Born at No. 25, Rue Cranz, Etterbeek, Belgium, on May 22, 1907, at 6:30 AM Local Time, Georges Remi was the child of Alexis and Elisabeth Remi. His father had been born in 1882 and worked in a boys' outfitters alongside his twin brother Leon. His mother had no occupation.  The young child, the first of two born to the couple, was very cranky as a young child. He was to remark in later years that he was kept quiet only when given pen and paper to play with.

Known even as a child for having artistic talent, his parents sent him to an art school, which he soon dropped out of because he believed it encouraged copying of style and disenfranchised creativity.  His secondary school years, "incredibly dull", coincided with the occupation of Belgium by the forces of Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany. The dark, oppressive, gruesome atmosphere of 1914-18 was to leave a permanent mark on the young Georges. His earliest known drawings were in the margins of school textbooks, where he sketched derogatory but understandable caricatures of the fearsome soldiers that patrolled the streets of his country.

The young Georges lived with his family, now including a younger brother Paul, in Ceroux-Mousty, a  quiet rural suburb of Brussels, capital of Belgium. After the signing of the Treaty of Versailles, and the forging of a new but superficial peace, Georges entered the College Saint-Boniface in Brussels. His teachers found him a frustation, yet another worthless student who found no interest in what they had to teach him or how they did it.

A year later, Georges Remi joined his high school scout troop, a new phenomenon rising throughout Belgium after its success in the British Empire following the foundation of the movement by Sir Robert Baden-Powell. The young Remi, christened the Curious Fox, Leader of the Squirrels Patrol, took a new turn as he learned ideals and was taken to summer camps abroad, in Italy, Spain, France, and Austria. His drawings appeared in Le Boy Scout-Belge (The Belgian Boy Scout), the monthly magazine of the Catholic Boy Scouts of Belgium.

In 1924 he found himself working under the pseudonym Herge (a pronunciation of his initials, G.R., reversed in French [an Anglicized version would be Argee]) and in 1926, he created his first recurring character, Totor, Leader of the Hannetons Patrol, a fresh-faced, button-nosed, plaster-haired boy scout whose comical misadventures caught the eye of many throughout Belgium, including Father Norbert Wallez. 

In 1928, having completed his required military service, Herge began his job as chief editor of a new children's supplement to a Belgian daily Catholic newspaper, Le Vingtieme Siecle (The Twentieth Century), ran by staunchly Conservative dynamo Father Norbert Wallez. The supplement, called Le Petit Vingtieme (The Little Twentieth) made its debut on November 1, 1928. It was to be published weekly, a new issue coming out every Thursday.

The periodical was in need of a story that would make readers take up and sit notice, and so on January 10, 1929, a story, The Adventures Of Tintin And Milou, written and illustrated by Herge, began serialization in Le Petit Vingtieme.

The story was in a format called a comic strip pioneered in America. Tintin was a reporter for Le Petit XXe who would be sending back "dispatches" from Soviet Russia, where he was to denounce the activities of the OGPU, the Soviet secret police, and reveal the evils of Bolshevism aided by his dog Milou, who would later become Snowy to millions of English-speaking fans. 

Herge would release two pages every week until the spring of 1930. By that time, Tintin and Snowy's adventures had become so popular that a book containing their adventures was considered worthy of release. A small bookmaker run by Le Vingtieme Siecle, Editions du Petit Vingtieme, released 500 "albums", all entitled Les Aventures De Tintin, Reporter Du Petit Vingtieme, Au Pays Des Soviets (The Adventures Of Tintin, Reporter For Le Petit Vingtieme, In The Land Of The Soviets). Every book was signed "Tintin and Snowy". The books quickly flew off the shelves. 

The same year, Herge created two new characters, Quick & Flupke, two ill-mannered children who wreaked havoc throughout the city of Brussels for many years to come. Another adventure of Tintin, Tintin In The Congo, was released. By 1934, Tintin's adventures had become so popular, that the books were from then on to be released by Casterman Publishing House Ltd. of Tournai, Belgium and Paris, France.

 In 1936, the debut of The Adventures Of Jo, Zette, And Jocko, two Parisian children and their pet chimpanzee, was a success. Having married his secretary Germaine Kieckens in 1932, Herge continued his work at Le Petit Vingtieme until 1940, when the Nazis conquered Belgium. Herge was forced to stay in Belgium for the duration of the war, and drew Tintin strips for the newspaper Le Soir. In 1942, his publisher, Casterman made a proposition to him: if he limited his Tintin stories to 62 pages, they would publish them in color. Herge accepted. 

 In 1946, having not found work since the end of the war, Herge was approached by a French Resistance leader, Raymond Leblanc, who offered to start the publication of Tintin Magazine if Herge consented. The Adventures Of Tintin, as well as the other works of Herge, had found a home. Many other comic strip artists found a vehicle for their work as well.

 In 1950, feeling overwhelmed by the enormous responsibility of drawing and writing Tintin, Herge started the Studios Herge, a team of artists who would share the labor of working on Tintin books. Their responsibilities did not extend to actually writing and drawing the stories, but helping with research, providing fine details, and drawing covers for the books and Tintin Magazine.

 By 1958, Tintin was a phenomenon, selling over a million copies in French a year. His publisher, Casterman, found that they could not produce the amount of books demanded. Around the same time, Herge's personal life was in turmoil. His marriage was at an end and he was exhausted by his work. He produced his personal favorite book, Tintin In Tibet, a tribute to friendship.

In 1959, Tintin was adapted into a television series and the following year, a full-length blockbuster feature film based on Herge's work was released. By the 1960s, Tintin was one of the most famous characters in modern fiction, rapidly being translated into several languages and being exported throughout the globe, fast becoming Belgium's best known and most popular ambassador and international icon.

 During this same time period, Herge took advantage of his financial situation by purchasing a wide collection of art, including works by Picasso and Monet. He also adopted the policy of widespread international travel. He had never visited any of the places Tintin had traveled to, however accurate his depictions of them were. The only place he had ever traveled to to collect information for his book was Switzerland, which he visited often. Now, with less work and better financial circumstances, he could afford to travel abroad.

He visited Denmark, Sweden, Greece, Italy, Spain, and England, as well as the Bahamas and the United States Of America. He made several trips to the States, the first in 1971. During his first visit, he traveled to New York, California, the Midwest, Kansas City, Chicago, the Sioux Reservations, and Rapid City, South Dakota. Then, taking up an offer given to him 36 years before, in 1973, he accepted the invitation of Madame Chiang Kai-shek to visit China by traveling to Taiwan.

In 1976, the same year the final complete Tintin book, Tintin And The Picaros, was released, a documentary, I, Tintin, was aired. It gave an in-depth look into the work of Herge and provided some fascinating interviews. In 1977, having divorced his first wife Germaine, he married Fanny Vlamynck, a artist from the Studios Herge whom he had been living with for many years.

In 1979, Herge reached a milestone in his life: Tintin was 50 years old. The world celebrated his half-centenary with great pomp and the Belgian post office released a stamp featuring him, Snowy, and Captain Haddock. American artist Andy Warhol, the king of Pop Art, whom Herge had become a great friend of, released a series of four portraits of Herge as a tribute. The book Fifty Years Of Happy Work was also released to commemorate the event. A bronze statue bearing the likenesses of Tintin and Snowy was unveiled outside the Belgian Centre of the Comic Strip in Brussels. Herge also attended several social functions as part of the celebrations and released a series of drawings commemorating the event. Some were happy: a family portrait of the Marlinspike crew; others included a sketch of Herge wearing prison clothes, chained up, and being forced to draw Tintin and Snowy endlessly by an unforgiving Haddock, a surly Snowy, alert Thompsons, indifferent Calculus, and a whip-bearing Tintin.  The different drawings perfectly portrayed Herge's own thoughts on the reporter he had created half a century ago.

 On February 25th, 1983, after having suffered from anemia for a long time, Herge fell into a coma at his home. he was rushed to St. Luc Clinic in Brussels, where he was treated in the intensive care unit. On March 3, 1983, he died. The newspapers all across Europe were filled with the news of his death and tributes to him. Following Herge's wish that Tintin be discontinued after his death, no new adventures were drawn, and the unfinished framework of Tintin And Alph-Art was released posthumously.

Even after his death, Herge's rich artistic legacy lives on. Tintin, undoubtedly his greatest creation, is one of the most famous characters in all fiction, having sold over 200 million copies in 59 languages around the world. His adventures are read on every continent and he still sells 4 million books every year. The work of Herge has inspired 3 television series, 3 videogames, 8 films, and 2 musicals and still continues to be a source of inspiration for many today. By creating Tintin, he has been immortalized, and the world will never forget the characters, the situations, the places, and the stories he gave us.

           HERGE

         1907-1983

The role of a cartoonist drawing a highly motivated and extremely popular strip, as well as two other ones, all to be completed with a good storyline, excellent artwork, and planning before a deadline set by an editor can be very demanding of an artist. It was so for Herge. He had to extensively research information for his Tintin and Jo, Zette & Jocko stories while finishing a work of quality on time, as well as illustrating other aspects of the periodical he was working for (which varied from time to time) and drawing yet another strip, Quick & Flupke. He also was often called on to use his artistic talent to decorate the covers of Le Petit Vingtieme during his 12-year tenure plus a cover for Editions Casterman, his book publisher, when the album release was planned.

So when, in 1941, when Herge was approached by a economy-concerned Casterman about shortening his stories to an exact 62 pages and putting them in color, he was forced to accept because of Tintin's popularity, and out of dire financial need. However, his work could allow for him to edit the storylines intensively to meet the first guideline, but he could not color all the albums.

So, the only possible solution was to recruit an assistant, who would color the story for him. Coloring was only a secondary element in the creation of a comic strip, and until then, was unheard of. So coloring was not a priority to many "dessinateurs", like Herge.

His assistant was Alice Devos, an 8-year old student who used watercolors to paint the black and white storyboards drawn by Herge. She herself did not contribute to the story or the artwork in any way; that was Herge's responsibility. She continued assisting him with the colored versions of The Secret Of The Unicorn, & Red Rackham's Treasure. When Herge's time schedule permitted, he himself took on coloration of the remade albums. He did this in 1943 with The Broken Ear and the now defunct version of The Black Island.

In December 1943, at a party, Herge met another artist, a robust, bespectacled man named Edgar-Pierre Jacobs. Jacobs was not only a talented artist but also was excellent at providing the finest detail with utmost scrutiny, something Herge greatly adored and admired. A month later, when the B&W newspaper daily strip edition of the new Tintin adventure, The Seven Crystal Balls, began publication, Herge sought assistance from Edgar-Pierre Jacobs, but only with research. Jacobs was a former opera singer, and his experience with the stage allowed Herge to accurately depict all sides of the music hall during the well-remembered but ominous scenes at the beginning of the book. Later on, Jacobs also accompanied Herge to the site of the house that was the physical inspiration for Tarragon's home.

Later on, in 1946, when organization for the first issue of the new Tintin Magazine was well under way, Jacobs joined the team of artists contributing to the new youth periodical. He came up with his own strip, Le Secrets De L'Espadon, (The Secret Of The Espadon), which eventually became known as the first part of another epic Belgian saga, Blake et Mortimer.

Tintin Magazine demanded color publication, right from the start, and Herge not only recruited Jacobs as colorist but his former assistant Alice Devos as well. The two of them quickly used watercolors to elaborate on Herge's finely woven texture. If one sees the original edition, you can see how hastily it was colored, as white spots still remain and the coloring bleeds and is lightly done.

Alice Devos and E.P. Jacobs continued to color the story until its end of publication on November 30, 1947. By then, Jacobs was a successful artist with a lot of responsibilities on his hands and little time to work with. He had to abandon his role as Herge's assistant, although he was fully responsible for the coloration of the book of The Seven Crystal Balls and King Ottokar's Sceptre. The frescoes and murals on the walls of Kropow Castle in the previous work were done by Jacobs, who left an ominous error in his work that has intrigued Tintinologists for decades. His collaboration with Herge ended when Jacobs suggested a shared credit.

Forced to continue alone while himself coloring Quick & Flupke and Jo, Zette, & Jocko, Herge worked himself to exhaustion as his editor, Raymond LeBlanc, a natural entrepreneur, prodded him with contracts signing away commerical rights to his work. In 1949, Herge got fed up with all his obligations and fled Brussels. It was four months before he resumed his work.

In early 1950, another such breakdown had more serious consequences. Herge abandoned all work and fled Belgium for over a year, camping out, resting, both physically and mentally, and spending some time on self-contemplation. When he returned to Brussels after 18 months, he was ready to re-start.

In the meantime, on April 6, 1950, several young artists, as well as those from Tintin Magazine, came along to set up an office on the Rue du Lombard, where Herge could work. Covers would be drawn by the team of artists, and background details would also be sketched by them, as well as inking, lettering, bubbling, coloring, plating, and photoengraving. This removed about 80% of Herge's own workload and caused a division of labor, as the team of artists also worked on doing the same for Herge's other strips. Like Herge's previous assistants, they did not illustrate or write the story, but simply worked on things that were not first-degree priorities. This new team of inspired artisans called themselves the Studios Herge.

The Studios eventually ended up working on Destination Moon, Explorers On The Moon, The Calculus Affair, The Red Sea Sharks, Tintin In Tibet, The Castafiore Emerald, Flight 714, Tintin And The Picaros, as well as the Quick & Flupke books, Jo, Zette, and Jocko, and the color versions of Cigars Of The Pharaoh, Land Of Black Gold, Tintin In The Congo, & The Black Island. This comes to a total of 43 books.

Model aircraft and cars were analyzed and sketched by artists, who then sent their renditions to Herge who modelled his own work after theirs. Various Studios artists played a particularly big role in the adventures' creation, notably Roger Leloup and Bob de Moor.

The Studios closed down in 1986, when Herge's widow Fanny, who had actually met her husband when she became an artist working for the Studios, changed it into the Herge Foundation. This not only continued promotion of the work of Herge, but also maintained the spirit and good nature of his stories and artwork, as well as managing his estate. The Quick & Flupke books were recolored and rereleased under different titles in the late 1980s. The coloration was led by Johan de Moor.

In the end, Herge dissapproved of his work being continued, even by his co-workers because he felt that Tintin was captured by himself, and could not so be through the imitation of another. In the end, he was right, and the adventures of Tintin have long ended, and The Herge Foundation, as well as its company, Moulinsart, will not allow Tintin to be continued in any way or form, or re-license Herge's characters or works.

 Edgar-Pierre Jacobs, celebrated creator of Blake et Mortimer, and assistant to Herge on five accounts, from 1943 to 1950, with Georges Remi himself at a party in 1974.

 Bob de Moor, chief assistant to Herge from 1950 to 1968, who provided drawings modeled by Herge for landscapes ranging from Scotland to the Moon. Large influence visible in Explorers On The Moon, The Red Sea Sharks, and Flight 714. Also offered to complete Tintin And Alph-Art, but was denied. Also creator of The Mysterious Mr. Barelli.

The following interview has been translated from its original language by the Webmaster and is not to be replicated, reproduced, or copied in any form whatsoever.

Derived From Tintin: An Interview With Hergé

Christian Goux conducted the interview at Studios Hergé on November 23, 1979

It was within the Studios Hergé, on the Avenue Louise in Brussels, that the father of Tintin and Snowy agreed to answer my questions. Naturally, all the warmth and cordiality of the remarks of Hergé (this interview was also recorded on tape) is not reflected in this article.

Q:  Haddock’s first name in the last adventure was revealed to be Archibald. Did you feel a need for baptizing him more than thirty years after his first appearance or is it an anecdotic detail?

A: Yes, I know that Haddock did not have a first name. I sought out some who likened to him and I have it fore-mentioned Archibald. But it is, as you said, anecdotic; it does not play a significant role. Even if his name is Archibald, Haddock will always be the same.

Q: Haddock detests la bella canto!

 A:  In any case when sung by a certain person...

Q: Tintin does not seem to appreciate the services of Bianca Castafiore either. Do you yourself appreciate the (lyric) art?

H: I like to hear singing from time to time. I adored listening to Callas, for example. But I do not like the opera. I do see the decoration, the manufactured one; I am completely bewildered by the global appreciation for opera. It is a whole universe of conventions I do not manage to adhere.

Q: The albums of Tintin are built with an impeccable meticulousness as well with regard to the scenario in what touches the decoration. Don't you regret time all the same when you were not dependent on this rigor? I think of the period of " Le Petit Vingtiéme" during which the series was published in serial form was perhaps at time of less meticulousness in your work.

 A: It was obviously " serial ", but it is always serial, since each page finishes on a point of suspense. I do not regret anything strictly because that is not used for nothing to lead the eye fixed on the rear view mirror. Into fifty years, I changed and I thus do not work any more same manner but formerly. If I tried to retrogress, I would not be natural any more. I thus do not regret having arrived of it at the point where I am, while regretting not having better done than I made. But, it likens to a Chinese proverb: one does not bathe twice in the same river! And the regrets are always superfluous and useless.

 Q - the book " Flight 714 " finishes on the same image as the initial scene. Can one imagine that there was a return behind and that Tintin and its friends traveled in time?

A: No, no, but there is a "bracket". Our friends arrived in Djakarta and their adventure started there: they left with the Carreidas (160i Jet)  and then they returned to Djakarta to take the plane for Sydney. The voyage for Australia was thus stopped, but nothing other. Something occurred even if they forgot it. A voyage in time, you said? One could perhaps imagine it. But for me, they lived a true " terrestrial " adventure.

 Q: Doesn't the uniformity of your feature pose problems on the level of the legibility of the drawing? For the differences in plan for example: in a drawing of " Tintin in America ", Tintin appears to be bigger than he actually is. Certain children think that Tintin became a giant whereas it does not act, in fact, that of an effect of prospect?

 A: At the time of Tintin in America, my feature was uniform because I used a different illustration style. I think of having used this style in The Blue Lotus. Currently, I do not employ this style any more, but a " traditional " style instead. But the prospect, for me, is not only in the thickness of the feature. To tell the truth, I use another, finer, style sometimes. This is for the decorations, but the difference is not strong. For me, the legibility is, obviously, in the feature, but it is also in the construction of drawing, in a kind of hierarchy in the image that makes the foreground an actual foreground and the background an actual background. It is by construction that one realizes the difference of the plans.

Q: Had you been already asked this question about the feature?

A: No. In general, the journalists are not draughtsmen as you are. All that is technical, in general, escapes them. And it is completely normal.

Q: Nevertheless, children tend to be confused. When I was six, my friends and I wondered why on this Tintin image had "grown ".

 A: It is certain that the prospect is a convention. And a very young child cannot understand that there is an effect of prospect and that Tintin did not grow at all.

Q: There are very few female characters in Tintin and I understand your step very well, that you explained many times. But don't you think that, from time to time, pretty girls appearing would decorate the images? There are pretty girls in Syldavia. Don’t you think so too?

 A: Yes, of course! But my answer will always be this one: all my characters are caricatures. Yes, all! My illustrations do not feature fine young men either, so why would there be pretty girls? From time to time, someone of general aesthetic interest passes by, like that, but he or she does not play a significant role: Air hostesses and nurses are good examples. There are others who do play a significant role, of course. But since they play a role, they must belong to the same universe that the other characters and thus they - automatically - are caricatured and thus they are not " pretty girls "! Perhaps others succeed in drawing a pretty woman who is at the same time a caricature. This is beyond me...if it is a character that is there only for one episode of the series, yes; but if it is a significant character, like Castafiore for example, I do not do such a thing.

Q: A question that often returns in the letters to the Editor of (Tintin) Magazine: Are you working on the next adventure of Tintin? Can you present the broad outline of it to us?

A: Yes, I am currently working on a new adventure of Tintin. You would like to know the broad outline of it? I am afraid I cannot, for I myself am too confused with where it will lead me. All that I can say of it to you, it is that it revolves around the avant-garde art. I believe that that can be very amusing. In any case, I have fun while working in that particular field! But it will take me at least two more years to complete the book.