Blistering Barnacles! Boy Reporter Turned 75 !!

An article that aroused my interest on BBC.com was “Boy Reporter Still a Global Hero” by Stephen Dowling. The article is referring to Tintin, the famous cartoon character created by Belgian artist Georges Remi, aka Hergé. The article discusses how 75 years after his creation, Tintin continues to sell millions of books a year. He continues by talking about the events throughout 2004 that will commemorate the anniversary, including an exhibition at the National Maritime Museum in London. Throughout the article, he adds some interesting facts about the character and his creator.
The subject of Tintin relates to many topics that we talked about in class. First of all Tintin was part of the Entertainment Revolution that occurred in the period between the late 19th and early 20th century. Tintin was one of the earliest comic books to be made as it was started in 1929. It was also the first of the Franco Belgian Bande Desinee genre to be created. Belgium now is probably Europe’s leading comic book producer and it would not have been so without Tintins’ immense popularity.
Tintin and his adventures are all icons, not just of cartoon art, but also of the Twentieth century. I simply wouldn’t find space to write all that I learned from Herge on what happened in the decades that I did not live myself. Hergés’ books depicted the events and the moods of the day. Tintin in the Congo, which was made in the thirties, depicted Colonialism which was going on at the time. Congo itself was a Belgian province. Tintin in America, drawn a year later, shows Tintin fighting Al Capone and the Chicago mob, as those days were the days of Organized Crime and the Prohibition. The Moon books published in the late Fifties, describe the Space Race that was going on at the time between the world’s superpowers. Even the means by which Tintin traveled the world are a reflection of what means of travel were popular at the time. From the late Twenties through the mid Forties, Tintin traveled by boat. Tintin used planes from then on, and in Hergé’s last installment of the Tintin series in 1976, Tintin and friends are seen getting on board a Boeing and leaving for home.
Another reason why I found this article relevant to our topic was due to a particular detail mentioned in it. The author was quoting Michael Farr, a Tintin fan who wrote a book called “Tintin; the Complete Companion”, which I had read myself, also being a Tintin fan. Michael Farr mentions in his book that “He [Hergé] was a real stickler for detail. All the details and background he really labored over.” When I read Michael Farr’s book, it had many images of newspaper clippings that Hergé used to model his backgrounds and characters on. These pictures included everything from the popular cars at the time, exotic locations, uniforms, machines and even drawings of the moon. Next to those images were Hergé s’ comic art based on the clippings. Both looked identical. The realism in the art was astonishing, and the perspective perfect. From the many books I have read on Hergé, I know that he was a perfectionist and paid a great attention to detail. Some of the backgrounds in his comics were amazingly real. He even used to redraw the same comic over again (more than once) to try and make the comic as close to real life as possible. I actually own an older and a later version of the same Tintin comic book. Hergé s’ emphasis on perspective and realism in his art reflects the European obsession with realism and how Europe dealt with its19th century crisis of realism in art. Europe places a great importance on art being as close to real life as possible. Even I prefer realism to abstract art. This is partly due to Hergé s’ influence on me as a child. To conclude, Hergé s’ work is not only a perfect example of the Crisis of Realism in modern art, but also a perfect icon of 20th Century politics, history and issues.

Sources Used:

Dowling, S (2004, Jan 9). Boy reporter still a global hero. Retrieved October 10, 2004 from http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/arts/3382633.stm

Farr, M (2002). Tintin; the Complete Companion. London: John Murray.