Kid and good friend of Lincoln Peirce, launched "Big Nate Island" on his new website Poptropica, a virtual website aimed towards kids. And suddenly, Big Nate exploded. Millions of kids, for the first time, were learning about Big Nate. It started to become so well-known, several people started coming to Lincoln Peirce, telling him that he had to write a book series based off of the comic strips.

Lincoln had never written a children's book before, but he decided to give it a go. It was quite possibly his greatest decision that he ever made, and to this day, the EIGHT Big Nate novels have sold over 15 million copies, boosting the popularity of the comic strip through the roof, and when the comic strip collections came out, they, too sold like hotcakes.

Now there has been a play, a musical, and now even a TV Show. But all of this would never have happened if it wasn't for Lincoln Peirce's dedication, persistence, and determination, as well as Jeff Kinney's simple idea.

Trivia

  • The series takes place in a fictional town called Rackleff which is located in Maine, despite there being a street called Rackleff which is in Maine and a senior community called that in Canby, Oregon.
  • When it comes to the title of each Big Nate book, every comic collection has the word “big” lowercase while actual novels have “BIG” uppercase.
  • Almost all Big Nate books have Jeff Kinney's quote, "Big Nate is funny, big time.", on the top of the front cover.
  • "Big Nate" is named after the author's older brother, Johnathan. He realized the name had the name "Nathan" within it, and soon after, he started calling him "Big Nate".
  • The comic strip went on a hiatus from December 31, 2017, to July 15, 2018.

References

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