Tintin Forums

I saw the official Tintin book from some exhibition in a bookshop the other day. It's a reference book for all the things to do with the maritime aspects of Tintin and how Herge researched his nautical themes. I'm not an avid Sailor or anything but I found the whole thing extremely interesting.

What do others think of the Maritime themes in Tintin?

I think that Herge was extremely good at drawing ships, and often use his pictures of them as references of ship details.

I love it!! But then, I was a sea cadet so I have a love for the sea, even though I'm a pretty horrible sailor :D

Although none of the Tintin books are about a voyage per se (the voyage is always part of a greater mission or trip), I'd rank Herge up with Arthur Ransome and Jules Verne and the other great authors of books about the sea.

(btw - The book about the maritime exhibition is really worth getting - it talks about all the ships Herge created, the source materials he used and so on.)

The book by Michael Farr?

That's the one i'm talking about, it's not by Michael Farr, he just edits the English one.

I think it's Tintin, Haddock et les bateaux in French (by Yves Horeau)...What's it called in English?

Tintin at Sea, as was the associated exhibition at the Maritime Museum in Greenwich. The English version is slightly re-written as well as translated, and it has the much less sombre cover with Tintin standing on deck next to the flag now adopted for foreign editions; originally in French I think it had a horrible dark blue and black drab affair of a life-boat, and was rather a dry read. Michael Farr jollies it up a bit.

I'll have to look out for it - I haven't seen it yet, as Tintin can be notoriously hard to find in English Canada....(if you don't know where to look)

I bought that book through Amazon recently. It looks great. But I can't read it until I'm done studying for a test I got. Believe me: if I start reading it now, I won't stop!