Tintin Forums

Balthazar
I don't think two things can be said to "equal" each other simply "provided they can be crossmatched or connected to each other in some way or other, via text and image, as in a rebus." Not unless "equals" = "connected to", which it doesn't.

What about Herge's words 'text and image explain each other' = text and image are connected to each other AND can thus equal each other, at the same time?

yamilah
What about Herge's words 'text and image explain each other' = text and image are connected to each other AND can thus equal each other, at the same time?

Look:

'text and image explain each other'
'text and image are connected to each other'
'text and image can equal each other'
'text and image thus equal each other'

These are four different sentences meaning different things. They may, on occasion, all be simultaneously true statements about a particular element of Hergé's work. (On other occasions, when applied to another element of Hergé's work, maybe only two of them will be simultaneously true, or three of them, or only one.) But just because two or more of these statements happen to be simultaneously true, it doesn't follow that you can link those statements together with an "equals" sign. That would be bad logic.

Hergé's work is all about absolute clarity, and most of his statements about his work are prettty clear too, I think. This doesn't mean his work isn't intricately constructed, and doesn't reward study - far from it. (As a strip cartoonist and children's author myself, I can happily study and analyze a single page of Tintin for hours and learn loads.) But it does mean, in my opinion, that the work deserves to be written about with a respect for clarity equal to Hergé's. (And, ideally, with some understanding of how such work is put together, but that's a separate argument!)

If you learn to write in clearer prose, you might find you have clearer trains of thought. Hope that's not being too critical.

Balthazar
These are four different sentences meaning different things.

Maybe such text-image equations are valid in rebuses only?
And maybe that's precisely why Tintin's world is officially called totally unique?

Is that prose clear enough?

We seem to have moved on from the subject of the correct/incorrect use of words like "pun" and the correct/incorrect use of of the equals sign, and back to the familiar subject of your pet theory, yamilah, but that's fine!

Your prose is sort of clear enough (by your standards!), though I still had to read those two sentences a few times to get what you meant. I think what you're saying is that your habit of equating things that are merely connected is valid if the things in question are actually part of a giant rebus cipher.

To give a similar but quite seperate example, you could claim that "The letter A equals the letter B" is a valid statement as long as we're dealing with situation where the text has been encrypted by the well known shift cipher (where the letters in the text have been shoved one place along the alphabet). Is that what you're getting at?

If so, I don't think this proves anything. You're surely trying to prove the validity of each individual connection/equation/avatar that you spot in the Tintin books by pointing to the existence of a grand overall rebus that spans all the books. But then you prove the existence of the grand overall rebus by pointing to each individual connection/equation/avatar that you've spotted. Two unproven things can't prove each other. It just goes round in a circle (like my poor head at the moment).

It'd be like me claiming my tongue is blue (which it isn't), and saying I can prove it's valid to believe that it's blue because of the existence of aliens who go round turning people's tongues blue. When you ask me to prove the existence of these aliens, I say the proof is that my tongue is blue.

And whenever anyone says they can see my tongue isn't blue, and starts holding up a mirror to show me the flaws in my beliefs, I simply say "Oh, well maybe you're just not interested in the totally unique world of tongue-bluing aliens", refuse to look in the mirror, and move onto the subject of my green ears.

Sorry to seem critical. I'm just trying to help you come back to the land of the logical!

Sorry, I think Herge's Tintin military* rules & English key*, etc, etc. can be crossmatched and interconnected, contrary to your own tongue's story, be it blue or green!

yamilah
Maybe such text-image equations are valid in rebuses only?
Well yet again you create an arbitrary rule to validate an unsubstantiated hypothesis. Balthazar makes a clear and persuasive case that you are appealing to the fallacy of circular reasoning, or Petitio Principii.

And maybe that's precisely why Tintin's world is officially called totally unique?
No, that is not the likely meaning of that at all: Hergé’s body of work is unique in itself - it has attributes of defining a graphical style and developing a new school of comic art, which make it totally unique - and there is no indication by implication or otherwise that it means anything else.

I think Herge's Tintin military* rules & English key*, etc, etc. can be crossmatched and interconnected
Yes, but what you think and what can be demonstrated rationally are not necessarily the same thing, are they?

Balthazar can think he has a blue tongue because in spite of the fact that his tongue isn’t blue, because he knows that the blue-tongue aliens have made it so, and because of this, the blue-tongue aliens exist. Likewise the mouse in my pocket who plays the glockenspiel and sings Bach chorales - because I believe it to be so doesn’t make it true.

jock123
'I think Herge's Tintin military* rules & English key*, etc, etc. can be crossmatched and interconnected'
Yes, but what you think and what can be demonstrated rationally are not necessarily the same thing, are they?

Who knows? maybe 'Herge 007'? let's wait and see!