Empire: World History - 309. Tintin, Nazis, & Soviets

Episode Date: November 20, 2025

What was the origin story of Hergé, the Belgian illustrator who created The Adventures of Tintin? How did an unlikely friendship transform Hergé’s life and lead him to draw Tintin crying in a comic strip for the first and only time? Anita and William navigate the turbulent hot waters of Tintin’s history from anti-Soviet propaganda, to featuring authentic Chinese calligraphy, to becoming one of the most successful comic book series in the world.  Join the Empire Club: Unlock the full Empire experience – with bonus episodes, ad-free listening, early access to miniseries and live show tickets, exclusive book discounts, a members-only newsletter, and access to our private Discord chatroom. Sign up directly at empirepoduk.com  For more Goalhanger Podcasts, head to www.goalhanger.com. Email: [e-mail] Instagram: @empirepoduk Blue Sky: @empirepoduk X: @empirepoduk Producer: Anouska Lewis Assistant Producer: Alfie Rowe Executive Producer: Dom Johnson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

If you want access to bonus episodes reading lists for every series of Empire, a chat community. Discounts for all the books mentioned in the week's podcast, add free listening and a weekly newsletter, sign up to Empire Club at www.mpower.com. Hello and welcome to Empire with me Anita Arnhannan. And me, William Durimpool. Last episode, we were talking about cartoon characters and we're going to talk about a proper doozy in this one. So we talked about Baba, the elephant and the asteroids. It is that thing that we have so often on Empire

where two things are true simultaneously. And Baba, the elephant, is enormously charming and we all love those pictures. But it is also enormously offensive to many people at the same time and try to keep both those visions in the same pair of binoculars. It's a tricky thing, isn't it? Well, I mean, I was really interested in your response to pictures that you had seen and accepted as a child

and now you were going, oh my God. It never occurred to me growing up in 1970s sort of semi-Edwardian Scotland that any of the staff was at all dodgy. But yes, no, I can totally see it now. Anyway, look, we continue the discussion, but we're talking about Tintin, tantal, if you're on the other side of the channel. And it's a cracker of a story that you've uncovered Nita. I have to say, this is Lita's research, not mine, this episode. And it is one of the most extraordinary stories we've ever dealt with. So onto it, it's great.

Thank you so much. Well, if you thought, you know, there was controversy surrounding the other two characters that we did last week, nothing compared to this one, which is a bit of a hurricane. So for those of you who don't know, Tintin, the character is very simply drawn. You know, it's just a round head, two dots for eyes, two little semicircles for eyebrows. He has this blonde quiff, which is really the Tintin style. And Blue Jumper, khaki trouser combo than usually. And in a nutshell, you know, he's this sort of intrepid journalist who gets pulled into all sorts of daring do. He has a dog called Snowy. They travel around the world, solving mysteries, uncovering conspiracies, looking for treasure, and you might

recognize some of the side characters, Captain Haddock. I love Captain Haddock, the sea dog. There's a bit of Captain Haddock about you, actually. Thank you very much. Certainly a fondness for rum would certainly be. He's a bomb vivor. As well as, as Haddock, you've got eccentric Professor Calculus, who's sort of the brains of the operation. So these books were written between 1929 and 1976, which is a great span of history. And the adventures also take you across a huge span of the world, you know, from the jungles of South America to the moon even. And they had an impact on you as a child. I mean, were these one of your favorites? So bizarrely, while I grew up with Asterix,

and he was something that was very much around from my nursery days, Tintin was something that seemed enormously sophisticated and other boys knew about when I went to school. And I remember trading sort of Sweeties and North Berwick Rock, which was what I used to appear at school with from Scotland, this chewy sweet that they made on the seaside at home for the loan of Tintin and the Golden Clause or something like that. Other boys had these books at school and they were new to me. I remember thinking they were very sophisticated and exciting that I didn't know about them when I went to school. A lot of people did because let me tell you, this is one of the most successful, widely distributed comic series of all time. So let's run through some of the stats.

that's for you, first of all. It's been translated into 110 languages and dialects. Over 270 million copies have been sold worldwide. That's a lot of copies, isn't it? I mean, and those are any figures from 2019. That's the latest I could find. It's going to be more now. Estimates suggest that up to a billion people have read Tintin to date worldwide. And just tell us about how much these pictures go for, William, because it's eye-watering. Well, if you look on auctioneer websites, the Luletus Blu, the artwork for Lelotis Blow, which was originally rejected, is too expensive to reproduce 1936 and kept in a draw.

The editor's son found it and sold it in 2021 for $2.3 million. So check your bottom drawers, anyone who's got parents that worked in publishing houses, because you never know. Yeah, there be treasure. And two years later, another drawing, Tintin in America, which was created back in 1942, it was used for the colour edition of the Belgian artist's 1946 book, which had the same name, sold just shy of £2 million.

So these things are worth a lot of money. Did you grow up on also the cartoon version? Because I remember later in my childhood, that there was a cartoon strip that was on in the holidays in the morning, which was again a whole new Tintin on TV, which is very exciting. I didn't. So do you know why I didn't particularly warm to Tintin? Because it was all about boys, all only boys. There were no strong girl characters.

There was, there was the opera singer. Do you remember the wonderful opera singer? No, I don't actually. But I do remember the sort of boys club going off and getting into troubles. You know, with the Thompson twins, who we didn't mention four particular favourites of yours. I did, however, watch the Tintin film. That was released in 2011. And boy, what a hefty powerhouse of Hollywood they had behind that.

So that was directed by Stephen Spielberg. He produced it with Peter Jackson of Lord of the Rings fame. John Williams composed of music and that grossed around 250 million pounds at the box office. That's how, I guess, they reached this estimate of $1 billion for this. And what is really extraordinary about this is that they were savvy. So the creator's widow, Arje, as he is known, and we'll get into the name of him because that's really interesting as well. She controls the commercial exploitation of Tintin. So that is memorabilia, licensing, merchandising, museum.

related business. This is like J.K. Rowling's business manager, exactly, who from the beginning, didn't they? They snapped up the rights to every sort of little plastic Harry Potter that ever was produced. Very cleverly. I mean, it's smart. But let's tell you about Argeet, because the world knows him as Arge. Tintin is Arge's child. But actually, the name of the creator was Georges Rémy. George Remy. I had no idea about that either. I mean, Ege has been so much a name since my childhood. I had no idea he was called something completely different. So it is actually his initials. So George R. Gr. G.R. G. R. R.G. R.G. Reversed is R.G.

So he was born in Belgium. What would be our French cartoon names? I would be B.W. Ah, uh-uh. Uh-uh. Which is strangely the predominant noise I heard from my mother growing up. Uh-uh. Uh-uh.

Anyway, look, he had a very humble beginning, did Arje. His dad worked in a sweetie factory. His mom was a stay-at-home housewife. And school reports always talked about him. him doodling rather than paying attention. And it was probably just, you know, the only thing he could do was go to art college. Supposedly, this would have been the exact right place for him, but he hated it. He didn't like to be told what to draw. And from a very young age, Aarge was completely sucked in by adventure stories. He loved talking about Alexander Dumas,

Jules Verne, Robert Louis Stevenson, Arthur Conan Doyle, these were his favourites, these were his seminal works. And there was something about how they made his little world in Belgium grow bigger. And he channeled that. And something in that middle-class dreamer also touched a nerve with the readers. He also said, you know, actually the Boy Scouts movement was a huge influence on him. So he said it erased the boredom of childhood. and it gave him all the time to draw these comics, his little characters. And he came up quite early with this character called Totor, who looks a little bit like Tintin.

He was in a Belgium edition of the official Boy Scouts magazine, which he was sort of, you know, right from the start. It's like he's destined to birth his character. Was Toto an influence on Tintan? He looks a lot like Tintin. Must have been. So what I hadn't realised and what was so interesting reading about this is the actually very sort of right-wing Catholic background to the early Tintin stories. And in October, 1925, at the age of 18,

Eurge joins the Levantiam Cycler, which is a kind of right-wing Catholic newspaper published by the Societ Newvel, headed by a sort of Fundo Catholic priest called Norbert's Wallace. And he moved up the scale in the office from Aaron Boyd, illustrator, and then reporter photographer. So in a sense, that Eugé was the original tinted, but in a slightly more sort of dodgy background than we realized. And in 1929, Eurge creates his first real balloon comic with Les Eventure de Tantin, the Adventures of Tintin, which ran in Le Petit Vant-Tiem, a young person's supplement to the paper. And this is commissioned by Father Nobert, who is this, as I said, this sort of ultra-conservative Catholic. and it was like those sort of early CIA propaganda books that were distributed across the Soviet.

It was actually Tanta Ope de Soviet. So Tintin in the land of the Soviets. And he's uncovering sort of Marxist propaganda. And this is all meant to be sort of consumed by nice Belgian kids to see the errors of communism. Right from the start, you get the impression that, you know, his editorial is controlled by this man called Norbert Wallets. And Norbert really does want to run down things he doesn't like from children's earliest, most pliable minds. So, you know, he's the one who wants to have this anti-Soviet propaganda. And this is all sort of, you know, staged elections, factories run only when foreign visitors are present.

Violence against dissenters. All of this is kind of woven into the comic strip as well. Just to make clear, this is not a sort of distant cousin of our familiar tantan or tintin. this is absolutely the Tintin we know enough with a little quiff of her. He's already there with his doggy, Snowy, working against baddies in caps. But they are Soviet baddies, and it is anti-communist propaganda. So let me tell you the story of this first foray of Tintin into the world. So Tintin and Snowy are being chased.

They are arrested. They escape multiple times. The Soviet secret police or the OGPU, they are stupid in this. They're not very clever. They're not very good. It stands for, by the OGPU, the Joint State Political Directorate, if you really want to know it. So they were the really terrifying secret Soviet intelligence agency from about 1923 to 1934, a real thing. So, you know, a precursor to the dreaded NKVD.

And the magazine goes down so well with Norbert, Father Norbert, that he decides, actually, you know what, this is going to be a real thing. He sees what this little kid in his office is produced. And he says, right, okay, you know what? We're marketing. That's what we're going to do. So he hires an actor and a dog that looks like Snowy to wander around Brussels, dress like Tintin and his dog, to publicize this newly born comic. And it works a treat.

Tintin pretty much becomes an overnight sensation. If Arshae minded being used by his editor, you know, for political propaganda, he didn't show it. I mean, you know, he's young, I suppose he just feels lucky to be there. How old is Ere at this point? 18 when he starts working for the paper. So it's like a couple of years later. So I'm like, yeah, really, of course he is. money in his pocket. They're sending out adverts for him. It's great. It's like having, if you've

got a book published, seeing your poster on the underground is thrilling. So the next commission is another piece of propaganda. For this second installment, El Jé had wanted to send Tintin to the United States. But Father Norbert said, no, no, no. I think what we do is why don't we send Tintin and Snowy to the Belgian colony of Congo instead? Which, as we know from our Conrad episode last week with the wonderful Maya Jasnov was in many ways the worst European colony of all, an absolute horror story. And here is Tintin doing active propaganda for the Belgian Congo, albeit a little bit later than the kind of real horror times of the early 1900s and 1920s. So tell us about Tanta or Congo, Anita. Well, I mean, look, the takeaway message from it is

Colonials, great missionaries, fabulous, and the local black population savages. So this was like a great civilising mission. That's what Father Norbert had wanted to convey. And the images, you just need to take a look at the images from the time. I mean, they weren't out of place at the time, but now if we look at them, so you've got, you know, sort of one, you've got a missionary in a boat with Snowy and Tintin. With a cross around his neck, a pith helmet and a Father Christmas beard. Basically, the biggest stereotype of missionary, you can imagine. But rowing the boat are six black sort of servants, I guess. With enormous lips, the ultimate stereotype.

Sickening, slightly sickening, actually. Absolutely. And just, you know, to recap, if you haven't heard brilliant Maya Jasano, go back and listen. But Belgium at the time was ruling over the Congo free state, later to become the Belgian Congo. And these attitudes towards black people were widely accepted, not just in Belgium, society, but in wider Europe. So where is it, you know, if you were a kid, you open the book, you'll see like an exciting children's adventure, but this stuff sort of seeps in underneath. You know, it's paternalistic. The white people are the ones who are, you know, making all the

decisions, having all the agency. And the Congolese characters are nothing. And just think about what was actually going on at the time in Belgian Congo, because you have King Leopold the second who has claimed the Congo at the Berlin Conference from 1884 to 1885. He says, look, this is going to be a humanitarian philanthropic project. We're going to civilize Africans, even saying, you know, we're going to suppress the slave trade, which is an African thing. But in reality, what this was, as a private economic enterprise, designed to extract, extract, extract, especially ivory.

And then later in the 1890s, it would turn to rubber, which was in high demand. And, you know, this was the actual politics and experiences of those there. And just to, again, we said a little of this last week with the Conrad episode, what was going on was that if individual villages did not produce their quota of rubber and ivory, there was extreme violence, hostage-taking, or what we would probably call terrorism. Entire communities were destroyed and burnt down. And the most visible symbol of this was the cutting off. of hands, which is extraordinary. I'm looking now at photographs of some guys who've had their

left hand cut off with the machete. These are the children of the workers. So if quotas weren't meant often, you know, children were netted up and their limbs were cut off. One of the images that you're looking at is a child of about 10 years old who's missing a hand. And this is not done by sort of, you know, mercenaries without the knowledge of the colonial officials, because in one of the photographs. We have a colonial official in a white pith helmet like the missionary in the cartoon. And he is sitting there in a beautifully starched white imperial suit. And he's pointing at the hand of the person who's had his hand cut off at the stump. And this is extremely produced as an advert or warning or is it proud colonial official showing folks back home what he's been doing in his spare

time? It's a grotesque picture. And there's not just one or two of them. There are lines of these pictures of kids of There are so many of these pictures of atrocity. And if you look at the numbers, they're not going to make you feel any better than the images, which will rock you to your route. Because it's suggested the Congo's population fell by 10 million or more, which is roughly half the population during Leopold's rule, due to not just these kind of maimings, killings, famine, forced labour, disease. You know, so these are absolutely appalling times. And news is getting out. And actually, we portrayed the missionary in the Beaudot-Eurier, indeed. But some missionaries were appalled by this.

So you have travellers and reformers who are coming there. Missionaries are sending their statements back, these are the kids who are turning up to our missions. This is what's happening. E.D. Morrell, who's a French-born British journalist, he's an author, he's a pacifist. He's there. He's sending scathing remarks back. So Roger Casement, you remember we talked about him?

This extraordinary character, yeah. He appeared in an Irish series. Yeah, and we talked about Roger Casement in the Ireland episodes, you know, diplomat, Irish nationalist who eventually gets executed by the United Kingdom for treason during World War I and thrown into an unmarked grave at the back of Pentonville prison. They are putting on the pressure on Belgium saying, you know what, you cannot do this. You are the king and it is all being done in your name. And it's thanks to pressure from people like Casement that King Leopold then ends up seeding control to the Belgian state in 1908. but you know what, things don't get better, do they? So this cartoon is being drawn in 1934, when things are a little better than they were

during the limb-cutting bonanza of what was about the 1910s, it's still absolutely the worst of all European colonies is always recognised as such. And the Belgian state control becomes more regulated, but it's still unbelievably harsh condition than the mine, especially copper and diamonds and uranium, all these sort of things, claiming hundreds of lives and there's racial segregation in the cities, strict control over movement and labour, and this is the model colony which Eurge, in one of his earliest incarnations,

is drawing propaganda for effective. Even so, his comic book carries on being very popular. He has huge success. Congo gets independence from the Belgians in 1960. And so all of this is then out and discussed and in the public domain. He does reflect about it after, you know, sort of this huge slurry of images and reportage becomes public after the Belgians finally leave. And in 1975, he actually does a series of interviews with a journalist called Numa Sadul, which, you know, look up because they're really fascinating. He's asked about, you know, those early successes, including Tintin in the Congo, which put him on the map, you know, year, decades before. And he says, look, this is a direct quote, I was fed on the prejudices of the bourgeoisers.

society that surrounded me. It was 1930 and I drew them in the purely paternalistic spirit that was that of the time in Belgium. And he acknowledged in those interviews that the work reflected the prejudices at the time rather than any understanding he had of Africa. And he asked for forgiveness. He said, look, this is a youthful sin. I'm sorry about the colonial stereotypes. And he also did talk in those interviews about being used in anti-Soviet propaganda. But these are the once that Aosha talked about, there are others that maybe I would like to ask him about. There are some others. William, tell us about Tintin in America, which he draws in 1932. Well, yeah, it goes on. And again, you know, it's very difficult to know how to react to this,

because do you just say this is the prejudices of the time? But what he's drawing in Tintin America, of course, is Red Indians committing savageries. And by Red Indians, in Verdecomas, we mean guys in wigwams with feather headdresses doing, inverted commas, native dances and yeah, it's all very primitive and savage. There's the only word for it. This is 1932 though. Let's cut him a break with that. This is the same period as those black and white movies where hundreds of Indians are being shot dead by early John Wayne characters and that sort of thing. So give him that. But then something changes, even before the 1960s and 1970s when you have the civil rights movement and you have all this evidence coming out from historians

about what actually happens in these places. But something, happens that makes his next work, the Blue Lotus, the one that William was talking about, you know, that image that was found in the editor's son's draw that sold for 2.3 million. Something happens that changes his mind and it is so human and rather touching, join us after the break and we'll tell you about it. Welcome back. So, in 1936, what happens to the Blue Lotus? Give you a little synopsis. The story begins with Tintin in India where he receives a mysterious invitation to China from a stranger,

connected to a secret opium smuggling ring. And Tintin arrives in Shanghai. He finds himself caught up in the middle of political tensions between China and Japan. These things were happening. Japan is preparing to invade China. Propaganda's being used to justify their action in Europe. But Tintin learns that the drug smuggling is linked to a Shanghai opium den called the Blue Lotus and a dangerous poison.

This poison is called, is it Rajaja juice? and is being used to drive people insane. Now, what happens? And this is the lovely sort of human happen charts, Anita referred to, that while investigating, Tintin is befriended by a young Chinese boy named Chang Chong Chen, and their friendship becomes this very sort of touching aspect of the series, especially when Tintin protects Chang from racism and bullying. And together they uncover the truth, a sinister conspiracy involving corrupt officials,

Japanese spies, and an internet. national drug cartel. And in the end, Tintin manages to expose the criminals, dismantle the opium operation, help the Chinese resist Chinese manipulation, and the story closes with Tintin and Chang partying as close friends, promising to see each other again. So the question is, how come that we get this very different sort of racial spin? Anita, tell us. Oh, it's so exciting. Okay, so it is because of one man, a man called Zhang Chongren, who is a young Chinese man who will change Eosha's brain. So born in 1907, this young man, Zhang John Huyen, is raised in a Jesuit orphanage in old Shanghai.

And he will become one of the greatest sculptors of his age. I mean, they refer to him even now as the Rodin of the East. In fact, just to give you a sense of how important he is to the art world, in the mid-1980s, French cultural authorities made a cast of his hands. That is an honour they only bestowed on Rodin himself and Pablo Picasso. So cut back to when he's actually sort of nothing, just a young man. It's the 1930s. News has started leaking out that Arje, who's now like a superstar cartoonist, is going to set his next work in China. And at that same time, it just so happens that Zhang Jorren has traveled to Brussels and is studying as an art student.

And he is in the care of a Jesuit priest called Father Leon Gossé, who's the chaplain for Chinese students at the University of Levin, where Zhang has come to further his studies. I should say quickly that my priest brother also studied at the University of LeValle in his priestly formation, I think they call it. There's always a dalrymple somewhere. You just have to scratch the surface. Gosset, who is looking after these Chinese students, is a little bit worried because Herge is like this phenomenon. And he's worried about the impact of the kind of stories and the kind of pictures that Arge produces. What will they do to the people that he loves, his Chinese students? So, you know, he says, look, I'm going to write to him. I'm going to tell him because I'm worried that Eoschet might treat the Chinese the same way he treated the natives of the Congo. Because they were very popular with his students, wasn't he who saw them reading Eurge comics and wanted him to be properly.

He didn't. Well, he just didn't want his Chinese students to be heard. So he writes to Eosje and to Eoshe's credit, he writes back. And he says, you know what, Father Gossé, if you're really upset about it, the best thing you can do, and this is a quote, is find me a Chinese advisor. So that's what Gosse does. He introduces Aalje to several Chinese students in LeValle and finally to Zhang himself. And the date is May 1934. And at this time, Zhang, he's only a year younger than Aalje, is 26 at this time.

And he's, you know, doing very well in art. And Aarge, of course, you know, he loved art. Art was his slipstream into drawing cartoons. And he visits Aalje at his home every Sunday throughout the year of 1934. and he starts to talk to him about Eastern art. He teaches Eiché calligraphy. He teaches in the basics of Taoist philosophy. They talk about Chinese current affairs and the culture.

And Zhang can talk to him because he's fluent in French. You know, he's been raised in this sort of Jesuit tradition, so he's bilingual. And so you can see this impact on Eoshe's work. Because if you look at the cartoon strip, The Blue Lotus, there are Chinese phrases in the background of the comic strip, like little hidden messages or little, little strokes his friend's face, you know, written out by Zhang. Zhang actually does the calligraphy for him. There are phrases from the old book of Tang, which only Zhang could have told

him. You know, they praise the virtues and determinations of an ancient doctor, son Shimao, and they furnish the headquarters of the Sons of the Dragon, a secret society dedicated to fighting the opium trade. The Chinese heroes are fighting the open trade. And there are posters in the background of this comic strip, calling for boycotts of Japanese goods. So if you can read it, there's propaganda within propaganda. And it says, down with imperialism. So Urges is rather turned from his days supporting pith-helmeted Belgian missionaries of the Congo. So this starts off as a relationship through Father Gose, where, you know, okay, you want somebody to advise you, I'll give you Zhang. That's not a problem. But it turns into this really

tight friendship. And there is a biographer of Eulge who says, El Jé loved his friends so much. He says, look, let me co-credit you for the creation of this book. I want to put your name on the book. And Zhang says, no, I really hardly did anything. And it's a very humble guy. And so he says, no, no, it's okay. I won't do it. So instead, he says, look, Zhang, just do something. Because when I open this book, I want to see you in it. So sneak your Chinese name into some of the shop signs that Tintin passes by. And that's, you know, it's a lovely little nod to each other. And I think it's the political aspect of this, with the Chinese not being depicted in the same old, lazy old way that El J has done with other, you know, some native populations is different.

And if I'm right in saying he's not only defending the Chinese from the Japanese aggressors, but also from Western businessmen. So there's a complete turnaround here from what we've been seeing in the other words. Yeah, absolutely. For the first time, an anti-imperialist message, you the American businessman who's in it. You're absolutely right. It's a man called Gibbons beats a Chinese weight of spilling a drink and calls him yellow scum, saying that he should learn manners from superior Western civilization. But Aalje makes him look ridiculous and him look like the bully.

He's the villain, yeah. But that is not to say there is not a really uncomfortable racist stream running through these Tintin books. But it's not directed at the Chinese because he's got a Chinese brand. Instead, William, it's directed at the Japanese. somebody's going to get it in the neck and it's the Japanese, so what happens to them? It's easy to spot the Japanese character in the book because they have extra long teeth and really a sort of childish inability to do anything at all effectively. So it's not like we're in sort of racial heaven here.

Well, he's got a Chinese friend. I mean, some of his best friends are a Chinese man. But the Japanese take such issue with the newspaper. They issue a formal notice of complaint. It goes right to the ambassadorial level. It's like huge diplomatic incident. the ambassador to Belgium demands the book is banned completely. But according to Asuline is his name, Aarge's biographer, Zhang just reassures Eurge, look, I know you've got a headache from all of this diplomatic stuff.

But he says, if the Japanese are angry, it's because we are telling the truth. And they weather it out. The comic strips are a massive success. Father Gosse's students love them. Everybody else loves them. He gets an invitation from the Chinese First Lady in nine. 1939 to come to China, which he's really excited to do because he can go traveling and, you know, his best friend can show him around China. But then the outbreak of World War II stops all of that.

Yeah, 1939 is not a great moment to get invitation anywhere, least of all, to China on the eve of the Japanese invasion. If you want to look at, there are some lovely things online about, you know, how El-Shea transforms his friend into the hero of the comic book, a character called Chang in the book. and you've got a photo of his friend and how he maps it and then creates this face which looks like his best mate and will appear in the comic. So it really is like a love song to a best friend. And there's another photograph from the 1980s of Zhang Chong Ren standing next to a poster of his sort of alter ego in the cartoon, pointing at him in a kind of pride and this lovely old guy with glasses clearly in his boy, 70s in the picture, looking at this youthful version of himself in the cartoon.

So you've got stereotypes of Japanese, you've got less of a white saviour thing going on here, you've got more sort of Chinese being human and heroic here. Zhang, I should say, goes on to establish a really successful art school in Shanghai. But because of the war, they are separated, he gets called back to China. He doesn't see his friend for the next 40 years. The wonderful thing about how Aalje feels about this, He's said to be plunged into depression when his friend Zhang leaves. And in the comic book, it is the only panel that he paints where Tintin cries when his friend goes away.

Isn't it sweet? Isn't it sweet? So racism is all over. It's dealt with, isn't it, William? It's all gone. It's all gone from Tintin. If only, because actually, we're still very much in the 1940s. Sadly, things are not as they should be. So the next story, the shooting star, 1942, has to be withdrawn and redrawn after the war because of a grotesque, anti-Semitic caricature of a villainous banker named Blumenstein in the original French. But this actually is only the tip of the iceberg of what Eurge is doing. On the 3rd of September 1944, Brussels is liberated from Nazi occupation. And Ereges loses his publication, L'I is what he's cartooning for at this.

point. And he's forced to drop his pen, drop his paints and stop. And that is because Lesois, who he's been now doing comics strips for, has been under Nazi control during the German occupation of Belgium in World War II. And it used to publish pro-German propaganda, written content, but also, you know, the Tintin story, you know, the Blumenstein, greedy Jewish banker is another example of that. So Blumenstein, if you look at the picture of him, is like the classic European anti-Semitic caricaturedial. of the Jewish banker that you see in 19th century, anti-Semitic cartoons going right through the 20th century,

this sort of plump, bald guy with an enormous nose, and it's fantastically offensive. And doing bad things, you know, for greedy reasons. So all of these things have been contained in Lissois. And the Belgians who have been liberated are now turning on these Nazi collaborators. And the entire editorial board, including Eulge, find themselves arrested for collaboration.

Elje is freed after only one night and he's a lucky one because others go down for a lot, lot longer because they argue, Arge's representatives argue, look, he was naive, he was young, he was just drawing comics, he was just thinking of kids, you know, he wasn't doing this for political reasons and he doesn't end up convicted, but the stink sticks to him.

So, you know, people start to find Arje unfashionable, that's the best case scenario, but at worst, they go for him. There's no question at all that this is, I mean, looking at these cartoons from this period, that those are straightforward Nazi cartoons, aren't they? I mean, to us it's very black and white that this is the cartoon embodiment of everything Hitler writes about Jewish bankers. And they do appear in Nazi sympathetic publications.

So, you know, he's writing in Lesotho, the Belgian's turn on that newspaper and they start calling it Lesois, which is the stolen swar, you know, that it was stolen by the Nazis. It was even translated in a Dutch Nazi-controlled newspaper. So, you know, the Nazis loved it. One of the founders of that Dutch magazine that printed and reproduced Ere's Tintin was the founder of the Belgian Nazi Party back in 1931. And Eulge illustrated his book, a man called Leone de Rheel. It was a book for schools.

You know, so all this stuff going on in America about librarians being targeted, if you can get the mind of the young and control it, then you have the future in your hands. And that's what the Nazis believed. That's why they turned so much attention to comic strips and children's books and controlling what they were reading. But after the war, people do not want to know this anymore. And is there a sense that there's a continuity, Anita, between the early sort of right-wing Catholic world that he is in the beginning of his career and the people who are controlling and owning Lesoth during the war? Father Norbert's not unique. Again, you will have many stories of collaboration with the cloth and the jack boot.

But likewise, you will have also those who speak out. And a number of priests are rounded up by the Nazis because they're troublemakers, because they are speaking out against it. But to collaborate, if you're, you know, the winning side, it happens a lot. Father Norbert, who started Arre's career, believes that even before the Nazis are a twinkle in the eye, pounding out this stuff, imperialism good, black, brown, inferior, Jews, inferior. You know, he has those attitudes already before the Nazis. And there's another thing that Eugre does during the war that also has anti-Semitic stereotypes, isn't there?

1941, a book called Fables. Yeah, it's a children's book again. I mean, again, it's another one of these really horrifying things. You think, oh, my God, leave the kids alone. But it's got this racist story about stingy Jewish people. And in Alge's defense, which he does mount, he says, look, I left these characters off the cover. I didn't want these characters on the book of fables, but it was the publisher who kept them on. I didn't, I was already feeling uncomfortable about this, but they did it anyway.

So look, he carries on. And you look at the, again, the body of work around this time. You've got land of black gold, which takes him into the land of the Arabs. And, you know, the Arabs are lazy and violent and bumbling. If you've got the Latin American world, where you've got the broken ear, tin and the piccaros, where, you know, they are corrupt or they're incompetent. You've got black dock workers and the crab with the golden claws. I mean, that's the one you were talking about earlier, wasn't it? The one that you said, yeah.

That's the one that was the TV on TV in the 1970s. Do you remember if they kept sort of the lips and bulging eyes of the original? Do you remember if they modified it for TV? I'm not sure that in 1970s, Britain, anyone would have seen anything wrong with it, even at that stage. Black and white minstrels and things went on until... That was still on TV, yeah. So the backlash, you know, so you've got the discomfort in Belgium, but largely because of collaboration with the Nazis, so it's a bit quiet. But then he's rehabilitated.

He explains himself. He says, you know, I didn't do this. the editors made me do this, I was just following orders. But, you know, he's kind of forgiven. It is forgotten. But then it gets ahead of steam again in the 1960s when you've got the civil rights movement. And just as with asterix and with Barber, as we talked about, people start looking, particularly from America, at black depiction in popular culture. And there's a famous interview with Mohamed Ali, the boxer.

He talks about the way in which this sort of pounding imagery, what effect. it has on a man. And he's sort of laughing. I think he's talked to Parkinson at the time. I remember this interview really well. But he says, you know, when I was growing up, there was a white Jesus. There was a white Tarzan. Comic books said, you know, white was good, black was bad or stupid. And it's really moving. He's just explaining what life was like. But this is not yet the land of litigation. That you have to wait until 2007 when people start actually taking Ere to task. The books to task in the courts. So in 2007, the CRE, the Commission for Racial Equality calls for Tintin in the Congo to be withdrawn from bookstores. This is a 1931 edition. This is the one which has the missionaries

in Pith Helmits and the sort of caricatured black people basically depicted as savages. That gets moved out of the children's sections of bookstores. But it's looking up now, it's still available. And even the front cover is pretty dodgy. So, I mean, I'm looking at. I'm looking at, Looking at the statements from Waterstones and other booksellers at the time, the Waterstone spokesman says at the time in 2007, we have reviewed the titles situation. We are moving it away from the other Tintin titles into the graphic novel section. And the CRA comes back saying, how and why do they name another bookshop borders, think it's okay to peddle such racist material.

The only place it might be acceptable for this to be displayed would be in a museum with a big sign saying, old-fashioned racist clap trap. And although that sounds extreme, I have to say, looking at some of the cartoons, it's hard to disagree. And even looking at the front cover, it's hard to disagree. So the response, Higermont, who are the books publishers, say, look, we've actually put a warning on this book now. And we've said in this book, it features bourgeois paternalistic stereotypes of the period and interpretation some readers may find offensive. And you have the Erge Foundation that owns a lot of the rights about this, saying, look, you know what? It should

be read in the context of the period when it was published. Do not judge it by how you look at the world now. And it wasn't the only lawsuit. I mean, in Sweden there were campaigns to get it removed from libraries. There was a Congolese student, a man called Mr. Mondudu, who even filed lawsuits in Belgium and France

seeking to have the book banned or at least published with this warning label that subsequently was attached in 2007. So you do see the book in circulation, but you will see now warnings on it. Now, what do we think about this? Because we had a chat about this after the asterix.

and the Barba episode. Tintin, look back and discuss. Like with Baba and like with Asterix, I think, you know, it's very easy to sound like the Daily Mail would be on our backs saying we're sounding like sort of commissars, banning books and being woke, but it is very difficult to look at the stuff without being hugely offended. And these are really vicious stereotypes which are being reinforced. So yes, it's of its time, but yes, it's also extremely offensive. I'm sort of thinking about why didn't I want to tint in, apart from the fact that there were no heroic girls in it. I think it was just such a clear explanation that if you didn't have white skin, you were thick or devious or a wrong thing. You picked that up at the time?

I think I must have done because why I loved reading. I read everything, graphic novels. I loved comic books and graphic novels. And why I think I didn't feel that with Asterix is because everybody was a bumbling buffoon. And everybody was sort of, they were all. and equal opportunities of sort of lunacy and mad capery. But with Tintin, it felt different to me, at least. Now, having said that, you know, my kids have read Tintin and have loved it. They thought it's really, you know, exciting. And the adventure, and all they're there for, they are just there for the adventures, and Captain Haddock, largely. I don't know if they don't notice or they're not hurt by, maybe not, but I didn't. And you can say that the, I suppose, in its defense,

that the buffoonery is, you know, is colourblind, that Captain Hadda, because there's drunken sailor, is obviously a caricature of a white guy. But then there's the fantastic Bianca Castafiori, the opera singer, who I loved, who's always turning up and singing operas and breaking windows and shattering glass wherever she goes and driving everybody out. And there's these terrible sort of calamities wherever she sinks. I mean, there's no question. I'm looking at the, particularly the Congo book, it's not something I would want to give to my kids now. What if he would have met somebody from the Congo? I mean, there doesn't that what if moments, a sliding door moments. He happens to meet a Chinese artist who touches

his heart and they are then safe. Doesn't it sort of open the door to, if we just knew more about each other and knew each other more and spoke to each other more, this would happen less. Even today, it's a standard to live by. That's quite a good takeaway from that. Anyway, look, that's it for now. We're going to take a small break from writers and we're going to talk about it. The ashes starting. Do you speak cricket? You fluent in cricket, William? I don't speak cricket. Not only do I not speak cricket, I'm deeply prejudiced against all sports. All my childhood was watching cricket on the one television in the house. And I remember when I was wanting to watch Tintin cartoons, the crab with the golden claws, it would still be the ashes.

You're going to bloody love this mini series then, can I tell you? It's really exciting. The history of cricket is so intertwined with imperial history. So we're going to be talking about, of course, Australia, because it is the ashes. And we are also going to talk about the Asian subcontinent because can you get much bigger than a cricketer in India and Pakistan? I mean, God, they are rock stars. They are gods. I remember coming to one of the Jayapur literary festivals. I think you had Rahul Dravid, and I was almost trampled to death because people were trying to get to his session.

He's become a friend since then. And he listens to Empire. He makes the Indian cricket team listen to Empire too. So we're going to talk about that. We're also going to talk about these extraordinary. characters who changed history, people like Basil D'Olavera, if you know, you know, if you don't, you should, because these are people who upend, exactly like, you know, this sort of little friendship between these two people upended some of the prejudice in Ere. These are people who

really did change the course of sporting history. So do join us for that. Till the next time we meet is goodbye from me, Anita Arnhem. Hi, goodbye from me, William, the Rumpel.