MAHARAJA SRISCHANDRA COLLEGE

• NAME: AMANDEEP SHARMA

• UNIVERSITY ROLL NO: 192212-21-0021

• REGISTRATION NO: 212-1111-0058-19

• TOPIC: THEME OF FRIENDSHIP IN TINTIN

IN TIBET

• PROFESSOR’S NAME: SUNANDA RAY

• STREAM: B.A SEM Ⅲ ( HONS.)

• SEMESTER: 3rd SEMESTER

• COLLEGE ROLL NO: 205

• PAPER: CC6
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I would like to express my special thanks of gratitude to my Professor
Sunanda Ray as well as our principal , Shyamal Kumar Chakraborty , who gave us the golden
opportunity to do this wonderful project on the topic “ The Theme of Friendship in Tintin in Tibet” which
also help me in doing a lot of research and I came to know about so many new things, I am really thankful
to them.

By doing this project we got enriched with many information which can also help us in our future.

INTRODUCTION
Tintin in Tibet was first published in Tintin magazine in the autumn of 1959. Herge, the Belgian cartoonist
presented his proposed front cover for the upcoming book, to Casterman. The principle behind the concept
was simple : Tintin , Snowy, Captain Haddock and Sherpa Tharkey, examining the yeti’s snowy footprints .
Likewise, the story tells of the young reporter Tintin in search of his friend Chang Chong-Chen, who the
authorities claim has died in a plane crash in the Himalayas. Convinced that Chang has survived and
accompanied only by Snowy, Captain Haddock and the Sherpa guide Tharkey, Tintin crosses the Himalayas
to the plateau of Tibet, along the way encountering the mysterious Yeti.

Theme Of Friendship In Tintin In Tibet

‘Tintin in Tibet’ is the twentieth volume of the ‘The Adventures of Tintin’, the comics series by Belgian
cartoonist Herge. It was serialised weekly from September 1958 to November 1959, in Tintin magazine and
published as a book in 1960 . Herge considered it his favourite Tintin adventure and an emotional effort, as
he created it while suffering from traumatic nightmare and a personal conflict while deciding to leave his
wife of three decades for a younger woman.

One of the most compelling things about Tintin in Tibet is its unabashed demand on our capacity to put faith
in prophetic visions. At the beginning of the book, Tintin has a nightmare about his friend, Chang, lying
injured in a snow-covered land. This fearful vision turns into a moment of truth the very next morning, as
Chang’s death in a plane crash is reported in the Daily Reporter. Despite repeated warnings from others,
Tintin remains unshakeable in his resolve to save Chang and sets out for the Nepal Himalayas. As he
embarks on this unusual quest to rescue a friend he believes to be alive, the readers, too, are required to take
a leap in the dark.
Friendship is irrational — affection between friends often defies logical behaviour. The conflict between
reason and emotions informs the core of the book. (Captain Haddock, who opposes Tintin’s ‘foolish’ plans
to save Chang all along, cannot give up on him. Even more, at a crucial point in the narrative he is ready to
sacrifice his life to save Tintin.) “The accident happened days ago,” Tintin tells an incredulous Captain
Haddock, “but yesterday I saw Chang alive…calling for help, but alive!” Suddenly Tintin’s dream — he
calls it “a sort of premonition” — becomes more real than the news of his friend’s death. Chang becomes
alive because he is imagined to be so. And the world around suddenly seems to be full of signs that affirm
his conviction.

As the Captain tries to dissuade Tintin from his foolhardy enterprise, a Pekinese dog, also called Chang, is
scolded by its mistress for speaking to Snowy, “a common mongrel”. Then a chambermaid lets out a roaring
sneeze, “Chang” and apologises, “I got a terrible cold id by dose.” Telepathy overwhelms Captain
Haddock’s reasonable argument. Tintin’s faith in his instincts proves more substantial than evidences.

In the course of his adventures, Tintin is faced with a series of provisional endings each time he faces
resistance from a number of people: first, the airport manager, fiddling endlessly with a rubber band,
dismisses the possibility of Chang surviving the crash; then the Sherpa, Tharkey, refuses to accompany
Tintin to the site of the crash; and, finally there is the Captain, who gives up on the mission several times but
cannot abandon young Tintin either. These false endings are overcome by new beginnings. Faith wins over
reason again and again; selfless love conquers self-protection. The grand beginning comes at the very end —
heralding a new phase in Chang’s life, as also in his friendship with Tintin.

For Hergé, too, Tintin in Tibet was about new beginnings. The idea for the book was suggested to him by
one of his assistants, Jacques Van Melkebeke, in 1954. Before the album was serialized in Le Petit
Vingtieme between 1958 and 1959, Hergé was himself living a nightmare. His marriage with his first wife,
Germaine, was breaking up. He dreamt he was surrounded by a white, featureless world, friendless and
alone. These haunting visions made their way into Tintin in Tibet, into the stark, snow-bound landscape
along the ardous journey that Tintin undertakes to rescue his friend, and in the desolate time that Chang
spends in the cave, kept alive by the yeti’s hospitality. There is even an allusion to Germain in the furtive
reference to the Nightingale f Milan, Bianca Castafiore. Captain Haddock’s outburst, on hearing the porters
play Castafiore’s coloratura on their radio, captures Hergé’s increasing disaffection with his wife.

The most important human presence in the book is, of course, Chang, modelled on Hergé’s friend, Zhang
Chongren, with whom he had lost touch during the Fifties. The book was thus a personal tribute to a ‘lost’
friend, who became a street-sweeper during the Cultural Revolution, and met Hergé several years after the
book was first published in 1960. Beyond the autobiographical aspect of the book, it was also recognized
and appreciated as a major introductory volume on Tibet, in the way it remained attentive towards that
country’s culture, life and traditions. Despite a feeble story filled with coincidence, a psychic visions and
aimless wondering, the messages about the nature of friendship and humanity redeem the book, making it
slightly better than average.
 BIBLIOGRAPHY
To complete this project , I have taken help from :-

• Fandom. “Tintin in Tibet” . https://tintin.fandom.com

• Tintin in Tibet by Burch
• Handbook on literature
• www.telegraphindia.com
• https://www.wikipedia.com