Fans celebrate 75 years of Tintin
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More than 200 million Tintin stories sold worldwide in 55 languages
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BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP) -- Belgium increased its daily dose of Tintin to saturation point Friday on the eve of the 75th birthday of the cartoon character, perhaps the country's most famous icon.
Newspapers had the young reporter all over their front pages, capping a week of endless analysis of Tintin on radio and television.
"From zero to 75," headlined La Libre on top of a cartoon of Tintin grabbing his coat to chase after another adventure with his trusted dog Snowy in tow.
In fact, Tintin hasn't chased a new adventure in a quarter century and 20 years after the death of his creator Herge, it looks like he never will. Now he lives on in marketing of an endless stream of Tintin T-shirts, mugs and watches.
There were more collector's items on Friday, especially when two newspapers banned all photos from their pages in favor of cartoons from Tintin's 23 books.
On the front page of Het Belang van Limburg, the news of a woman jumping out a window was accompanied by Tintin crawling from one window to another in a Chicago skyscraper in "Tintin in America."
Saturday's birthday kicks off months of exhibits, plays and tours in Europe. The dashing reporter already has his very-own silver 10-euro coin, minted especially for the anniversary.
There are plans for a Tintin museum to be created in Brussels by the time of the centennial of Herge's birth in 2007.
Tintin first appeared in the Brussels Le XXme Siecle newspaper on Jan. 10, 1929, and he hasn't looked back since.
From Belgium, Tintin first went to "the Land of the Soviets" to put the dastardly Communists in their place. Then he helped spread colonialism in the Belgian-Congo before trekking to the capital of crime, Chicago. Before World War II, he added Egypt, India and China, where the classic "The Blue Lotus" is set.
He was traveling all over the globe, and slowly the world started reading him in ever greater numbers.
His 23 adventures have sold over 200 million of copies worldwide and have been translated into 55 languages. He has become a Belgian icon, despite the Belgian perception that the French have long tried to usurp him.
In Brussels, an exhibition and tour will visit some of the Tintin scenery and the home where Herge was born as Georges Remi in 1907. He died in 1983, meaning Tintin will get older than his creator this year.
Belgium has issued 10 euro coins in honor of the comic strip star.
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At the Royal Ethnological Museum in Leiden, the Netherlands, the scenes from the Temple of the Sun will come to life again in the exhibit "Tintin and the Incas."
Captain Haddock proves an inspiration for two exhibits. In Barcelona, Spain, the Maritime Museum will feature the sea and travels of Tintin in the aptly named "Llamp de Rellamp" exhibit. The title, of course, translates Haddock's favorite curse "blistering barnacles" in Catalan.
"The Adventures of Tintin at Sea" at the Greenwich National Maritime Museum in London takes up the same theme, if with a more predictable name.
It will have a painting of Herge made by Andy Warhol, underlining how his appeal crossed national and cultural barriers.
Warhol was not the only one to be inspired by Herge's rounded clear lines; Roy Lichtenstein also became an avid fan.
But Tintin was about more than just prolific drawing.
"Storytelling, extraordinary scenarios, the drawing, the topical subject matter, the relationships between the different characters, the humor. That makes for many elements and he succeeded to bring them all together," his widow Fanny Rodwell said Thursday.
The stories have a movie quality and rumors continue to float that Steven Spielberg will finally put Tintin back on the silver screen. The French produced two live-action movies in the 1960s, along with numerous animated TV series and films.
The books also have a political quality beyond the endless debate about Herge's relations with the German occupier during World War II.
Five years ago, French lawmakers used their august legislature to debate the question "Tintin, is he from the left or the right?" Years earlier, Gen. Charles de Gaulle had sighed that "deep down, my only international rival is Tintin."
Copyright 2004 The
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