Tintin in the Congo
Tintin in the Congo (French: Original Title: Tintin au Congo) is a comic album of the series The Adventures of Tintin by the Belgian cartoonist Hergé, the first from 1930 to 1931 as a continuation of history in the children's supplement to the Belgian newspaper Le Vingtième Siècle and 1931 as an album in Black White appeared. The colored version of 1946 was completely redrafted and revised again in 1975.
The band was not the first adventure of Tintin, even if it is now published as number 1. Tim previously appeared in the Land of the Soviets (1928 ), but was not - like all the other albums - reissued in color.
Action
Tintin travel together to the Belgian Congo. After a few incidents on the journey they reach their destination, where they go together with the local Boys Coco in a rental car to hunt. After a short time the vehicle is stolen them from a white man. You manage to retrieve the car, the thief would come of it, however.
Later, Tintin, Snowy, and Coco visit a local village. Tim is still haunted by the white man who repeatedly tried to kill Tim. Yet remains open to both Tim and for the reader, which is why the White Tim stalking. In a final attempt Tim is rescued by a white missionary who takes him in his mission, where Tim is, however, still exposed to the attacks of whites. In a final battle between the two of whiteness is eaten by crocodiles, though Tim had this is actually not intentional.
In the belongings of the White Tim finds a letter of Mafia boss Al Capone, who leads a diamond smuggling ring in the Congo. Al Capone had the whites on Tim recognized because he had mistakenly assumed this would have traveled to Africa to investigate the smuggling ring. Tim covers in sequence to the smuggling ring, and the gang is taken. Ultimately, can still enjoy their leisure time in Africa Tintin. As they get trampled by a herd of buffalo almost saves an aircraft that takes her back to Belgium, where they prepare for their next trip to America.
Criticism
Hergé was accused of racist, colonialist and glorify violence representations because of the consequence of Tintin in the Congo. The African natives are represented as very naive and childlike. The illustrations are a reflection of the prevailing prejudices of Europeans towards Africans. The violence towards animals has been criticized, for example, Tim kills an elephant in order to acquire its ivory and participates as a matter of course on the popular at that time among the colonizers big game hunting.
Hergé later admitted that the album was of a very naive view of Africa. In the later color version (1946 ) Hergé removed all references to Belgium as a home Tims and that the Congo at the time of the initial publication of the adventure (1930 ) was a Belgian colony. And so the story has been simplified and optimized for international publication. With these changes, Hergé came to the critics, however, very little counter, since among other things the racist representations remained largely intact. This factor had the consequence that the color output of Tintin in the Congo in the United States and Great Britain was published in Egmont Publishing in 2005, and there also with a special preface, which explains the historical context of their occurrence. In February 2013, the publishing houses, said at the Carlsen publishing house of the newspaper New Germany, the Belgian copyright holders prohibit it Carlsen, take a preface or else an explanation of the colonial background of the comics in the book ( that and more below links).
In Germany the color output was not published until 1976. For the Scandinavian version was an episode in which Tim a rhino with dynamite blasts, has been replaced by a more benign variant, which was also used in the English version.
Revised version
The characters Thomson and Thompson appear in Tintin in the Congo in the very first photo of the album, but have not had their first appearance in this story. The two were not shown in the first edition of 1930 and were added only in 1946. In the color version of Tintin in the Congo by Hergé, himself drawn as a reporter, adopt the Tim in Antwerp at the station.
Literature and sources
- Michael Farr: In the footsteps of Tintin, Carlsen, Hamburg 2005, ISBN 978-3-551-77110-0
- Hergé: Tintin in the Congo, Carlsen, Hamburg, November 1997, ISBN 978-3-551-73221-7
- Kurosch Sadjadi Nasab: Tintin in the Congo. Racist stereotypes in Hergé's Africa, in: Leaves for German and International Politics 43 (1998 ), No. 1, pp. 94-103.