<P> In continental Europe, both original book - length stories such as La rivolta dei racchi (1967) by Guido Buzzelli, and collections of comics have been commonly published in hardcover volumes, often called "albums", since the end of the 19th century (including such later Franco - Belgian comics series as The Adventures of Tintin in the 1930s). </P> <P> As the exact definition of the graphic novel is debated, the origins of the form are open to interpretation . </P> <P> The Adventures of Obadiah Oldbuck is the oldest recognized American example of comics used to this end . It originated as the 1828 publication Histoire de M. Vieux Bois by Swiss caricaturist Rodolphe Töpffer, and was first published in English translation in 1841 by London's Tilt & Bogue, which used an 1833 Paris pirate edition . The first American edition was published in 1842 by Wilson & Company in New York City using the original printing plates from the 1841 edition . Another early predecessor is Journey to the Gold Diggins by Jeremiah Saddlebags by brothers J. A. D. and D. F. Read, inspired by The Adventures of Obadiah Oldbuck . In 1894 Caran d'Ache broached the idea of a "drawn novel" in a letter to the newspaper Le Figaro and started work on a 360 - page wordless book (never published). In the United States there is a long tradition of reissuing previously published comic strips in book form . In 1897 the Hearst Syndicate published such a collection of The Yellow Kid by Richard Outcault and it quickly became a best seller . </P> <P> The 1920s saw a revival of the medieval woodcut tradition, with Belgian Frans Masereel cited as "the undisputed king" of this revival . His works include Passionate Journey (1919). American Lynd Ward also worked in this tradition, publishing Gods' Man, in 1929 and going on to publish more during the 1930s . </P>

When did graphic novels first come into vogue
find me the text answering this question