Tintin Au Congo: (Les Aventures de Tintin) (French Edition) [Hardcover]

Herge (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 14, 2005 | Age Range: 10 and up | Series: Tintin

The Adventures of Tintin (Les Aventures de Tintin) is a series of comic strips created by Belgian artist Herge the pen name of Georges Remi (1907 1983). The series first appeared in French in Le Petit Vingtieme, a children's supplement to the Belgian newspaper Le Vingtieme Siecle on 10 January 1929. Set in a painstakingly researched world closely mirroring our own, Herge's Tintin series continues to be a favorite of readers and critics alike 80 years later.
The hero of the series is Tintin, a young Belgian reporter. He is aided in his adventures from the beginning by his faithful fox terrier dog Snowy (Milou in French). Later, popular additions to the cast included the brash, cynical and grumpy Captain Haddock, the bright but hearing-impaired Professor Calculus (Professeur Tournesol) and other colorful supporting characters such as the incompetent detectives Thomson and Thompson (Dupond et Dupont). Herge himself features in several of the comics as a background character; as do his assistants in some instances.
The success of the series saw the serialized strips collected into a series of albums (24 in all), spun into a successful magazine and adapted for film and theatre. The series is one of the most popular European comics of the 20th century, with translations published in over 50 languages and more than 200 million copies of the books sold to date.
The comic strip series has long been admired for its clean, expressive drawings in Herge's signature ligne claire style. Engaging, well-researched plots straddle a variety of genres: swashbuckling adventures with elements of fantasy, mysteries, political thrillers, and science fiction. The stories within the Tintin series always feature slapstick humor, accompanied in later albums by sophisticated satire, and political and cultural commentary.

Editorial Reviews

Language Notes

Text: French --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Age Range: 10 and up
  
• Hardcover: 61 pages
• Publisher: Casterman; French edition (November 14, 2005)
• Language: French
• ISBN-10: 2203001011
• ISBN-13: 978-2203001015
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 0.4 x 11.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #262,702 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Very cool!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! May 23, 1998

By A Customer

Format:Hardcover

Tintin is asked to visit the Congo to report to Le Petit Vingtieme of life there. Instead he ends up fighting natives and wild animals and busts Al Capone's diamond racket.

18 of 21 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Get over it! September 7, 1999

By A Customer

Format:Hardcover

I remember when I was a kid this was one of my favorite tintin books and I gotta admit last night when I read it again after nearly 20 years I still love it. The cartoonish killing of animals didn't bother me then and shouldn't bother any normal kid today either. Gotta admit the way the natives are portrayed though is not PC.

47 of 60 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Artistic advance for Herge, but too many dated attitudes March 28, 2002

By darragh o'donoghue

Format:Hardcover

'Tintin In The Congo' is something of a taboo for devotees of Herge - how to reconcile the famed humanitarianism and tolerance of the Tintin books with the unthinking racism that informs this adventure? And so there have been attempts to pretend it doesn't exist - you won't find it on the back cover of Tintin books with the other volumes - or to excuse it, by showing how Herge was merely reflecting the attitudes of his time, although, three decades after 'Heart Of Darkness' and the findsings of Roger Casement, it's difficult to justify as naive the (ahem) white-washing of genocidal Belgian colonialism, with the benevolent missionary project celebrated here, full of heroic action-priests. This is certainly the most difficult Tintin to read - watching our hero referring to natives as 'boy'; bullying them into working, and generally abusing them for his mistakes; treating Africa as a big playground where people exist to serve him and animals for the jolly slaughter.

Tintin is on a safari holiday to the Congo. His presence, however, is minsinterpreted by the area's gangsters, who send one particularly unlovely goon to get rid of him, which he attempts to do by raising the natives against Tintin. Among the various trials inflicted on our hero, the most memorable include being hung over a river of hungry crocodiles, being charged by an army of M'hatavus; and precipitating on a branch over steep rapids.

'Congo' is really Snowy's adventure - from his opening struggle with a parrot on board their cruise, Snowy is prominent, getting into scrapes, endlessly rescuing his recklessly adventurous master, at one point even made king by a tribe of pygmies.... This focus is appropriate in an environment stuffed with animals; encounters with crocodiles, snakes, monkeys, buffalo, hippopotami, giraffes and rhinos make up the bulk of the action. This has a sinister side - the monkeys bear a striking resemblance to the Africans, whose flock-like instincts, dumb obedience and malleability marks them as barely above the level of animals, their minds as primitive as their way of life.

There are two types of colonialism in this adventure - one, bad, that exploits the natives, treats them as slaves and robs them of their resources; the other, that of Tintin and the missionaries who teach the natives that their home country is Belgium, is benevolent, bringing railways, medicine, education technology, progress. I think it's possible, however, that Herge, contributing to a right-wing Catholic magazine, was straining at his story's ideological limits - the reduction of the train service to a rickety tin-can hardly heralds the success of colonialism; the repeated imagery of holes, trees, fluids (water, rubber seeping from trees), arrows etc., might take on a Freudian dimensnion, suggesting unconscious anxieties behind the optimistic facade - the incident with the buffalos might suggest as much. When Tintin prepares to shoot a rhino, the film camera he had been carrying is turned away - this is an activity best not documented. At one point, a gangster disguises himself as a priest, momentarily suggesting a connection between the two (exploiting) groups. Throughout the story, judgements and observations made by Tintin based on appearances - the wandering of a leopard into a schoolroom; the charge of whooping pygmies - are shown to be inaccurate. The importation of the less pleasant aspects of colonialism - especially militarism - is seen to blow up in the natives' faces.

The well-meaning attempts to ignore 'Congo' is wrong, a denial of history, an attempt to pretend Western Europe was never fundamentally racist. The real shame is that the book is a big improvement on its predecessor - the drawing is much more controlled and imaginative - memorable images include the torchlight revelation of a hunting monkey; the rescue attempt by the priest on two wires over the rapids, with the knife-wielding gangster looking on; the pygmy charge through the forest; the silhouette of Tintin hanging from the rope ladder of a biplane as he escapes a herd of buffalo. Most brilliantly, the landscape often mirrors the action, e.g. the palm trees overlooking the homicidal witch-doctor at night. Read more ›

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Another great Tintin for the collector! January 5, 2012

By Minerva

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

Still one of the best comics around. A very fun adventure story set in the Belgian Congo. Some content may be deemed racist, but please bear in mind that at the time of creation, the Congo in Africa was still under Belgian colonial rule. Herge was a Belgian. Most Europeans had not come to terms with Africans, and there is the inevitable condescension toward them and mild racism. Considering the times, you have to make allowances. We are all, a product of our times. Enjoy it for what it has to offer - adventure, mystery, humor, and buy it!

5.0 out of 5 stars Tintin is great May 22, 2013

By bannelaure

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

This is a very important comic book from a socio-political point of view.
That comic well reflects the colonial perception of the "Other" at the time of the writing.
While the racism is difficult to handle at times, this book is important to understand how the French thought of their colonies.

4.0 out of 5 stars For completion, for fun, and for learning another language March 20, 2013

By F. J. PRISCO

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

It's funny that anyone would call a cartoon from the 1930s 'dated' -- as if typical European attitudes of that time toward Africans wasn't well-known to be ethnocentric and even paternalistic. Since all the Tintin adventures before THE BLUE LOTUS were largely free of meaningful plot or character, there is no way to purge TINTIN AU CONGO of these aspects, which is why this book is often out-of-print; it is what it is, and it can't be any better without turning it into a different book entirely.

So much for literary critique; as a stand-alone book, it would be only a curiosity. But there is the Tintin character [not to mention his faithful dog Milou], and their adventures begin here; those who enjoy the later books will want this not just for completion but for the genuinely hilarious additions to their history. As my daughter remarked, it may be very racist but still very funny. It's often silly, but it is entertainingly well-drawn, and shouldn't be taken any more seriously than a Tarzan film from the same era [which are actually *less* appallingly racist than the original books by Edgar Rice Burroughs].

FWIW, I do find it better to read in a non-native language; the story is simple enough that a bilingual dictionary can get you through, so I have this book in both French and German, but not English ... I guess it isn't all THAT interesting a story :)

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Book! March 2, 2013

By sb

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

My husband had these books when he was a child and now the tradition is getting carried down to my son. My son adores Tin Tin. We just ordered 2 more!

9 of 14 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Belgian Imperialism in cartoon format December 17, 2000

By A Customer

Format:Hardcover

This book gives an excellent viewpoint of Belgian imperialism in the 1920s and '30s. With a portrayal of natives from a deficit model and the killing of multiple exotic creatures, this book reads more like a chapter of history than a children's tale with morals. Still, the book is what the book is: an accurate snapshot of the perceptions of Belgians at this time period. I believe that Herge is a genius in creating story plots and drawing his beloved characters and that the story (like all the others) is extremely amusing. The only reason I give it less than 5 stars is because it demands parental guidance in working through the historical and political differences of the 1920s and now, so that children also understand the lens through which many Europeans viewed their African colonies. Therefore, it turns out to be more of a history lesson than a comic book. May I suggest something like "On a Marche sur la Lune" among many other titles for lighter fare that children can enjoy freely without political implications.