Reupping a slightly rewritten post that I had written on the 89th anniversary of Tintin's creation. He turns 94 today. He was born as a cartoon character in 1929 on the pages of a children's supplement to the Belgian newspaper Le Vingtième Siècle.
Here is what I like the most about Tintin who turns 94 today. He is a journalist with an unlimited expense account, gets to travel the world in search of stories which he never files for a newspaper that does not exist and whose editor he never gets in touch with. Naturally, he has no deadlines. I want that job.
Tintin, created by the late Belgian writer and artist Georges Prosper Remi better known by his penname Hergé, first appeared on January 10, 1929 in a Belgian newspaper. Since then he has remained one of the most popular cartoon characters in the world, a favorite with the filmmaker Steven Spielberg who made a brilliantly animated/motion captured version ‘The Adventure of Tintin’ in 2011. There are reports that Spielberg along with fellow filmmaker Peter Jackson, who collaborated on the first one, are making a sequel.
I read/watch Tintin in various avatars fairly regularly as a relaxing distraction from the daily grind. After watching Spielberg’s version I wrote, “I have also found a place where I want to be posted. It is called Bagghar, somewhere in Morocco. It is a North African sultanate by what looks like the sparkling blue Mediterranean Sea. There are other fringe benefits to being Tintin. Although he is 94, he does not look a day over 18. He has a perfect quiff that never collapses. Also, he does not seem to have a bank account or a credit card. He receives no threatening letters from the income tax or internal revenue authorities. And finally, he does not ever have to shave.”
While as a boy I loved the thrill of Tintin’s adventures depicted by Hergé through his brilliant drawings, in my more mature years the attraction has been to his career as a carefree journalist. I also like his sartorial choices. If I were to locate myself between two fictional characters it would be Tintin and Sherlock Holmes.
If we have to live in a fictional world, we might as well live in the one created by Hergé.