Rethinking History

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A never ending trial: Hergé and the Second World

War

Benoît Peeters

To cite this article: Benoît Peeters (2002) A never ending trial: Hergé and the Second World War,
Rethinking History, 6:3, 261-271, DOI: 10.1080/13642520210164490

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Published online: 04 Jun 2010.

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02Peeters (bc/d) 10/31/02 4:18 PM Page 261

Rethinking History 6:3 (2002), pp. 261–271

•ARTICLES•

A Never Ending Trial: Hergé and the Second

World War

Benoît Peeters
Translated from the French by Phillip Newman and Hugo Frey

Twenty-five years ago, when I first began to write on the Adventures of Tintin,
the name of Hergé was already controversial. ‘Extreme anti-Communist’,
‘odious colonialist’, ‘inveterate reactionary’, ‘Second World War collabora-
tor’, these common judgements were, at the very least, hasty, but they ren-
dered suspect virtually all more attentive readings of his work.
Pierre Assouline’s biography of Hergé (1996) tried to clear the air. Thus,
when this eminent biographer, known for his work on Gaston Gallimard,
Georges Simenon, and other prominent personalities of the 20th century,
declared his interest in the creator of Tintin, he demanded free access to the
Hergé foundation’s archives, including opening files that had previously
remained closed. In a methodical fashion, Pierre Assouline undertook the
historical and political inquiry that all the world was waiting for, well every-
one in Belgium at least. After so many rumours and misunderstandings it was
time to soberly dissect the most controversial of dossiers. But although this
inquiry, which had been so necessary and was undertaken with so much
rigour, constituted a major contribution, it did nothing to quash the rumours
about Hergé.
Without doubt some people, like Maxime Benoît-Jeannin, felt that Pierre
Assouline’s biography did not deal severely enough with Hergé. So, in March
2001, following a withering biography of Maurice Maeterlinck, Benoît-
Jeannin, a Frenchman already known in Belgium, published a small pamphlet
of 86 pages entitled Le Mythe Hergé (The Hergé Myth). With its hideous
unsigned cover illustration, its multiple misprints, its incessant approxi-
mations, this short booklet, which also in the final analysis brings nothing
new to the subject, does justice neither to the author, the editor, or to the jour-
nalists who have reprinted its hateful allegations without the slightest qualifi-
cation. All this smacks of opportunism and especially it shows that the air
has been far from cleared when it comes to Hergé’s war record. The trial
which Hergé escaped at the time of the liberation seems destined to be never
ending, especially in our days of ‘political correctness’. We belong to a time
when people love to judge, to conclude, to hand out prizes and especially to
show-up the faults in others. Sadly, this is also an era when people practice

Rethinking History ISSN 1364-2529 print/ISSN 1470-1154 online © 2002 Taylor & Francis Ltd
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DOI: 10.1080/13642520210164490
02Peeters (bc/d) 10/31/02 4:18 PM Page 262

262 Benoît Peeters

rough justice (without a court or lawyers) just as others practice cod-psy-

chology. An era in which peremptory opinions are pronounced on history
while the dramas that are being played out before our eyes are forgotten.
It is not my intention, in only a few pages, to resolve the question of the
most difficult chapter in the life of the greatest Franco-Belgian BD artist. For
as far as defining clearly the attitude of Hergé under the occupation, one
would first have to delve into the period of the cartoonists’ youth, the world
of the boy scouts and of l’Action catholique in which he grew up. Then one
would have to move on to explore the newspaper Le Vingtième siècle in which
Tintin was created. I do not intend to look at any of these areas in this essay.
Furthermore, it would also be necessary to draw out the specificities of the
history of the Nazi occupation of Belgium, a very different situation from the
French experience, to also analyse the role of Léopold III and the ‘royal ques-
tion’ which split the country, all of which is also impossible within the con-
fines of this brief article. I will therefore only summarize the essential facts,
leaving the rest for the biography of Hergé that I am preparing (Peeters 2002).
There is no doubt that Hergé (alias Georges Remi) (1907–83) was pro-
foundly marked by his first mentor, Abbé Wallez, who was an admirer of
Mussolini, and that his first publications came from the Catholic milieu that
was close to the extreme right-wing. Hergé worked to order, whether it was
a matter of running down the ‘The land of the Soviets’ or capitalist America,
or of celebrating the vast colony that was the Belgian Congo. In 1934, his
meeting with the young Tchang Tchong Jen marked a new awakening. Now,
for the first time, Hergé freed himself from the ideological certainties which
had encircled him up to then and he was able to offer a more open outlook.
By the eve of the war, two sentiments guided Hergé’s political outlook.
Firstly, he believed in a sincere anti-Nazism, witnessed in certain jokes in the
Quick et Flupke series and also in the Tintin album Le Sceptre d’Ottokar
(1939) (King Ottokar’s Sceptre), and, secondly, most especially, in a neutral-
ist perspective. On the 14 October 1936, King Léopold III gave a powerful
speech to the cabinet defending the neutrality of his country. It read:

Our military strategy, like our foreign policy – which necessarily determines the
former – must not plan a more or less victorious war, following a coalition view,
but to push war away from our country. (. . .) This is why we must, as the Min-
ister for Foreign Affairs has recently said, follow a policy which is ‘exclusively
and fully Belgian’.
(cited in Dumoulin et al. 2001: 104–5)

Hergé shared the same views as those gathered around the King. Moreover,
he addressed a letter of support to King Léopold. It was only a little later the
artist became closer to an influential young journalist named Raymond De
Becker, two of whose books he had illustrated at the beginning of the 1930s.
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A Never Ending Trial 263

In December 1939, Becker founded L’Ouest, which he described rather indul-

gently as ‘the Weekly fight in favour of neutrality’. In it, Hergé published the
somewhat forgotten strip, Monsieur Bellum, a typical ‘we’re-off-to-war’
satire. Among the editor’s of L’Ouest Hergé indeed rubbed shoulders with
several future collaborators.
Hergé’s neutralist convictions did not stop him from being mobilized on 1
September 1939, but his poor health permitted him to be quickly demobil-
ized. During the Phoney War, flirting with the contemporary issues of the day,
he started to draw the Tintin adventure Au pays de l’Or noir (Land of Black
Gold) for Le Petit Vingtième newspaper.
Without an ultimatum or a declaration of war Germany invaded Belgium
at approximately 4.30 on the morning of the 10 May 1940. One consequence
of this, amongst many others, was that Le Vingtième siècle disappeared. Like
nearly a million and a half other Belgians Hergé and those closest to him made
for the roads. They left for Paris, and then took refuge in the Massif Central.
During these weeks, whilst the Belgian defences and those of their allies col-
lapsed day after day, tensions between the King and his ministers reached
breaking point. By 19 May most had left for France. However, Léopold III,
who personally had led military operations, refused to leave the country. His
duty, he thought, was to remain at the side of his fellow citizens. Subsequently,
Hitler demanded an unconditional surrender which Léopold III regretfully
accepted so as to avoid a senseless massacre. On the Belgian front-line, a
cease-fire was called at four in the morning of 28 May. Shortly after, the radio
transmitted the King’s message to those who were refugees in France. In
particular, it claimed: ‘Tomorrow, we put ourselves to work with a strong will
to raise the country from its ruins.’
Like the vast majority of Belgians, Hergé approved of Léopold III’s
position. And, all his subsequent attitudes followed on from this. In a letter
to a historian, written sometime later, he explained perhaps most strongly his
ideas on this subject:

For my part, sentiment and reason placed me first and foremost, and without
hesitation, on the side of those who approved the decision of May 28. Many
years have since passed. Never, I think, has any evidence shaken my initial con-
viction (. . .) The King was right.1

On 30 June, when Hergé returned to Brussels, he found a country that had

been profoundly changed. In contrast to its neighbours, Belgium was placed
under the direct authority of a German military administration. General
Alexander von Falkenhausen retained full powers and his primary aim was
to ensure that the situation rapidly returned to normal, and, in particular, that
the country’s resources be utilized in support of the German war economy. In
short, the occupation was more utilitarian than political.
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264 Benoît Peeters

After the closure of Le Vingtième Siècle Hergé found himself without work.
On 10 August, the artist thanked Charles Lesne, his principle correspondent
for the Casterman publishing house, for having just handled Hergé’s copy-
right. In the same letter Hergé wrote: ‘I am seriously asking myself if I should
not embrace a career as a street singer’. Nevertheless, soon after this an offer
of work was made to him by one of the lieutenants of the Rexist leader, Léon
Degrelle. It was an invitation to come to work for the Pays réel and to produce
‘a kind of Petit Vingtième’. Hergé declined this deadly offer. While he had
known Degrelle in his youth, when they both worked on Vingtèime Siècle, he
had not cared for the political leader. In fact, without doubt, the father of
Tintin had already re-contacted Raymond de Becker who had suggested he
join him on the leading Belgian daily newspaper, Le Soir, the paper which De
Becker had just been appointed to head up.
Hergé was only just 33 years old. This could well have been the age for
‘starting out’ but he had at least half of his work behind him. Working solidly
since 1928, he had drawn eight-and-a-half Tintin adventures, virtually all of
the Quick and Flupke series, nearly all the Jo and Zette books and hundreds
of illustrations and dust jacket covers. Very quickly his characters were success-
ful in a way that would take much longer for sales to catch-up with. Tintin was
still a phenomenon limited to the press and it is certain that at this time Hergé
was not in a position to live from his copyright royalties alone. A new source
of revenue was needed. And, he had no intention of being forgotten.
Rejoining Le Soir was a personal move by Hergé. A choice that it is import-
ant not to understate, even if, thereafter, Hergé always held that he had only
sought to stay in work, just as a baker would, and as Léopold III had invited
all the Belgians to do. Mainly this is because Le Soir was not just any news-
paper to obtain a post with. ‘Stolen’ from its legitimate proprietors, Raymond
de Becker’s Le Soir looked to gain from the notoriety of the title from before
the war, and succeeded in doing so. A circulation figure of 60,000 copies on
13 June quickly became 100,000, then 200,000, before reaching the 1939
figure of 300,000 daily copies, a considerable number in proportion to the
low number of French-speaking Belgians. Ideologically speaking, the auton-
omy that De Becker claimed for his paper was illusory and his room for
manoeuvre could not have been more limited. Even if he did not push pro-
Nazi enthusiasm as far as those responsible for other publications, the editor
in chief derived his authority from the Propaganda Abteilung and worked
under its strict surveillance.
‘Tintin and Milou have returned’ was the sober headline on the cover of
the first issue of the Soir jeunesse (17 October 1940). Now, at the precise
moment when Hergé made one of his more questionable political choices,
Tintin started to withdraw from politics. Le Crabe aux pinces d’or (The Crab
with the Golden Claws) was a new start, a second birth, and the arrival of
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A Never Ending Trial 265

Captain Haddock provided a new narrative motivation that had great poten-
tial. Alongside the ‘hollow-headed hero’, Tintin, there was now a more com-
plete Romanesque figure who broke abruptly into the story and took no time
in finding his place. The new adventure quickly seduced readers and sales for
the album started to take off. In fact, they were slowed only by the restric-
tions on paper.
The following adventure, l’Etoile mystérieuse (The Shooting Star) is much
more problematic. Among all the evidence it constitutes the most serious
element in the case against Hergé. First, the story begins with the threat of
an Apocalypse in the form of a gigantic meteor that is heading towards Earth
and bringing with it the prospect of total destruction (an image which can be
read as a metaphor for the Belgian military defeat of 1940). In the end, only
a fragment of the meteor falls close to the North Pole and two rival scientific
expeditions throw themselves into the search for the precious metal that it
contains. Some commentators have reproached Hergé on this point because
there are only representatives from the Axis Powers and the neutral states
amongst the European scientists who embark with Tintin on the good ship
‘L’Aurore’. It is however clear that since the story was to be published in a
newspaper controlled by the Nazi occupiers he could not have presented it
any differently. But if the criticism on this point is a trifle excessive (since
neither these scientists or their nationality play any great role in the story), it
was at the very least cavalier of Hergé to claim, without more precautions,
that the album was about ‘the rivalry for progress between Europe and the
USA’. On the eve of the Americans’ entry into the war, the representation pro-
posed in l’Etoile mystérieuse was more than biased, the behaviour of the
Americans in the story being constantly shown to be underhand.
The Blumenstein case is more problematic still. Blumenstein is the financier,
devoid of any scruples, who supports the American expedition to capture the
meteor. He was drawn according to the stereotypes of the anti-Semitism of
the day. Worse still, two boxes from the strip which appeared in the Le Soir
serialization, thankfully removed before the first edition of the album, con-
tained a miserable gag which can only disturb all Hergé’s admirers. So, while
the prophet Philippulus declares the end of the world by tapping on his gong,
two Jews are rubbing their hands. Their conversation reads:

You have understood, Isaac? The end of the world! If this was true!

Hey! Hey! This would be a good little earner, Salomon! I owe 50 000 fr to my
suppliers . . . With this, I would not have to pay.2

After the war, Hergé’s defence, always remaining the same, was undeniably
insufficient:
02Peeters (bc/d) 10/31/02 4:18 PM Page 266

266 Benoît Peeters

Effectively I drew an unsympathetic financier, with a Semitic appearance, and

with a Jewish name, the name Blumenstein, in L’Etoile mystérieuse. But does
this signify anti-Semitism? . . . It seems to me that, in my panoply of drawings
there is everyone. I have shown quite a few bad types from many different
origins, without constructing a type particular to such and such a race. (. . .)
Jewish stories, stories of the people of Marseilles, the stories of the Scottish, they
have always been told. But who could have foreseen that the Jewish stories,
those ones, were going to end in the way that we know they did, in the death
camps of Treblinka and Auschwitz?
(cited in Sadoul 2000: 75)

If Hergé was unaware of the Final Solution when he was drawing L’Etoile
mystérieuse, he was not lacking in information regarding other anti-Semitic
persecutions. Moreover, the first anti-Jewish measures taken in Belgium were
on 28 October 1940. Furthermore, in May 1942, one week after the publi-
cation of L’Etoile mystérieuse in Le Soir, the Belgian Jews were made to wear
the yellow Star of David. As for Gestapo round-ups, they began in July of the
same year and of the 70,000 Jews who were living in Belgium in 1940
approximately 32,000 were killed in the Holocaust. The time for ‘Jewish
stories’ was rather misplaced.
The truth is that Hergé’s mind was elsewhere. During 1942, and for the
following two years, the author of The Adventures of Tintin seemed to hardly
notice the war which raged on, except that is for matters that directly con-
cerned him. In his small house on the outskirts of Brussels he worked nearly
12 hours a day, including weekends. Not only did he have to supply a daily
strip to Le Soir, but also by February 1942 he succumbed to the advances
made by Casterman to ‘carefully reduce the number of pages of future Tintins
so that they might be printed in colour’. Moreover, it was also necessary to
re-edit the pre-war albums in the new 62-page format. This task meant that
a complete recasting of these albums was necessary. Lettering, the formatting
of images, the rhythm of the story, everything had to be rethought. Realizing
that it was materially impossible for him to execute all this work alone, Hergé
organized ‘a workshop, specializing in this kind of work’.
In the next new Tintin story that Le Soir published, the superb twin albums
Le Secret de la Licorne (The Secret of the Unicorn) and Le Tresor de Rackham
le rouge (Red Rackham’s Treasure), Hergé deliberately kept himself at a dis-
tance from contemporary events. In an occupied country, where the slightest
journey was difficult, he opted for the most romantic theme possible. This
was to be the hunt for lost treasure. However, the true importance of these
two strips is elsewhere. Hergé deepened his fictional universe and completed
his imaginary family of characters. For example, Captain Haddock now
finds himself provided with a prestigious past, while Professor Tournesol
(Professor Calculus), Nestor, the butler, and the chateau of Moulinsart
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A Never Ending Trial 267

(‘Marlinspike’) make their respective debuts in the series. Hergé’s universe

was enriched and the stories became more complex.
At this time the war changed direction. In political disagreement with the
Germans, Raymond De Becker resigned from his post as editor in chief of Le
Soir in September 1943 and was subsequently moved to a house in the Bavar-
ian Alps, which was monitored by the Germans. Despite his great affection
for De Becker, Hergé did not profit from the situation by quitting Le Soir,
which was now placed under the direction of a radical Germanophile, Max
Hodeige. Such was the depth of his concentration on his work that it is not
even certain that he envisaged the possibility of leaving the paper.
More vigilance was apparent at the Casterman publishing house. When
Hergé mentioned his forthcoming edition of L’Etoile mystérieuse, now
appearing with the major Flemish daily Het laatste Nieuws, his colleague at
Casterman, Charles Lesne, for the first time put him on guard:

The publication of L’Etoile mystérieuse in a daily strip in Het laatste Nieuws is in

itself excellent news. I often ask myself – and this is very much a personal reflec-
tion – if it would not be more opportune, for your own interests, for you to wait
until the end of the war before increasing the publication of your drawings in the
press. . . . We are perhaps not so far from the end of hostilities, and it could happen
that once the war is finished there will be reactions which, while unjustified, will
be no less disagreeable. . . . Have you already reflected on this hypothesis?

Hergé’s reply was less prudent than the tone of his correspondent. To my
knowledge, the following lines are the most explicit statement he ever wrote
on collaboration. The decision was made in an absolutely lucid fashion:

I thank you for what you say on the subject of Laatste Nieuws. I did reflect
before taking this decision and it seemed that at the end of the day I should
accept it. It is now or never to get a foot hold in as many newspapers as possible,
even if these papers will come to disappear or change in their direction after the
war. Anyway, I will have reached a wider public. And this is an excellent result
if one imagines that after all this the American strips and the books will reap-
pear, supported by the propaganda of their cartoon films.3

What follows in the same letter goes beyond irony and testifies to an unpleas-
ant cynicism on Hergé’s behalf:

The reactions that you fear are entirely possible. I would even say that they are
probable. There are unequivocal signs of it. But I am already listed among the
‘traitors’ for having published my comic strip in Le Soir, for which I will be shot
or hung (we are not yet certain on that point). The worst then that can happen
to me is that having been shot (or hung) for my collaboration with Le Soir , I will
be re-shot (or re-hung) for my collaboration with Laatste Nieuws, and re-re-shot
(or re-re-hung) for my collaboration with l’Algemeen Nieuws, in which my Quick
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268 Benoît Peeters

and Flupke series appeared from September ’40. The most terrible moment is
when one is shot for the first time. After that, it appears you get used to it . . .

Did Hergé really appreciate the risks he was running? Was he reassuring
himself or trying to provoke? One thing for sure is that when one year later
he was confronted by the difficulties in question he showed considerably less
humour.
In January 1944 the assistance brought by Edgar Jacobs, the future creator
of the Blake and Mortimer BD, lifted Hergé’s spirits. For some time now
Hergé had hoped to meet a true alter ego. Up to the final days of the occu-
pation, he continued to deliver the magnificent scenes from Les Sept Boules
de cristal (The Seven Crystal Balls) story to Le Soir and to also continue the
re-drafting of his pre-war albums. Writing to Charles Lesne on 19 June 1944
Hergé declared: ‘You certainly know the saying: Lord, liberate us from our
protectors and protect us from our liberators’. Hergé could not have imag-
ined how true this would be.
Brussels was liberated by English troops on 3 September 1944. Quickly,
the legitimate owners of the press took back control of their papers. On 9
September Hergé was arrested, along with many others, and marched by foot
to the echoes of jeers from the crowd to Saint-Gilles prison. He spent only
one single night in prison. Then he was arrested by another group, and
quickly released. All in all, in the first place, Hergé was more frightened than
seriously hurt. He even had a tendency to show off which is demonstrated in
his letter of 19 September, again to Charles Lesne, who was clearly not of the
same opinions as Hergé:

The optimists are wrong. Wrong not to be more optimistic. The pessimists – of
which I was one, I swear, are wrong for their brief moment of shame. What is
essential is that all this has happened at the speed of lightening, and, for the
second time, our country has been, in the main, miraculously saved. Two
miracles in four years, that is a lot, and I would never have dared hope for it. I
was wrong. So much the better.

Hergé’s shame was only brief, if at all. And the summary of the circumstances
also rather cavalier. At first Hergé didn’t seem to be interrupted in his projects.
He even produced some drawings for the historic occasion including illus-
trating a scarf to the glory of the liberators, and some pretty book dedica-
tions to an officer from the ‘British Liberation Army’! Moreover, with the help
of Edgar Jacobs he finished the colour version of Tintin au Congo and
inquired after the original Sceptre d’Ottokar that had been stuck in Paris since
the start of the war. It was all as if the shock wave had not yet hit.
It was in the Autumn of 1944 that Georges Remi started to reappear, having
been concealed for 15 years or so behind the mask of the nom de plume
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A Never Ending Trial 269

‘Hergé’. He was 37 years old, and had two thirds of his oeuvre behind him.
For the first time in years doubts took hold. Many years later, in his last inter-
view, Hergé still recognized this. In fact, the difficult days of Autumn 1944 were
the most important and saddest time of his life. He would never reach an under-
standing of ‘the attacks and the hatred’ which were directed at him and
especially those which were directed towards his nearest family. He explained:

I had journalist friends who I still believe to this day were absolutely ‘clean’ and
who did not sell out to the enemy. And when I saw some of these people that I
knew, and whose personality I knew to be patriotic, condemned to death and
some even shot, I no longer understood anything anymore.
This was an experience of absolute intolerance. It was dreadful, dreadful!
(Hergé in Peeters 1990)

Hergé’s morale quickly suffered. His self-confidence was broken and he was
subjected to long periods of depression in the 15 years that followed. He
would never again find the creative energy of his early years.
The artist escaped somewhat better when it came to the question of the
legal process. On 8 March 1945 Military Auditor Vincotte shared his doubts
with the General Auditor Walther Ganshof van der Meersch. He was increas-
ingly inclined towards not pursuing Hergé. For example:

I estimate that Justice would be undermined if proceedings were brought against

an author of harmless children’s drawings. However, an examination has been
instituted. In question is Le Soir. And, since currently one accepts the principle
that cases are to be pursued against those that worked in the collaborationist
press, even if they were not personally involved in propaganda. . . . I am com-
pelled to point out, that, however one looks at it, Remi, with his drawings, is
one of those who did the most to sell Le Soir under the Occupation. As I find
myself obliged to peruse the literary journalists, the sports’ columnists, etc., the
writings of whom are nevertheless not subject to criticism, one could say that
Hergé has as much, and even more than them, contributed to the approval and
spread of the newspaper.

One could not put it any better. The problem is perfectly framed, without
hatred but also without indulgence. Also, it is clear that the Military Auditor
had not looked so closely at the ‘harmless children’s drawings’. Comic strips
were ‘not his thing’. They appeared to him more ‘anodyne’, or more insignifi-
cant, than a sports article.
On 12 October 1945, the scrupulous Vincotte wrote again to the Auditor
General:

Preliminary investigation of Hergé has not produced any new information since
the 11 September. (. . .) No other activity, such as cartoons of a propagandistic
02Peeters (bc/d) 10/31/02 4:18 PM Page 270

270 Benoît Peeters

nature, the membership of a pro-German movement, or even evidence of

favourable views towards the New Order have come to light.

The Military Auditor even rejected in very concrete terms the idea that the
success of Tintin would have contributed to the sale of Le Soir. He noted:

Everyone knows (. . .) that very quickly the circulation of newspapers was

restricted by the Propaganda (Agency) and that there wasn’t unsold stock. The
sales figures for the newspaper were determined by the quota of paper fixed by
Germany rather than the success of the paper. This being the case, the opposite
reasoning, just as theoretical and just as irrefutable, could be made: ‘in occu-
pying space in the columns of the paper, in drawing for children, or in speak-
ing of art, or fashion, or sport, I reduced the space reserved for enemy
propaganda and I have accomplished a patriotic act’. Moreover, Le Soir had
only a moderate position in collaboration and was not subservient to an extrem-
ist movement.

Hergé never knew of these documents although if he had they would have
probably brought him some relief. It is in any case striking to see that the
judges of the purge, acting in the heat of the moment, held a more measured
position than the author of Le Mythe Hergé (The Hergé Myth) who was
writing sixty years after the events!
Today, what balance sheet can one draw regarding Hergé’s attitude during
the war?
From a creative point of view these years were essential. Hergé deepened
the world of the Adventures of Tintin and drew some of his most beautiful
stories. Apart from the at the very least untimely strips from L’Etoile mys-
térieuse, he kept himself at a remarkable distance from current affairs.
From a moral point of view, one can be more circumspect. Hergé did not
conduct himself like an active collaborator but still his attitude was in the very
least thoughtless. Uniquely preoccupied with the artistic and commercial
development of his work, he lived through the years of the occupation showing
an incredible indifference. He saw nothing, and wanted to see nothing.
With his ambiguities and his subsequent loyalty to those who had suffered
in the purge, and for who it had not gone so well, the name of Hergé appears
to me, when all is said and done, fairly close to that of François Mitterrand.
Certainly you can dream of a smoother, franker and more courageous course
in life. You can also marvel at the fact that Georges Remi, whose talent devel-
oped in such a narrow-minded and hardly sympathetic milieu, succeeded in
giving birth to such a universal body of work.
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A Never Ending Trial 271

Notes

1 Letter from Hergé to Colonel Remy, 19 November 1976.

2 Hergé presented the original conversation in a satirical interpretation of a German
Jewish accent. For the record it reads: ‘Tu as entendu, Isaac? La Fin du monde! Si
c’était vrai!’ – ‘Hé! Hé! Ce serait une bonne avaire, Salomon! Che tois 50,000 Frs
a mes vournizeurs. . . . Gomme za, che ne tefrais bas bayer.’
3 Letter from Hergé to Charles Lesne (6 September 1943).

References

Assouline, P. (1996) Hergé, Paris: Editions Plon.

Benoît-Jeannin, M. (2001) Le Mythe Hergé, Villeurbane: Editions Golias
Dumoulin, Michel et al. (2001) Léopold III, Bruxelles: Editions Complexe.
Peeters, B. (1990) Le Monde d’Hergé, (updated and reviewed edition), Tournai:
Casterman.
Peeters, B. (2002) Hergé, fils de Tintin, Paris: Flammarion.
Sadoul, N. (2000) Tintin et moi. Entretiens avec Hergé, Tournai: Casterman.