Eurozine News Item
Eurozine
Eurozine
2010-11-23
The case against Tintin
On 22 November, the publishers of Tintin in the Congo had to appear before a court in Brussels charged with racism. Morten Harper has found that in Norway, too, humour functions at the expense of minorities. About the Belgian court case he says: "What is so controversial about the case is that Mondondo is right but ought nonetheless not to be proven right."
On Monday 22 November, Bienvenu Mbutu Mondondo, a Congolese man, together with an anti racism association urged a Belgian court to pull the comic book Tintin in the Congo from 1931 from library bookshelves, or at least slap a warning label on it.
The comic appeared between June 1930 and June 1931 in Le Petit Vingtième (the children's supplement to the Belgian newspaper Le Vingtième Siècle) and was published as an album in 1931.
It has provoked controversy in modern times, with complaints from people who think the depiction of Africans is racist, and from animal rights groups who feel Tintin engages in cruel behaviour. Hergé said that he was influenced by the naive, colonialist views of the time, as well as his employer, Wallez, who believed that Belgian youth needed to know more about the values of colonialism. He later described it as "the sin of his youth".
The plaintiffs said the book about the adventures of the intrepid reporter and his dog Snowy in Belgian Congo, now the Democratic Republic of Congo, should at least be relegated to the adult sections of libraries.
The defence attorney for the publisher said at a previous hearing in May that a ban would be like a "book burning".
The next hearing is set for 8 December and a decision is expected within the following two months.
Morten Harper, a Norwegian writer, comic book expert and legal consultant has found that in Norway, too, humour functions at the expense of minorities. About the Belgian court case he says: "What is so controversial about the case is that Mondondo is right but ought nonetheless not to be proven right."
Read why in his article "Tintin in Tana"