The Real Hergé, page 1
The Real Hergé
For Dorrie and Joan
The Real Hergé
The Inspiration Behind Tintin
Sian Lye
First published in Great Britain in 2020 by
White Owl
An imprint of
Pen & Sword Books Ltd
Yorkshire – Philadelphia
Copyright © Sian Lye 2020
ISBN 978 1 52676 390 7
eISBN 978 1 52676 391 4
Mobi ISBN 978 1 52676 392 1
The right of Sian Lye to be identified as Author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
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Contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Bibliography
Acknowledgements
With thanks to Kate Bohdanowicz, Michelle Higgs, Gavan Curley, Justine Hawkins, Sam Lye, Peter Lye, Jim Lewis and all at Pen & Sword Books.
Introduction
Hergé, otherwise known as Georges Prosper Remi, is one of the best-loved authors in history, yet also one of the most controversial. He created only twenty-four Tintin books, but The Adventures of Tintin have sold more than 250 million copies worldwide in an eventful career, have been translated into more than 110 languages and are considered to be one of the greatest comic series of all time.
Now, thirty-seven years after his death, Hergé remains an enigma and a phenomenon. He survived a barrage of scandals, including accusations of racism and anti-Semitism. He was also attacked for appearing to collaborate with the Nazis during the Second World War.
His personal life was no easier. Although he had a loving mother, she suffered from mental health issues and would end up in a psychiatric hospital. In his later years, he would hint at surviving abuse from a relative and would also mention the abuse that was rife within his former Scouting troop.
For decades, critics have attacked Hergé’s work for racism and sexism, and indeed his original stories do feature racially offensive caricatures considered wholly unacceptable by today’s standards.
But Hergé was a product of a different time and reflected the prevailing attitudes of the day. One of his greatest strengths, but also one of his greatest weaknesses, was that he was very easily influenced by a variety of charismatic characters. In many ways this ability to absorb the opinions and talents of others led to some of his best work, but it also led to him making poor political decisions that would continue to haunt him throughout his life.
The criticism he faced greatly affected Hergé: though he would rarely retaliate, he did change aspects of his books to make them more palatable in later years. Indeed, Hergé was an exacting artist who expected the best from others as well as himself. He would often revise previous work before it was to be reprinted, amending anything he felt he could improve, but his perfectionism would cause him no end of health issues.
Ahead of his time, Hergé introduced Europe to the American style of cartoon strip which incorporated speech bubbles and captured the imagination of millions of children and adults alike. Although he was not a gregarious person and was reluctant to attend book signing sessions, he was fiercely loyal to his fans and would write long personal letters in reply, even going so far as to loan money to some of his fans when asked. Privately, he battled a debilitating depression, and was unhappy with his achievements. Later in life he would say that he hated Tintin, and would have much preferred to have been an artist in the more traditional sense.
Hergé had numerous affairs and wanted to leave his marriage, but felt riddled with guilt from his Catholic upbringing and Boy Scout ethos. He was unable to have children and did not want to have a family in any case as they would have disturbed his work too much; he had a great need for peace and quiet. His friends would say he didn’t have the knack for happiness.
Always searching for more, Hergé was interested in new ideas and new people. He loved jazz music, and by the 1950s, his latest passion was Pop Art and the modern abstract styles. The paranormal always held a fascination for him, and in later life he would rely on the opinion of a clairvoyant. While going through a particularly tumultuous period, he recorded his traumatic dreams and consulted a Jungian psychoanalyst for help. After meeting Zhang Chongren in the 1930s, he carried a lifelong interest in Eastern philosophy, particularly the writings of the Tao.
He was a complex and naive man in many ways, haunted by the demons of his past and desperate to escape the work he had been so successful in. His constant need to run away frustrated those who worked with him, and he lacked the courage of the famous hero he created. In many ways, he remained a lost little boy scout who never really grew up. But his artwork and meticulous plotting were exceptional and paved the way for graphic comics. Hergé has left a canon of work that children and adults the world over continue to love.
Chapter 1
In the spring of 1907, Alexis Remi and his wife Elisabeth welcomed their first child, a son they named Georges Prosper Remi. In typical reserved fashion, Alexis was not there at the birth and the doctor had to sign the birth certificate. The couple had just bought their first house together – a modest family home in Etterbeek, a peaceful suburb of Brussels. They hoped for a quiet, stable career for Georges, possibly in the army, and never dreamed he would achieve global success as an artist.
Alexis and his twin Léon were born in 1882 to Marie Léonie Dewigne, an unmarried 22-year-old, who worked for the Countess Helene Erremault de Dudzeele as a chambermaid. The countess let the mother and boys live on the family estate of Chaumont-Gistoux in Brabant, near Brussels, alongside the two daughters of the house, Germaine and Valentine, with the countess educating them as if they were her own. She would dress them in beautiful clothes and often take the twins on a carriage ride into the town for a treat. The twins were even able to attend school until they were 14 years old, which was a rarity at the time.
However, when the twins were 14, the countess unceremoniously gave the family their marching orders, and they moved out into the lower middle classes.
In September 1893, Marie married her cousin, a significantly younger man, Philippe Remi, who was 23 at the time and worked as a printer. He gave the family its surname. Although it seemed the young man had simply volunteered to give the family an air of respectability, he and Marie continued to live together until her death in 1901. After her death, little is known of Philippe. He signed the marriage certificate of Alexis Remi as ‘father’, but never met Hergé and died in 1941.
It was generally assumed that the biological father of the twins was someone from the chateau, possibly the master of the house, Count Gaston Errembault de Dudzeele. However, one frequent visitor to Chaumont-Gistoux was Belgium’s then king, Leopold II, and it is a Belgian legend that Leopold is Hergé’s ancestor.
Later in life, Georges would often casually mention to colleagues that his family came from Chaumont-Gistoux, without giving any further details, rather enjoying the mystery that surrounded him.
With a childhood enveloped in luxury, the move was difficult for Alexis, who found himself working for the clothing manufacturer Demoulin at the age of 14, making clothes for young people. Eventually he became a well-respected worker and often worked directly with the boss, HenriVan Roye-Waucquez, who was impressed with Hergé’s father partly because he came from such a supposedly affluent background.
In 1905, at the age of 23, Alexis married his childhood sweetheart, Elisabeth. She was from the Marolles quarter of Brussels, born in the same year as her husband, 1882. She worked as a seamstress, but gave up work when she married.
Alexis and Elisabeth set up home close to Elisabeth’s parents on 25 de la rue Cranz in Etterbeek, and they lived a qui
Elisabeth constantly struggled with health problems. Before Georges was born, she nearly died from pleurisy, and towards the end of 1909, she had a major relapse. Alexis thought she had passed away and searched anxiously for a priest, but she pulled through and he would forever proclaim the incident was a miracle.
However, she remained in frail health, often sick and would suffer blackouts too, which was especially difficult for the family as Alexis would have to travel for work; he would often be away for long periods at a time, sending home long, loving letters to the wife he doted on, urging her to have courage and patience.
Elisabeth was a loving mother to Georges in the early years and he was very close to her. He didn’t go to kindergarten, preferring to stay with his mother, and she would take him to the cinema each and every week. He would sit in her lap and absorb the work of the pioneers of cinema at the time – Georges Méliès, Max Linder and Buster Keaton – people who would shape his ideas and creations later on.
Georges’ mother also made all his clothes. It was fairly clear she had wanted a girl, as until Georges was 5 years old, he wore dresses and his hair was styled in shoulder-length curls. Elisabeth would carry on making Georges’ clothes for most of her life.
Georges loved to draw, even from a very early age, and his parents used to foist pen and paper on the young boy to keep him calm as he would often get into trouble when bored.
In January 1912, the Remis moved again, this time just a few streets away. Two months later, their son Paul arrived and completed their family of four. For Georges, this was a major disruption as he had enjoyed being an adored only child for five years, and Elisabeth was even more indulgent with her second son.
The two boys had completely different personalities and temperaments. Paul was an active, popular boy with a quiff and a round face, while Georges was also outgoing but quieter and more introspective than his brother. Although Paul was a muse for the young artist, the pair were not close growing up.
The Remis were a quiet, undemonstrative family, and while Georges had a close relationship with his mother in the early years, his bond with his father grew stronger as he got older. They would sit and draw together – sometimes his father would teach him how to draw clothes, other times they would while the hours away sketching aeroplanes together, with Georges realising how similar they were, but also how different. While his father would draw his aeroplanes to be as light as insects, his own were brimming with accuracy and engineering.
His father was a curious character, and would often meet with his twin brother, Léon, who lived nearby, to go for long walks together around the neighbourhood singing loudly in unison. With their moustaches, suits and identical bowler hats and canes, they were a clear inspiration for the comical twins Thomson and Thompson in the Tintin books.
The twins were so alike that Georges’ mother, Elisabeth, was known to interrogate the two in the evening to make sure she didn’t accidentally retire to bed with the wrong brother. Georges remained close to his father, who acted as his business manager and was involved in his work for the rest of his life.
As a young boy, Georges developed a passion for film, having been influenced by the trips to the cinema he had enjoyed as an infant with his mother. He loved an early animation called Gertie the Dinosaur, as well as the slapstick work of Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin, which his comics would later reference.
Although not a keen bookworm in childhood, Georges did enjoy burrowing himself away in adventure novels such as Huckleberry Finn, Treasure Island and Robinson Crusoe, as well as grittier books by Charles Dickens and Alexandre Dumas.
Georges started at the preparatory school at l’Athénée d’Ixelles in 1913, which was a private, secular school. This was an interesting choice as there were many schools closer to the Remis, and they were unusual in not choosing a Catholic school for their young son. Alexis would occasionally attend Mass, while Elisabeth was less invested in the religion and would only attend Mass very rarely.
Georges was a conscientious student and achieved good grades. He had many friends and enjoyed days full of quiet family life, school and friends. However, in 1914, life was darkened by the death of his grandfather, Elisabeth’s father, and the rest of the world was about to be turned upside down.
Soon after Georges’ grandfather died, Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir presumptive to the throne, and his wife Sophie were assassinated on 28 June, setting into motion a string of events that would alter world history and life in Belgium irreparably.
When the First World War began, Germany invaded Belgium and Luxembourg, both neutral countries, as part of the Schlieffen Plan. The intention was to catch the French off guard with a surprise entry through the neutral countries and capture Paris very quickly.
Britain was bound by an agreement from 1839 to protect Belgium should the country become embroiled in a war, and it was this act that spurred the British to enter the battle.
On 2 August 1914, the German government demanded that German armies be given free passage through Belgian territory, which was refused by the Belgian government the very next day.
The Belgian King, Albert I, addressed his Parliament on 4 August, with a hopeful speech, but one that revealed his deep concern. He said, ‘Never since 1830 has a graver hour sounded for Belgium. The strength of our right and the need of Europe for our autonomous existence make us still hope that the dreaded events will not occur.’
That day, German troops were given the signal to invade Belgium. They started at dawn, attacking Liège, which was captured three days later. Groups of resistance fighters formed quickly in Belgium and battled the invading army, but were dealt with brutally by the Germans. The resistance fighters demolished bridges and railway tracks, and the German troops treated any type of resistance as illegal and subversive. They would retaliate by burning buildings and shooting the parties involved.
For Georges, this was the beginning of an extremely tumultuous time. The family was ripped apart when his uncle Léon was sent to war, and he would not be seen again until it was all over.
The effects of the war devastated the country. Thousands of civilians were killed in altercations with the German army as they tore through the country. The population collectively panicked, and the Belgian government fled to France.
On 20 August, the German army invaded Brussels, with a small group of soldiers remaining to protect King Albert. The Germans acted swiftly and soon occupied and governed over 95 per cent of the country, with only the small area around Ypres staying under Belgian control.
Many civilians fled the war zones to safer parts of Belgium. The impact of the war affected Georges’ family significantly, and the health of his mother, Elisabeth, rapidly declined. The doctor advised a move to the country, which the family dutifully carried out, leaving for the quieter area of Watermael-Boitsfort. However, it was only a few months before they would return home to their old neighbourhood.
Many other Belgians escaped to the neutral Netherlands and around 300,000 people fled to France, while over 200,000 went to Britain. Here, many people settled in London and worked for the war effort. The governments of Britain and France created the War Refugees Committee (WRC) and the Secours National to help the Belgian refugees.
In 1915, the German authorities built the ‘Wire of Death’, a lethal electric fence along the Belgian-Dutch border to deter Belgians from escaping. This brutal fence would kill between 2,000 and 3,000 Belgian refugees trying to flee the country.
